Person:
Shah, Anwar

Global Practice for Governance, The World Bank

Fields of Specialization

governance; public sector reform; budgetary accountability;

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Global Practice for Governance, The World Bank

Last updated: January 31, 2023

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 23

Making Federalism Work : The 18th Constitutional Amendment
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-11) Shah, Anwar
The almost unanimous passage of a landmark consensus constitutional amendment "the 18th Constitutional Amendment" restored Pakistan's constitution to its original intent of a decentralized federation of four provinces as envisaged in the 1956 and 1973 constitutions. This amendment was hailed by policy makers and academics alike as a major step forward in reforming the multi-order governance in Pakistan. This paper takes a closer look at the provisions of this amendment and highlights both the potentials and pitfalls of the new constitutional order for good governance in Pakistan. The paper concludes that the amendment must be seen as a first yet small and incomplete step in reforming multi-order governance in Pakistan. A large unfinished reform agenda remains to be charted.
General Purpose Central-provincial-local Transfers (DAU) in Indonesia : From Gap Filling to Ensuring Fair Access to Essential Public Services for All
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-06) Qibthiyyah, Riatu; Shah, Anwar; Dita, Astrid
Indonesia has come a long way from centralized governance to decentralized local governance, and today Indonesia ranks among the most decentralized developing countries. The Government of Indonesia is revisiting all aspects of local governance to make appropriate legal and institutional adjustments based on lessons leaarned during the past decade. An important area of this re-examination and possible reform is the central financing of subnational expenditures. The system of intergovernmental finance represents one of the most complex systems ever implemented by any government in the world. The system is primarily focused on a gap-filling approach to provincial-local finance in an objective manner to ensure revenue adequacy and local autonomy but without accountability to local residents for service delivery performance. This paper takes a closer look at Dana Alokasi Umum -- the most dominant program of unconditional central transfers to finance provincial-local government expenditures in Indonesia. The paper also presents illustrative simulations of alternative programs and compares these with the existing Dana Alokasi Umum allocations. The paper concludes that super complexity leads to lack of transparency, inequity, and uncertainty in allocation. Simpler alternatives are available that have the potential to address autonomy and equity objectives while also enhancing efficiency and citizen-based accountability. Such alternatives would represent a move away from the complex gap-filling approach to simple output-based transfers to finance operating expenditures. Capital grants would deal with infrastructure deficiencies. And the alternatives would institute fiscal capacity equalization as a residual program with an explicit standard to ensure that all local jurisdictions have adequate means to deliver reasonably comparable levels of public services at reasonably comparable levels of tax burdens across the country.
How Close Is Your Government to Its People? Worldwide Indicators on Localization and Decentralization
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-07) Ivanyna, Maksym; Shah, Anwar
This paper is intended to provide an assessment of the impact of the silent revolution of the last three decades on moving governments closer to people to establish fair, accountable, incorruptible and responsive governance. To accomplish this, a unique data set is constructed for 182 countries by compiling data from a wide variety of sources to examine success toward decentralized decision making across the globe. An important feature of this data set is that, for comparative purposes, it measures government decision making at the local level rather than at the sub-national levels used in the existing literature. The data are used to rank countries on political, fiscal and administrative dimensions of decentralization and localization. These sub-indexes are aggregated and adjusted for heterogeneity to develop an overall ranking of countries on the closeness of their government to the people. The resulting rankings provide a useful explanation of the Arab Spring and other recent political movements and waves of dissatisfaction with governance around the world.
Public Services and Expenditure Need Equalization : Reflections on Principles and Worldwide Comparative Practices
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-03) Shah, Anwar
This paper reviews the conceptual challenges as well as lessons from worldwide experiences in implementing public services and expenditure need compensation in fiscal equalization transfers with a view to developing guidance for practitioners. The paper concludes that while in theory a strong case for a comprehensive fiscal equalization can be made, in practice fiscal need equalization as part of a comprehensive equalization program introduces significant complexity. This works against the simplicity, transparency and general acceptability of the program. This does not imply that fiscal need equalization should be abandoned in the interest of simplicity and transparency. Instead simplicity, transparency and local autonomy are preserved by having fiscal need equalization through public service oriented (specific purpose block transfers) output based fiscal transfers that impose no spending requirements for any functions or objects of expenditures. Such transfers contrast with traditional earmarked transfers, which impose conditions on spending for specific purposes or objects of expenditure and subsequent verification/certification of such expenditures. Such output-based block transfers would further enhance citizen based accountability for results and thereby offer potential for enhancing public confidence and trust in government operations.
Sponsoring a Race to the Top : The Case for Results-Based Intergovernmental Finance for Merit Goods
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2010-01) Shah, Anwar
Intergovernmental finance is a significant source of sub-national finance in most countries. In both industrial and developing countries, formula based "manna from heaven" general purpose transfers dominate but co-exist with highly intrusive micro-managed "command and control" specific purpose transfers. Both these types of transfers undermine political and fiscal accountability. Reforms to bring in design elements that incorporate incentives for results-based accountability are resisted by both donors and recipients alike. This is because the donors perceive such reforms as attempts at chipping away at their powers and recipients fear such programs will be intrusive. This paper presents conceptual and practical underpinnings of grant designs that could further simplicity, objectivity, and local autonomy objectives while furthering citizen-centric results-based accountability. The paper further highlights a few notable recent initiatives in both industrial and developing countries that embrace such directions for reform. The paper concludes that results-based intergovernmental finance offers significant potential to minimize tradeoffs between local autonomy and accountability while furthering access to merit goods.
Citizen-centric Governance Indicators : Measuring and Monitoring Governance by Listening to the People and Not the Interest Groups
(2010-01-01) Ivanyna, Maksym; Shah, Anwar
Governance indicators are now widely used as tools for conducting development dialogue, allocating external assistance, and influencing foreign direct investment. This paper argues that available governance indicators are not suitable for these purposes as they do not conceptualize governance and fail to capture how citizens perceive the governance environment and outcomes in their countries. The paper attempts to fill this void by conceptualizing governance and implementing a uniform and consistent framework for measuring governance quality across countries and over time based on citizens' evaluations. Using data from the World Values Survey (and other sources) we implement this framework into practice and build citizen-centric governance indicators for 120 countries over the period 1994 to 2005.
Macro Federalism and Local Finance
(Washington, DC : World Bank, 2008) Shah, Anwar
The book is divided into two parts. The first part macro federalism provides a fresh look at emerging constitutional challenges arising from globalization and the information revolution, as well as the dynamic-efficiency and growth implications of existing federal constitutions. Several aspects of these systems are examined: (a) institutional design to achieve internal economic union; (b) policies for regional development; (c) conduct of monetary policy; (d) coordination of fiscal policies, with a special emphasis on tax harmonization; and (e) management of risks of insolvency from sub-national borrowing. The second part of the book local finance provides a comparative perspective on local finances and measures the progress of decentralized governance reforms in developing countries.
Performance Accountability and Combating Corruption
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2007) Shah, Anwar
his volume provides advice on how to institutionalize performance-based accountability, especially in countries that lack good accountability systems. The volume describes how institutions of accountability may be strengthened to combat corruption. The volume is organized into two parts. The first part deals with public management reforms to ensure the integrity and improve the efficiency of government operations. It outlines an agenda for public management reforms and discusses the roles of e-government and network solutions in performance improvements. The second part of the volume provides advice on strengthening the role of representative institutions, such as organs and committees of parliament, in providing oversight of government programs. It also provides guidance on how auditing and related institutions can be used to detect fraud and corruption. The book highlights the causes of corruption and the use of both internal and external accountability institutions and mechanisms to fight it. It provides advice on how to tailor anticorruption programs to individual country circumstances and how to sequence reform efforts to ensure sustainability. This volume presents the latest thinking of leading development scholars on operationalizing such a governance framework. The focus of this volume is creating performance-based accountability and oversight when there is no bottom line. Each chapter addresses an important dimension of such a framework. The four chapters in part I are concerned with integrity and efficiency in public management. The nine chapters of part II are concerned with institutions and mechanisms to hold government to account.
Participatory Budgeting
(Washington, DC : World Bank, 2007) Shah, Anwar
This book provides an overview of the principles underlying participatory budgeting. It analyzes the merits and demerits of participatory budgeting practices around the world with a view to guiding policy makers and practitioners on improving such practices in the interest of inclusive governance. This publication includes five regional surveys, and seven country case studies can be found on the accompanying CD ROM. The study explains that participatory budgeting has been advanced by budget practitioners and academics as an important tool for inclusive and accountable governance and has been implemented in various forms in many developing countries around the globe. It adds that through participatory budgeting, citizens have the opportunity to gain firsthand knowledge of government operations, influence government policies, and hold government to account. However, participatory processes also run the risk of capture by interest groups. Captured processes may continue to promote elitism in government decision making. This book examines the potential and perils of participatory budgeting, as observed from practices around the globe. It is divided into three parts. Part I presents the nuts and bolts of participatory budgeting. Part II surveys experiences with participatory budgeting in various regions of the world. Part III (Vol. 2) is on the CD ROM accompanying this book, and it examines case studies of practices in seven countries.
Budgeting and Budgetary Institutions
(Washington, DC : World Bank, 2007) Shah, Anwar
Budgetary institutions have historically played a critical role in a gradual movement toward responsive, responsible, and accountable public governance in industrial countries. This paper includes the following headings: overview; a primer on budgeting and budgetary institutions; the budget and its coverage; capital budgets -- theory and practice; budget methods and practices; a primer on performance budgeting; accrual accounting in the public sector -- lessons for developing countries; activity-based cost management in the public sector; budget preparation and approval; budget execution; automating public financial management in developing countries; what would an ideal public finance management system look like; strengthening public expenditure management Africa -- criteria, priorities, and sequencing; budgeting in post-conflict countries; country case study -- Kenya; and country case study -- South Africa.