Practice Note Introduction to Practitioners: Using Aid Effectiveness to Improve Domestic Accountability

Independently Produced Practice Note Jointly Funded by Idasa and ANSA

December 2010 In 2009, Western tax payers spent USD 120 billion1 on development globally. African organisations can influence how much of this money is spent. They can also ask for a greater portion for African organisations and hold decision makers accountable for how these funds are spent. This paper is a step towards demystifying how development funds are spent for African civil society to improve accountability.

Please Read the Previous Background Paper: Threats to Domestic Social Accountability: Development Assistance and Aid Effectiveness in sub-Saharan Africa, (Idasa: November 2010

Author: Alexander ORiordan Alexander ORiordan is a consultant who has worked as adviser to the Governments of Kenya and Ethiopia in managing their relationships with donors. Mr ORiordan has also worked on aid effectiveness in Bangladesh, Bolivia, Ethiopia, Moldova, Somalia, Viet Nam and Zambia.

OECD.org (2010); Development Aid at A Glance: Africa reports Africa received USD 52 billion in commitments in 2008.

Contents
PRACTICE NOTE ....................................................................................................................... 3 How to Gain Access to the Aid Effectiveness Architecture and ............................................ 3 Improve Domestic Accountability .......................................................................................... 3 1.1 Audience: ......................................................................................................................... 3 1.2 Introduction: ..................................................................................................................... 3 1.3 Accountability and its Role in Governance of Donor Resources: ................................... 5 1.4 Methodology and Goal: ................................................................................................... 7 1.5 Common Perceptions/Misperceptions: ............................................................................ 8 1.6 Advocacy Principles First Steps for Civil Society:........................................................ 10 1.7 A note on Donor Communication:................................................................................. 10 1.8 Advocacy Goal: ............................................................................................................. 11 1.9 Who are the actors? Who makes the decisions? ............................................................ 12 1.9.1 How to identify supporters? ........................................................................................ 16 1.9.2 Identifying early Allies: .............................................................................................. 17 1.9.3 Why Some Might Oppose Domestic Accountability: ................................................ 18 1.9.4 Speak to the Junior Staff First/Recognise the Value of Local Staff: .......................... 19 1.10 How to get domestic accountability on the Agenda The Programme Cycle: ........... 20 1.10.1 How to Improve Influence through the Project Cycle: ............................................. 21 1.10.2 Monitoring and Evaluation, Project and Programme Design: .................................. 22 1.10.3 Job Boards:................................................................................................................ 23 1.11 Funding Cycles The Importance of Always Having a Proposal on Hand: ............... 23 1.13 First Steps..................................................................................................................... 26

PRACTICE NOTE How to Gain Access to the Aid Effectiveness Architecture and Improve Domestic Accountability
Ensuring MEANINGFUL participation by [civil society organisations] (CSOs) at all levels: CSOs are demanding to have MEANINGFUL engagement and participation in the whole process of implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the aid effectiveness agenda. By MEANINGFUL we mean: clear mechanisms of participation at all levels, with enough resources to ensure broad representation of diverse CSOs (including the commonly excluded groups, such as women, peasant, migrant, refugee and indigenous, among others). Clear parameters and accountability on how recommendations and proposals presented by CSOs will be seriously considered in the process should be decided in conjunction with CSOs. CSO International Steering Committee for Ghana, Policy Paper on Aid Effectiveness, July 2007 1.1 Audience:

This is intended as a starting point for African civil society actors to improve their access to donor decision making to improve domestic accountability and donor support for domestic accountability. While some advocates have advanced beyond what is proposed below, this note responds to the lack of advocacy tools specifically targeting the new aid architecture; this is only a starting point and should not be considered a comprehensive guide. Furthermore, the approach is based on what are widely used advocacy and lobbying tools; as such this practice note is not intended as a radical departure from existing methodologies.
1.2 Introduction:

The Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness resulted in the establishment of largely independent and unregulated aid decision making and consensus building structures. While this decision making structure differs from country to country, there are clear commonalities appearing. In Kenya the structure is called the Aid Effectiveness Group (AEG), in Zambia it is called the Cooperating Partners Group (CPG), in Ethiopia it is called the Donors Assistance Group (DAG) and in Somalia it is called the Somalia Donor Group (SDG). These groups tend to meet monthly and at the national level largely with donor in-country heads of agencies (Country Directors/Heads of Cooperation). These groups are mirrored at the sector level where donors establish technical working groups in sectors from education and health to democratic governance. These groups often meet without government participation and very rarely with regular participation from civil society2.

Zambia, Kenya and Ethiopia have not ensured domestic accountability in their aid architectures; the Commonwealth Secretariat (2010) case studies on Malawi and Cameroon Domestic and Mutual Accountability for Aid evidence the same pattern.

Technical (sector) working groups support joint donor decision making on funding, dialogue with government and in developing common political positions on the state of social and economic development at the country level. At the first level these groups are important for accountability because they have enormous influence on how donors allocate their funds. In Kenya, for example, 2008 official development assistance rose to over a billion dollars a year3 and in 2010 Kenyas Minister of Finance4 projected that just over a quarter of Kenyas revenue would come from donor resources5. In other countries like Ethiopia and Somalia the aid architecture groups govern public expenditure that is significantly larger than the governments; in conflict and postconflict situations accountability to citizens is further undermined because donors tend to make even fewer decisions in consultation with government and representatives of local civil society. At a second and possibly more important level, these donor groups are important for domestic accountability because they are spaces in which donors come to consensus on what they advocate or negotiate with the government. In many countries, there is little enough space for civil society to raise issues of critical concern with government. When accountability actors have no say in what donors communicate to government, a significant mechanism for accountability is lost. Worse, so long as civil society is not represented in these forums, donors are able to raise issues of critical concern by invoking the mechanism of speaking on behalf of local civil society. Being able to invoke the moral imperative and to do so unhindered is a very useful tool for donors when negotiating with governments. In other words, when civil society is not present it is possible for donors to mask their own interests as being in the interests of civil society to better encourage governments into agreeing policies jointly in the interest of government and donors. With Western donors feeling threatened by the rise of emerging powers like China, Brazil and India, donors are increasingly under pressure to improve their economic ties and political alliances with African governments. One way donors can improve their relationships with governments is by better directing their resources at government priorities. Deciding on how to spend these vast resources is increasingly institutionalised behind closed doors with only government and donors present. It would be nave to presume that any of the actors in these closed door discussions is necessarily acting in the interest of Africas disenfranchised and/or African civil society6.

3 4

www.oecd.org Development Statistics Business Daily, June 10, 2010, Front Page; Kenyas New Budget, Kenya: Nairobi 5 Ibid. Uhuru Kenyatta (Kenyas Minister of Finance) expects USD 1.8 billion in donor resources in the budget year 2010-2011. 6 See Domestic and Mutual Accountability for Aid Building Stronger Synergies (2010) London, United Kingdom: Commonwealth Secretariat that concludes that the spaces created to enable domestic accountability are in fact excluding non-donor and non-government stakeholders (art. 24) with the risk that implementing aid effectiveness commitments (art. 17) may create incentives for [governments] to prioritise donor targets over legitimate domestic priorities, and can even encourage the government to subvert the evaluation mechanism. Also see: http://www.hrw.org/en/node/93604/section/1 for Human Rights Watchs take on the role donors play in undermining domestic accountability in Ethiopia, (October 2010) Development Without Freedom, New York: Human Rights Watch.

1.3 Accountability and its Role in Governance of Donor Resources:

If there is no accountability, government is just paying for activities the beneficiaries disown. Kenya Ministry of Trade Official, 2010 Mario Claasen and Carmen Alpin-Lardies7 define accountability as the requirement of those in power to explain and take responsibility for their choices and actions. The applicability of this concept of accountability, however, becomes more nuanced in real world situations and particularly in Africa. Here, Claasen and Alpin-Lardies extend the concept of accountability to call for a continual feedback process where by those who have power constantly recognize their responsibility to report back, solicit views and ensure accountability to citizens. For accountability to be more than a mechanistic approach to justifying decision making, it should be extended to peer pressure mechanisms; hence accountability extends beyond, say, Members of Parliament (MPs) [having] a mandate to have oversightover the executive [to] also over each other. Opening public decision making to the scrutiny of peers, citizens and civil society improves decision making by decreasing space for interference and corruption as well as diminishing the risk of government policy being perceived as captured by vested elites. Containment of this risk is both in the interest of government and donors because when government is perceived as acting in the interests of vested elites, government authority is publicly contested and donors struggle to justify their support for the government in question. The means by which citizens and civil society hold decision makers accountable are familiar tools to stakeholders in the development sector running the gamut from using elections to taking legal action, advocating through the press, using lobbying and sympathetic institutions to maintain pressure and using alternative solutions to demonstrate problems with current government policies. In the context of this note, however, accountability is about recognising that the donor and government officials deciding how development resources are spent are not elected and as such need to be accountable in the local or domestic environment. To hold these decision makers accountable, this paper aims to improve access to donor-government decision making structures (the aid architecture) to better voice the interests of civil society. This will allow better monitoring and transparency, diminishing the incentive for officials to divert development resources away from the beneficiaries.

Claasen and Alpin-Lardies (2010) Social Accountability in Africa, Pretoria: Idasa, Associated Network for Social Accountability- Africa

The first step to demanding accountability in how development resources are spent is to recognize that domestic accountability is the only reasonable justification officials can use to explain their funding decisions. By this it is important to unpack the existing discourse. Officials of donor agencies do not own their development resources. These resources are granted to African beneficiaries by donor country electorates. The resources, then, belong first and foremost to the citizens of the beneficiary country because they have in a sense already been given. The primary justification donor officials use to rationalise their decisions is to say that they are acting in the interests of the beneficiaries by doing what government wants (as government fairly represents citizens interests). This justifies donor funding for activities that support government priorities. The way donors justify funding activities not endorsed by government is to argue that the government is not acting in the interests of its citizens. To convincingly make this argument donor officials resort to arguing they know better than the government about what Africans need or that the government is not acting in the interests of its citizens. These dual mechanisms of questioning integrity and capacity of government officials, enables donors to invoke the necessary authority to divert funds to their own priorities. To acknowledge that they may not know best what Africans need would mean to acknowledge they are spending resources earmarked for Africans on other priorities. Invoking the authority of knowing better what Africans need is useful and possible only because their decision-making is poorly contested and behind closed doors. Because donors are not accountable to African civil society, because these officials are not elected by African beneficiaries and because they are able to choose who they consult with; they have unregulated space to speak and decide on behalf of their beneficiaries.
The problem [in this country] is that we do not have our own NGOusually we have an NGO which we can use to write reports, hire consultants, convince the communities what needs to be done. UNDP Deputy Resident Representative/Country Director, 2007

This does not mean donors are not accountable at all. As Claasen and Alpin-Lardies point out donors have some accountability mechanisms built into their rules and procedures. These mechanisms, however, are largely about fiscal accountability8, that is ensuring transparent procurement and combating corruption. Domestic accountability is about making sure that donor resources are spent on what citizens need and done so in such a way that they do not reinforce vested political interests. Donors do recognise these challenges and have provided some support for independent institutions to promote accountability and good governance in state institutions. These include commissions on human rights or gender, ombudsmen and anti-corruption commissions. Most of these institutions play a monitoring role and are meant to be independent from state institutions. However, in the African context, these types of institutions face their own challenges, at times deliberately created by the state to undermine the role of what would be independent bodies. These challenges include under-resourcing (both human and financial resources), ambiguously defined roles, and most commonly, not having the necessary teeth to reprimand officials for misconduct. In all of these governance
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Projects that are not corrupt but do not respond to beneficiary needs are even less in the interests of beneficiaries than projects responding to beneficiary needs that suffer from some corruption.

initiatives related to state institutions playing an oversight role there have been few attempts to bridge the supply-side and the demand-side of governance. This note is about gaining access to donor decision making at the county level (the aid architecture) so as to improve domestic accountability and donor support for African accountability organisations.
1.4 Methodology and Goal:

The goal of this note is to elaborate how accountability actors and African civil society in general can better influence donor decision making and direct greater resources to accountability. The goal is also to explore how civil society can ensure donor officials are more accountable for how they manage resources granted to beneficiaries. Much of the methodology used will be familiar to activists as it is based on widely accepted lobbying and advocacy tools. This note aims to broaden the use of these tools by introducing how they can be applied specifically to the national aid effectiveness architecture. Here it is important to recognise that this note is targeted at national level decision making; in the context of aid effectiveness increasing shares of aid are programmed at the national level. This note aims to improve access and accountability of national decision making and is complementary to international advocacy and community or local level accountability.

1.5 Common Perceptions/Misperceptions:

While it is difficult to generalise across countries, confidential interviews and data collected imply a number of common (mis)perceptions about how government and donors perceive accountability actors. Key amongst these misperceptions is the notion that African government officials always want to exclude civil society and that African civil society believes it is consulted with and supported by international donors. The (mis)perceptions listed below give a more nuanced view of how actors may view the need for domestic accountability: Government officials typically want greater participation of civil society in donorgovernment decision making structures and see strong civil society as an important counter-weight to international donor/international NGO interests. Despite perceptions to the contrary many NGOs see government as being more open to civil society than donors: Government has created more space for NGOs than donors have. (Kenyan NGO leader). Donors are in principle advocating for greater involvement from civil society. However, donors tend to refer to international NGOs as good examples of local civil society and are often unaware of how they preference the voice of international NGOs over local civil society and African umbrella NGO organisations. There is a need for institutional capacity strengthening of umbrella NGO organizations in many African countries. This is essential both to coordinate and agree a common representative structure (that can advocate for the sector as a whole) and to build the necessary institutional knowledge to participate in and influence decision making in national donor-government forums. Strong national NGO networks act in the interests of African NGOs and domestic accountability actors as well as playing a role in monitoring and participating in the more technocratic aspects of government policy and decision making. Line ministries typically have insufficient human resources to coordinate/lead and monitor the use of donor funding at the sector level. Government and donors alike are generally aware of and uncomfortable with the probability that accountability organizations tend to have their independence undermined by the conditions under which they receive grants from donors9. This is one reason some argue that it has become an accepted norm to consider NGO criticism of government as being more in the interests of the NGOs donor than organisations constituency. Government and African NGOs have a common concern that funds intended for Africa are routed through international NGOs with little transparency or accountability to communities on the ground. At the very least, it is important to recognise a common interest in ensuring that funding intended for Africa and channelled through international NGOs (and other organisations) should be accompanied by a clear transfer of skills and resources to African NGOs. On the resources side, when international organisations and NGOs are recipients of donor resources they should be required to live up to their commitments to building African capacity by directing the majority of their grant resources through local (African) partners.

For example, the lack of core long term funding creates an enormous disincentive to demand accountability from decision makers that could impact their funding.

Poor government and local capacity to monitor and hold donors accountable for funding decisions has led to excessive duplication and often dangerous influences on local power structures. African umbrella organizations need to be capacitated to engage responsible ministries and to have the authority to minimise duplication and the likelihood of negative impacts on community structures. African civil society needs to be capacitated to better articulate its interests. There is significant resentment that international NGOs and organisations speak on behalf of and receive a better audience than local representatives (particularly amongst donors and the international community) Donors should be careful not to merge African civil society with governments. Accountability organisations have a significant burden in ensuring transparency and combatting corruption in management of public resources and will continue to find it difficult to ask for accountability if they are expected to partner with the very decision makers they are expected to hold accountable. Basket funds in which donors pool their resources in one project are increasingly popular tools for donors in Africa. Basket funds typically have poor representation from civil society in their management and decision making; these decision making structures also need to be more accountable to domestic actors. Strong civil society representation is in the interests of both donors and government as it is an essential precondition to strengthening their partnership. Strong endorsement from civil society and demonstrable proof of accountability is useful because it allows donors to fend off (often unwanted) interference from their headquarters. At the same time strong domestic accountability is a precondition to budget support and other flexible funding mechanisms that give government more control over how donor resources are spent.
In 2000, donors established an independent civic education grant making facility. This was considered successful and was well reviewed because decisions were made by representatives of Kenyan civil society in the interest of Kenyan civil society. The facility was closed in 2003 after the election of a new government. Some argue that this facility was established because donors were critical of the previous government. However, after 2003, donors did not want to be associated with critical civil society and hence closed this important source of support. A similar pattern of donor support occurred in South Africa with donors financing domestic accountability through independent grant makers like the Transitional National Development Trust, Interfund and the churches. Once apartheid ended, however, donors were quick to withdraw support for independent grant making and/or to support these grant making structures being absorbed into government (e.g. the Transitional National Development Trust is now the National Development Agency).

1.6 Advocacy Principles First Steps for Civil Society:

Accept responsibility for the need to represent civil society as a whole; recognise that you are particularly well position to speak on behalf of civil society even if the representative arrangements are not ideal, Recognise that you have the power to influence agenda setting and the right to have your priorities considered, Be prepared as an advocate; have a few clear requests donors can respond to. The sector needs: greater and better quality funding for accountability (independent grant making); better access to decision making (i.e. designated seats in basket funds, budget support meetings, working groups, etc.); institutional strengthening to the mandated national NGO umbrella body and for this body to lobby and better coordinate the wider sector; and, greater accountability of donors and international implementing partners to (through local NGOs) to local communities, Be positive (avoid adversarial relationships). Emphasise that greater access to decision makers and capacity is essential for building accountability that sustainable development needs to be about local NGOs taking the lead and authoritatively speaking on behalf of beneficiaries10. Emphasise the value local civil society offers government and donor officials. Remember that civil society endorsement of donor or government decision making is powerful and politically very valuable.

Remember change is about compromise and may be slow to come.

Donors often complain that their influence is undermined because they are unable to deliver harmonised and clear messages to government. This is a joint failing of the donor architecture and the fact that headquarters typically influence the message transmitted by donor officials at the country level. At the same time these differing and often contradictory messages are often aggravated by the fact that because many donor officials are permanent civil servants it can be difficult for a country director or head of cooperation to discipline his or her own staff. The result is that sector specialists (e.g. in governance or health) will often communicate very different messages than that of the head of agency. This is a point of much frustration for senior donor officials who are often measured on the success they have in communicating (dialogue) with government. Here domestic accountability organisations offer donors a valuable service; by clearly communicating what the priorities should be, senior donor officials have the authority to challenge their staff and other donors to speak on message. When donors raise issues that are neither a priority for government nor for domestic accountability actors, then donors are in a weak position to justify the importance of their concerns. Few donors want to fall into the trap of having to explain that their concerns are in their own interests because this exposes them to criticism that they are interfering in domestic politics.

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Here international NGOs should be reminded that their role is not to replace African organizations but to support and partner with them.

1.8 Advocacy Goal:

The first challenge for domestic accountability actors is in setting a clear goal. In this regard, it is important to use this space to advance the primary interests of domestic accountability actors. Here it is important not to fall into the trap of propagating politically correct slogans over targeting how to address the fundamental challenges facing domestic accountability actors in Africa. More important than anything else in demanding accountability from donors is to ensure regular independent funding and access to domestic accountability actors. Without this, it is unlikely that any other goals will be addressed. To do this, accountability actors need to build the national institutional capacity to represent their interests as a sector; here the national NGO council is essential as it is one of the few bodies that can legitimately speak on behalf of the sector as a whole rather than a particular institution or political group. What is detailed below is an illustrative example that should be tweaked to local needs.
Goal: Strengthen Local Civil Society to Improve Accountability and Better Influence Agendas (Let African Civil Society speak on behalf of and best represent the interest of Africans) What do we want? National umbrella body represent civil society in donorgovernment decision making forums, Reallocate funds and personnel to improve domestic accountability. Donors, Government and The National NGO Umbrella Organisation Civil society representatives identified, resources and capacitated to represent local civil society in all (sector) technical working groups, on all basket funds, in budget support meetings and on an ad hoc basis in the EU Fast-track Division of Labour Process Attract funding for institutional support programme to the national NGO umbrella body to establish a sector consultation and representation mechanism by which to identify wider sector needs and to give an incentive for better coordination, Institutional support for the national NGO umbrella body to understand, monitor and lobby donor decision making structures, Establishing a donor supported independent grant making facility to strengthen advocacy groups in country, Agreeing a joint donor-government-NGO statement that argues for at least 50% of funding that goes to international organisations and NGOs should be sub-contracted or granted through local organisations (this should be incorporated into the all Joint/National Development Strategies as a performance indicator). 2013 is an essential year because it is when many donors begin their new (often 5 or 6 years) programming cycle. Accordingly, if this opportunity is missed the next optimal time to change donor priorities will only be around 2018.

Who will make this possible? How do we want to be Represented in the Aid Architecture? What key goals will make this possible and improve accountability in the sector?

Deadline:

1.9 Who are the actors? Who makes the decisions?

Setting a goal is only a foundational step. The most important condition to success is being clear about to whom one is communicating and what specific behaviour change is desired. Here it is important to start working on a power map by which one identifies which individuals set the agenda and exert the most influence on decision making at the national level. Do not presume that the donor with the most funding or seniority of officials necessarily means greater influence. Language, for a start, has an enormous influence: in English speaking countries native English speakers have an advantage. Ireland, for example, often has influence disproportionate to its size in group discussions and drafting joint documents. Heads of large organisations are often too busy and overburdened to formulate policies and strategies. The EU, UK and US AID, for example, often vest significant strategy and decision making power in their governance officers (who are often comparatively junior). Recognise also that project managers and chiefs of party may not necessarily have access to the aid architecture. Depending on how representation is shared at the country level, GTZ project managers, for example, may have no access and instead be represented by the Head of German cooperation (DED). Here it is important to start by clearly identifying the target audience (example below). This exercise should be regularly updated and the findings verified on the basis of key informant interviews, reviewing meeting minutes and participating in forums. Even if one cannot get access to the decision making structure itself it is usually possible to approach a like-minded donor and ask them to confidentially assist in mapping out who they see as most influential in setting the agenda and shaping joint decision-making.

Audience Decision Makers and Agenda Setters: Head of External Resources Department/Donor Coordination Unit, Ministry of Finance/Planning11, Chairs of national donor coordination structure (e.g. in Kenya the AEG; in Zambia the CPG; in Ethiopia the DAG), the lead donor(s) for the EU Fast Track Initiative on Division of Labour and UNDP (including in its role as a resident coordinator of the UN system) as well as the World Bank country director. Potential Allies: Like-minded Donors (particularly the Scandinavian donors, Ireland and Canada), Spain (as a donor of emerging importance), the European Commission (in its role as setting common agendas) and UK Aid (for its reputation as an influential donor in governance and accountability programming). International advocacy NGOs like Human Rights Watch, Freedom House and other good governance groups and facilities.

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In some cases this relationship is managed by the ministry of foreign affairs.

Example: Who to Speak To about What? Minister Line Ministry Permanent Secretary Line Ministry Head of Unit/Section Line Ministry Minister Ministry of Finance/Planning Director of External Relations Department/Donor Coordination Unit Ministry of Finance/Planning Head of Donor Desk Ministry of Finance Planning

Project Financing

Joint Programme Decisions

Government National Implementation Policy / Decisions Country Strategy

Remember - most governments have appointed a responsible desk officer for managing relations with individual donors at a national level. Ambassador Donor Head of Cooperation Donor Head of Section/Desk Officer Donor Project Manager/Chief of Party Lead Donor in the EU Fast Track Initiative on Division of Labour UNDP Resident Representative/Country Director UNDP Deputy Country Director Programmes UNDP Project Manager/Project Officer Note: This table can vary dramatically depending on the size of donor mission, the size of overall ODA and its proportion in the national budget. The above-table should be used as an illustrative example only.

It is important to differentiate how we work with those that support better domestic accountability, those against it and those that are undecided. Because it is not politically correct to reject requests for improved domestic accountability, it is particularly challenging to identify opponents. More problematically, opponents in the development sector are more likely to talk as if they support better accountability while undermining domestic accountability behind closed doors. It is rare that opponents will come out and voice their distaste for improved domestic accountability. Opponents will more likely use their influence to keep the subject of improved accountability off the agenda, deploy delay tactics or resort to undermining the authority or integrity of civil society by criticising national NGO umbrella structures as being divided or tilted to specific

political interests and/or implying that African NGOs are just briefcase organisations. It can often be a losing battle trying to convince those opposed to change their approach. Instead, the best way to overcome opposition is often by working with supporters to strengthen and vocalise their support and by convincing undecided actors to participate in the conversation. It is critical to create momentum and a perception that a core group of donors is committed to better accountability. If a core and committed group advocates for better domestic accountability, it is unlikely that opponents will resist both because nobody wants to be seen as rejecting domestic accountability and because senior donor officials tend to be hesitant at criticising each other. There are three clear groups of beneficiaries: the first is the national umbrella NGO body. Supporting the national umbrella NGO organisation to act on behalf of civil society raises the profile of the national umbrella organisation as well as demonstrating to its members that they are doing their job and protecting the interests of national NGOs. The second group of beneficiaries are domestic accountability organisations. With this group it is important to have a clear message reminding them that the goal is for them to have greater access and influence as well as to improve the enabling conditions for domestic accountability. The third group of beneficiaries is likely the most important because it comprises the bulk of the remaining civil society and NGO community. This group is fractured and requires support. It needs issues to rally around. Here a central and important theme that often resonates meaningfully is the concern that African NGOs are often excluded, their opinions disregarded and that they receive a small portion of the funding in their respective sectors. In this regard, then, it can be very useful to adopt clear targets such as: Requesting donors to ensure that at least 50% of funds they grant to international NGOs and organisations are sub-contracted to African organisations, Incorporating and measuring what proportion of development resources go to African organisations, Incorporating project steering (governance) committees in all projects and ensuring that African accountability actors are represented on these committees, Better including African voices in deciding which grants are made.

1.9.1 How to identify supporters?

Identifying supporters is very difficult because officials in donor organisations are effectively contracted to diplomatic or Foreign Service branches of government. As such, it is important to be cognisant that the message they communicate is often filtered through their official institutional position and thus it is safe to presume they are communicating a strategic position rather than what they may see as the truth. Furthermore, it would be safe to presume that the donors and officials in strategic positions in the aid architecture are at least partly to blame for the fact that domestic accountability is not higher on the agenda. When approached by critical civil society or accountability actors, donor officials frequently find themselves on the defensive making supporters doubly hard to identify. Many experienced donor officials will be cautious to express their honest opinions for fear of being quoted out of context. Furthermore, civil society tends to approach donors either to solicit funding or to criticise them. Hence donor officials often feel justified in guarding how and what they say to civil society. One approach that has had some success in ascertaining donors positions is to couch dialogue in a narrative they are comfortable with. A donor official that has relocated from a first world capital to Africa to do development work is likely to have created a narrative justifying why he or she is well positioned to do his or her job. This narrative will emphasise the themes that internationally recruited donor officials: A. Have some skills and knowledge that Africans do not have, B. Are better positioned to know what is the right or more ethical approach than their government counterparts (this enables them to evaluate whether to support the government or not), C. Are justified in demanding accountability because they are tasked with protecting their tax payers funds. While many officials privately acknowledge the weakness in this narrative, it is important not to underestimate the power this sub-text has in justifying important decision making. Accountability actors are more likely to identify potential supporters by playing into this narrative. Approaching a donor in the spirit of doing research and wanting information from key experts is a good way to start a conversation. At the same time, it can be useful to invoke common concerns such as in raising the concern that donor funds granted to government are not necessarily managed in the interests of the wider population. Another option is to point out that one purpose of domestic accountability is to ensure better financial transparency. Treating officials in this way allows one to ask in a more open manner the questions that will help identify which donors are influential in setting the agenda: Which donors are the most influential in setting policy? To which donors is the government most willing to listen to? In the donor community which donors feel that their voice is not heard in joint meetings (i.e. in the aid architecture)? What are the most important development priorities and what will be the future development priorities (i.e. where the future funding will go)?

1.9.2 Identifying early Allies:

Special attention should be placed on approaching disenchanted donors. These donors might feel marginalised from a perceived consensus in the wider donor community because they have a more critical approach to corruption and human rights (e.g. the Scandinavian donors). Language and culture are also important means of exclusion. In English speaking countries for example, non-native speakers will likely have some frustration that Anglo-Saxons dominate group discussions thus undermining others inputs. Under-staffed donors also tend to feel side-lined because they have too many responsibilities to thoroughly/effectively lead in joint meetings. Ironically, disenchanted donors are likely easier allies to win because when accountability actors align themselves with these donors they raise the donors profile in the national aid architecture. Furthermore, by providing critical and often hard to come by information about what civil society wants, accountability actors can complement and be of benefit to the (formerly disenchanted) donors. By giving these donors privileged information they are able to speak with greater authority in joint forums about what the people want. Other important allies to approach early on are donors that typically have strong governance programming teams and budgets but do not lead on governance issues in the aid architecture. Because the leads or chairs of technical working groups are rotated, the lead of the governance technical working group may be held by a donor that has few human or financial resources. When the stronger donor is not leading the group, this can create some frustration based on the belief that they are not appropriately valued. Accountability actors can capitalize on this marginalisation to build alliances and advocating changes in the way that the donor architecture is structured. Here it is important to recognise the primary goal is to gain access to these decision making structures; what happens afterwards is another question but at least will be in consultation with domestic accountability actors. Accordingly, it can be strategic to initially advocate for the participation of African domestic accountability actors in a Machiavellian manner.

1.9.3 Why Some Might Oppose Domestic Accountability: In any case, dictators have received a remarkably constant share around a third - of international aid expenditures since 1972. The proportion of aid received by democracies has remained stuck at about one fifth (the rest are in a purgatory called Partly Free by Freedom House). As for US foreign aid, despite all the brave pronouncements such as the ones Ive quoted, more than half the aid budget still went to dictators during the most recent five years for which figures are available (20042008). Bill Easterly, Foreign Aid for Scoundrels, New York: New York Times (November 25, 2010)

While one will be hard pressed to find formal opposition to improving domestic accountability, the fact that accountability actors do not already sit in many working groups nor at the heads of agency meetings means there is undoubtedly some reluctance to civil society being present. Reluctance may arise from the risk of political repercussions and fear of being quoted out of context by civil society. Another factor is that decisions taken in working groups are not always transparent and may involve decisions to fund preferred organisations on the basis of no-bid contracting. Resistance to greater domestic accountability is likely to be always present in one shape or form simply because increased scrutiny (of donor activity/decision-making) is rarely welcomed. Nonetheless, much work can be done in diminishing the risk of opposition by identifying what organisations and/or individuals oppose and are not comfortable with greater domestic accountability and why. Here it is important to ask: What is to be lost in improving domestic accountability (recognise that some organisations will see this as a threat to their funding and others will see this as a threat to making preferred political deals that should be not be made in a transparent environment)? Who incurs professional or reputational risk by improving domestic accountability (remember many in the development sector succeed by convincing their peers that they speak on behalf of and have the voice of civil society often when they do not)? Who controls the current aid architecture (make no mistake, greater public scrutiny is a threat to this control whether those who control it purport to want this control or not)? Who sees donor decision making as exempt from domestic accountability scrutiny (many donors are still housed in very traditional foreign affairs type structures they see development as philanthropy and will see greater accountability as a threat to how they make decisions)? In opening discussion on how to improve accountability, it is important to be cognisant of some commonly cited reasons for the poor access given to domestic accountability actors. At one level, the aid architecture and working groups are, in many countries, relatively new phenomena. Often decision makers have simply not had the time to think about the importance of decisions taken in these groups and the importance of ensuring accountability. Another possibility is that while many participants are aware of the importance of giving access to accountability actors, they may view the working group

structures as fragile and not well enough structured to engage in more transparent decision making. Another common justification is that while donors see the potential benefit of greater accountability they do not perceive any requirement or obligation to open their decision making to better public scrutiny (largely because donors have their own accountability mechanisms). While the above-mentioned arguments are worth considering it is as important to emphasise to donors that without the endorsement of domestic accountability actors, their decision making invites further scrutiny, which can often be overly politicised. The 2010 Human Rights Watch12 report on distortions of aid in Ethiopia, for example, clearly accuses donors of making funding decisions with the primary intent of improving their working relationship with the Government of Ethiopia. The fact that Ethiopias donors cannot point to any meaningful dialogue and/or endorsement from domestic accountability actors has left them particularly vulnerable to the accusation that their decision making is more in the interests of Ethiopias political elite than in responding to the needs of the poor.
1.9.4 Speak to the Junior Staff First/Recognise the Value of Local Staff:

While most donor institutions take decisions from the top it is important to recognise these decisions are rarely taken without consultation with less senior staff. Typically speaking, potentially contentious issues such as a request to change the aid architecture to better allow for domestic accountability will happen at heads of agency level. In such a case, heads of agency will turn to their governance/political officers to prepare briefing notes. Accordingly, it is essential to ensure that the junior officers are well briefed before raising the issue with senior staff. Junior political and/or governance officers often occupy a difficult space in the aid architecture. While they are officially responsible for political/governance issues they are rarely afforded access to high level political meetings because these meetings are typically attended at the ambassadorial or head of agency level. This dynamic often leaves junior officers looking for a field in which to develop their expertise and remain relevant within their respective organisational hierarchy. Many of these officers resort to specialising in human rights, corruption and/or civil society issues in the hope of developing specialised knowledge that will earn them space at the table. However, being housed in an embassy and often being an expatriate staff member inherently means that they are disadvantaged in gaining access to civil society actors and being able to differentiate what information is most relevant. In fact, many of these officers rely mainly on reports from international NGOs such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International or Freedom House to inform their decisions. By making oneself available to the more junior officers, accountability actors can benefit junior officers with the authority to speak in meetings about what is really happening on the ground, including, of course, priority issues raised by the accountability actor. A good strategic move, then, is to garner good working relationships with junior political/governance officers so that they can raise issues of domestic accountability internally before accountability approach heads of agency for funding or to improve access.
12

Human Rights Watch (October 2010), Development Without Freedom, USA: New York, www.hrw.org/en/africa/ethiopia

At the same time be particularly sensitive to involving local staff in donor institutions. First and foremost, local staff members tend to stay with donors for a longer period than international staff; alienating entrenched local staff can be particularly problematic. More importantly, however, many local staff are better qualified than their international peers but frequently excluded from management decision making and career paths. This tends to make local staff more sympathetic to domestic accountability actors and often willing to support greater accountability in donor decision making. Creating allies out of experienced national donor staff is also valuable in identifying power dynamics, decision makers and what they want or need to better support domestic accountability.
1.10 How to get domestic accountability on the Agenda The Programme Cycle:

The programming cycle may sound administrative and technical but its understanding is essential to influencing decisions and improving accountability. Project cycle management is now a generally accepted management practice that guides most donor decision making. For accountability actors, in its simplest form, the project cycle defines when access and influence is more likely and when it will most probably be disregarded. Donors are increasingly moving towards medium-term funding cycles that define goals, budgets and focal areas on a four to five year basis. The medium term strategy for World Bank cycle below is the country assistance strategy. This strategy generally takes between six and twenty four months to develop but once drafted is a fairly inflexible structural condition for how aid is contracted and disbursed in country13. The strategy sets focal areas, elaborates targets and may indicate funding envelopes. It is against these conditions that new projects are evaluated and approved. Domestic accountability actors in Africa must begin now to prepare 201314 which may be the first year that Western donors (and particularly European donors) will formulate joint country strategies. At the very least these new strategy papers will agree the priorities for a handful of donors and may end up setting priorities for of the wider donor community. Joint country strategy papers will likely cover five year periods thus being important for accountability actors both in how funding is managed and where it is directed. Bearing in mind it can take up to two years to prepare such a document, it is likely that preparations will begin early 2011.

13

For the United Nations systems look for the United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF); this document is a joint UN document and important for a number of agencies. 14 See 2005 EU Joint EU Framework for Multi-Annual programming, 2007 EU Code of Conduct and 2009 Council of Europe Conclusions on an Operational Framework for Division of Labour.

World Bank: Making PRSP Inclusive

The section above details approaches to improving influence with donor staff. However, when it comes to reviewing past projects, identifying goals and setting new priorities donors tend to use external actors (e.g. consultants or think-tanks) in a bid to invite an outside perspective. These external actors have enormous influence because they tend to produce the first drafts of key documents that eventually become the foundation for future programming.

1.10.2 Monitoring and Evaluation, Project and Programme Design:

It is important to recognize that political positions are first elaborated in Terms of Reference when recruiting consultants to monitor existing projects. The outcomes of these monitoring exercises inform the terms of reference of consultants to evaluate projects. Projects evaluations and recommendations are then collated into new terms of reference to evaluate the country strategy as a whole. This evaluation and its recommendations are then repackaged into new terms of reference to design the new country strategy paper and future funding priorities. A similar cycle occurs in designing new projects. The outcomes of concluded evaluations and monitoring reports become the basis for new project designs. Accordingly, to influence the way funding is made it is essential to influence both the terms of reference and the outcomes of these assignments. This is not out of the reach of local NGOs or NGO umbrella bodies. When attempting to get involved in monitoring and evaluation it is of paramount importance to identify which organisation is responsible for contracting the consultant/monitor. Regardless of the fact that the exercise will almost always be characterized as an independent evaluation, monitors are consciously or unconsciously influenced by who manages their contracts. This can be advantageous whether the contracting body supports or opposes the need for greater accountability. In the case of a supportive body, ensuring domestic accountability is included is often only a question of communicating this wish to the contracting body. When the contracting body is opposed to domestic accountability, it is still possible to include domestic accountability in the monitoring or evaluation exercise because the contracting body will be sensitive to possible accusations that it interfered in the independence of the exercise this fact, however, should never be delivered overtly.

1.10.3 Job Boards:

Job boards are essential information gathering sites. When donors are preparing new programming and/or conducting monitoring and evaluation activities they will often turn to recruiting consultants for which these posts are likely to be advertised on the internet job boards. While is not always the case, rules of public procurement make job boards a good information tool. Additionally, focussing on the consultancy specific job boards15 will often allow one access to the specific terms of reference. Reviewing these terms of reference gives the accountability actor good knowledge of trends in the sector. This in turn enables better informed communication with donors on their obligations to improve domestic accountability. The launch of a new project design process is an opportunity to approach the donor and advocate for domestic accountability to be featured more prominently in the respective terms of reference. This is typically a good way to begin a conversation and tends to encourage donors to be more cautious about ensuring that civil society is consulted more effectively on project results and design.
1.11 Funding Cycles The Importance of Always Having a Proposal on Hand: The solution seems to rest in strengthening the civic sector rather than setting goals for it. Funds should be invested in raising capacities of civic actors so that they are equal, independent partners with more space to communicate with both clients and members." Tetyana Danyliv, Director of the GURT Resource Centre for NGO Development in Ukraine; Donor Exchange Network (DECIM), World Bank: November, 2010

While it should not replace active lobbying, it is an open secret in the donor community that development is a supply driven industry. As such, donor decision making is constrained by public expenditure cycles. At a basic level this means that when fiscal years come to a close and allocated funds have not been contracted or spent, donors risk losing these funds to their national coffers. It is an embarrassment to officials in the field to return development funds and it lays them open to being criticised for overbudgeting and under-performing. One way successful organisations are able to take advantage of this institutional constraint is to start pushing project ideas in the last quarter of the year. As donors tend to be looking for new, quick-to-contract projects as the year comes to an end, the usual standards and due process tend to be relaxed. This time of the year, then is a good time to float ambitious or new project concepts such as how to build domestic accountability into the aid architecture. This being said designing a good project well in advance will put accountability actors in a strong position; donors tend to be frustrated year end as many organisations submit poorly conceived and rushed project proposals to meet the year-end deadline.

15

For example, look at: devex.com or developmentaid.org.

It is advisable to have concept notes on hand that could be quick to receive funding. Of particular importance is recognising that promoting domestic accountability in the aid architecture requires specialised skills and institutional resources. It is expensive for civil society to pay for staff to learn how donor decision making works, to participate in all of the donor and technical working group meetings and discussions and to be able to contribute regularly and meaningfully to discussions and joint documents. Donors themselves find this a labour intensive activity so it is likely that they will recognise that participation in the aid architecture is not something that is easily resourced by civil society. Additionally, donors should be approached to fund better consultation as when it comes to establishing performance indicators and priorities (in budget support, for example), donors have a patchy record of consulting with and settings indicators in the interest of beneficiaries. 1.12 Power and Its Use Recognise the fragile allocation of power: Domestic accountability actors should not underestimate the power they have. If African domestic accountability actors formally oppose donor decisions and are able to justify how they represent the poor, this opens staff to the most damaging criticisms. A potential career breaker in a donor organisation is to get a reputation of making decisions that neither benefits the beneficiary government nor the poor. This power, however, is only useful as a threat and almost always back-fires when used. If ever exercised, this power risks forcing donors into a corner where officials career potentials are bound to their ability to disenfranchise domestic accountability actors. Accordingly, the first rule should be to avoid backing donors into a corner. Accountability actors will be wise to minimise the risk of embarrassing donor officials, as embarrassment more often leads to marginalization than progress. Recognise the power of writing in bureaucracies: formal letters become paper trails and if not responded to, paint donors in a very poor light (and are often reviewed by internal oversight mechanisms). For this reason, opt for a more benign line of questioning. For example, instead of asking for domestic accountability actors to be represented in the civil society working group, it might be better to ask donors if their policies allow for domestic accountability actors to partake in decision making. The latter question reminds donors that when making decisions without ensuring domestic accountability, they are acting against their own policies; this question is posed without donors getting the impression they are being criticised for not implementing their own policies. Less contentious communication can be more readily followed up with further written correspondence if not responded to. While most donors are sensitive enough not to dismiss African accountability actors offhand, be prepared that some will opt to criticise domestic accountability actors rather than engage with them. Here it is important to be prepared. One argument to make is that any criticism of the effectiveness of domestic accountability actors is strongly tied to the type of funding that donors provide. After all, with most funding in Africa coming from external sources and with an often unwelcoming environment, the failure of domestic accountability actors to professionalise needs to be linked to the type of funding donors provide. Here it is important to ask a few poignant questions: why there

is no systemic funding for legal aid for accountability actors, witness protection programmes, whistle-blower programmes and core-funding to accountability organisations so they can respond to their constituency before their donors. At the same time, it is also important to lobby for broader accountability norms. Here, it is often useful to respond to criticism by pointing out that donors are not accountable to domestic legislatures either that for donors to simultaneously deny access to domestic accountability actors and to ignore the role of parliamentary oversight does not demonstrate a willingness for greater transparency. It is also important to be aware of the fact that some donors have historical relationships with certain NGOs that they use to justify decision making. If donors respond that they consult with these NGOs it is strategic to acknowledge this consultation as a good practice while calling for greater inclusion of domestic accountability actors in these consultation mechanisms; here it is important to point out that no one NGO speaks on behalf of African civil society.

1.13 First Steps The new aid architecture has become a recent reality in developing countries. Working to make this architecture more accountable to domestic actors is relatively new and with few best-practices on which to build. As such the first step needs to be about engaging existing networks so as to collect and build on existing experiences. Here, networks such as the ANSA network can provide a good peer group and support network for making progress at the country level. At the country specific level it is important not to be too optimistic about how quickly things will improve. For a start, the space available to discuss issues with donors is already limited; accountability actors need to find early allies to get domestic accountability on the agenda. Here it is important to refer to the sections above on identifying like-minded donors and early beneficiaries (such as with umbrella organisations). At a minimum it is important to vocalise clear and pragmatic requests that will create space for dialogue and eventually a foundation to improve domestic accountability. Here African accountability actors should consider asking for: A target of 50% of donor funding to NGOs to either go to African NGOs or be subcontracted to African NGOs, Donors to commit to strengthening the national NGO umbrella body with specific attention to its capacity to represent domestic accountability actors, Dedicated medium term core funding for accountability organisations so as to build an institutional culture and competence predicated on advocating for beneficiary needs over that of donors or decision makers. Finally, it is important to be aware of existing processes. Many countries will redesign their national development strategies in 2011 and 2012; donors should be encouraged to solicit response from accountability actors before supporting domestic development strategies. At the same time, the next aid effectiveness forum in South Korea is due end 2011. It is likely that consultations and feedback will be solicited from developing countries; here it is important that African domestic accountability actors voice their concern and get the message across that aid effectiveness is a pipe dream without strong domestic accountability. Alexander ORiordan December 2010 [email protected]