"Best Practices: Advancing Our Share Agenda" Workshop

1. Civil Society and Development: Key Features

Civil Society Organizations (CSOs), including NGOs, play a key role in meeting the challenges of development. CSOs are closest to the poor helping them identify critical concerns and needs and supporting them with knowledge and expertise.

Poverty reduction is a multidimensional process. The Bank alone is unable to address poverty issues and develop a poverty reduction agenda; it needs to join multiple development actors. Civil society is a key player of development and an ideal partner.

Besides growth, good governance is a contributing factor of development. Good governance includes building consensus between the government, civil society and other stakeholders while promoting transparent and accountable management of resources in developing countries.

2. Bank’s work with Civil Society (CS): Best Practices

Civil society involvement in Bank-supported operations began 20 years ago and has turned into an important element of the Bank’s work. A formal, global mechanism for policy dialogue with NGOs was established in the early 80s: the NGO-World Bank Committee. At the time, this mechanism had no precedent and was innovative for an international development institution. The Committee enabled discussions on poverty reduction, participation and other issues essential to civil society, and has moved the dialogue closer to the field (see Best Practices - Box 1.1).

Since the end of the 1980s, this relationship has expanded greatly in both quantity and quality. Emerging issues of concern among CSOs has prompted the creation of ad-hoc, issue-based mechanisms for dialogue. The Consultations to develop a Bank Forestry Strategy is a good example of this new approach. Consultations have constituted a fora for validation of existing ideas, identification of priorities, and generated new synergies (see BP Box 1.2).

CS participation is fundamental in the application of key Bank instruments for policy-based lending such as the Comprehensive Development Framework (CDF) (see country update in Annex 1)and the Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSP). Through these instruments, the Bank seeks to enable country consultations on national development agendas. The Bank plays a facilitating role by encouraging civil society dialogue with their governments and other stakeholders at the country level on issues of global importance such as poverty reduction and development.

Currently, all operational units (regions and networks) interface with CSOs and CS participation in Bank-supported operations is being mainstreamed. During FY00, 100 percent (18) of full CAS and 70 percent (7) of CAS updates, - for both IDA- and IBRD-eligible countries- were prepared with civil society consultation, continuing the trend of the last few years of increasing stakeholder participation in CAS processes.

Examples of effective collaboration at the country level in emergency and post-conflict situations have included the participatory formulation of the Country Assistance Strategy in Honduras in the aftermath of the 1998 Hurricane Mitch (see BP 2.1). The Bank not only re-programmed its assistance but enabled a participatory process in the CAS preparation with the involvement of government officials, major NGO networks and hundreds of other civil society groups, and the private sector. This process has set the stage for a participatory formulation of the forthcoming PRSP.

Another important example is the multi-stakeholder cooperation for reconstruction in East Timor (see BP 2.2). This approach has proved effective in terms of resource mobilization and the full stakeholder involvement, specially on the part of East Timorese citizens and institutions. Although the Bank and other partners face challenges in both cases, important contributions have been made, and processes and mechanism are in place for greater and better operational collaboration.

In conjunction with other development partners, the Bank has embarked on various initiatives aimed at creating strong partnerships and alliances globally and regionally. Of the numerous initiatives the U.N. Vision Project on Global Public Policy (GPP) Networks recently reviewed, 10 had the active involvement of the World Bank. They are:

World Commission on Dams (WCD)

Global Environment Facility (GEF)

Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR)

Global Water Partnership (GWP)

Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI)

Roll Back Malaria Initiative (RBM)

Medicine for Malaria Venture (MMV)

Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP)

Non-Governmental Liaison Services (NGLS)

Intergovernmental Panel on Forests and the Intergovernmental Forum Forests (IPF/IFF)

3. New Context, New Challenges

In the last decade, CSOs have grown significantly worldwide, and their capacity to affect the development process has expanded accordingly. Technological advances have enabled CSOs to improve their institutions, expand their networks and become more assertive in policy deliberations and development interventions. New issues, new actors have emerged and the Bank is faced with keeping up with a rapid CS evolution, which is integral to globalization. Evidence from this rich experience has been presented through best practices of policy dialogue, operational collaboration and partnership. Examples have illustrated the way to peace, international cooperation and development through global solidarity.

However, all development actors face new challenges. From the Bank’s perspective, a multi-dimensional strategy to enable a country’s environment for civic engagement is critical. To do this, all development partners need to promote favorable legal, procedural, institutional, cultural-political and informational frameworks for civil society participation in the national development agenda. Key components of a multi-dimensional strategy to enable a country’s environment for civic engagement (depicted in Annex 2) are:

Promoting autonomy of NGOs and CSOs;

Facilitating performance and accountability of NGOs, CSOs and government through capacity building;

Promoting participatory approaches in the design and implementation poverty reduction strategies, and of programs in general;

Promoting the involvement of civil society in policy dialogue;

Developing an appropriate fiscal framework for non-profit activity and protection of NGOs in fiscal reforms;

Supporting favorable legislation regulating NGOs; and

Improving civil society access to information and to the media.

In addition, a mechanism for dialogue on globalization is crucial to advancing the exchange of ideas and proposals, and building some kind of global consensus. In recent years the debate on globalization has attracted the attention and interest of key development actors across regional and country boundaries. However, the debate lacks a systematic approach and consistency.

The lack of an appropriate approach have contributed to the emergence of communication barriers among different actors that prevent the convergence of analyses concerning the impacts of globalization on poverty and equality. These gaps also preclude consensus building on the solutions and strategies to reduce its negative impacts on the poor.

Street protests during the Global Days of Action (Seattle, Washington and expected in Prague) are expressions of the emerging frustration and fears among citizens. These protests will continue as long as the uncertainty and divergence of the diagnosis and responses to global issues persists.

An appropriate mechanism, process, system or "space" for pluralistic, consistent and systematic dialogue would contribute to enhance the understanding of the phenomenon of globalization and its social, political, environmental and economic implications for the poor people. It should bring to the table key global actors to participate in the debate. It must be based on reliable information and receive regular follow-up in order to deliver consistent results.

WORLD BANK BEST PRACTICES

1. BEST PRACTICES ON POLICY DIALOGUE

2. BPS ON OPERATIONAL COLLABORATION

Accreditation
Form 2006

22-23 Feb. 2006 Annual DPI/NGO Orientation
Programme