1. Power and Drivers of Change Analysis
Ben Dickinson
OECD DAC Secretariat
Good Morning,
My name is Ben Dickinson and I work at the OECD where I oversee the Development Assistance Committee sub groups on fragile states, on governance and on conflict prevention.

2. Evolving donor approaches to Governance

3. DAC Work on PDoC
Task Team formed (DFID, Sida, Norad, World Bank)
Lessons learned study on the use of Power and Drivers of Change Analyses in development co-operation.
Lessons note on “Using Political Economy Analysis to Improve Aid Effectiveness” (forthcoming)
Regional workshop planned for 2006 to (i) illustrate relevance of DAC/GOVNET work at the country level and (ii) explore how donors have joined up around the use of analysis.

4. Impact?
Allows more realistic ambitions for donor interventions to be set.
Takes donors into new areas (state building aspects of taxation).
Formalised and insitutionalised what we already knew, potential for harmonised approaches.
Shared understanding could lead to more consistent donor approaches (especially to problems like corruption).

5. Tension 1 Tension between
expectations for long-term incremental change that emphasises a shift from clients to citizens and
ambitions for delivering results, particularly the MDGs, emphasising pro-poor change.
Firstly, there is a real tension between what these studies have told donors about the pace and incremental nature of change and some of the historical causalities and sequences involved with the pressure to deliver on health and education results in the MDGs.
There is a considerable job in OECD countries to persuade tax payers of the long term engagement required and to stay the course with all the problems of corruption and rights abuse that are encountered along the way.
There are critical issues about the incentives that donors set their staff.

6. Tension 2 Tension between
often low cost, opportunistic and patient approaches to reform and
pressures to spend, particularly in an era of scaled-up aid (according to DAC projections an additional $50 Bn by 2010, which will exacerbate aid dependency)
Secondly and related is the issue of cash.
Much of what we know about supporting change does not involve huge amounts of cash. But the Jeffrey Sachs ‘big push’ involves huge additional sums.

7. Will Aid Dependency Worsen?
ODA%
GDP
ODA $ per head
ODA%GDP DAC simulation
ODA/
GXP%
GBS% GDP
2004
2003
2010
Burundi
53.4
31.0
63.2
88.0
Sierra Leone
33.4
57.0
48.5
128.0
10.0
Afghanistan
38.0
53.0
45.6
Malawi
26.3
47.0
43.3
71.0
5.4
Rwanda
25.3
40.0
40.5
78.0
10.3
Madagascar
28.3
32.0
36.7
46.0
2.9
Mozambique
22.1
55.0
36.2
7.6
Congo, DR.
27.6
102.0
32.1
592.0
Ethiopia
22.6
23.0
31.7
79.0
5.5
Nicaragua
152.0
29.5
103.0
I have just completed some aid dependency rations based on the 2005 aid projections to These are the top ten recipients of oda in 2004.
In 2004, aid represented 50% or more of government expenditures in 16 countries. By 2010 as a result of the projected $50 bn that will enter the aid system, 16 countries may be aid dependent to the tune of over 20% GDP in each case.
The 4th column is aid as a% of government expenditure. (IMF figures)
The last column on the right is budget support as % of GDP. (SPA Survey 2005 for 2004)
At the same time the IMF says that the overall impact on the tax take is negative. We hope to look in more detail at the tax and governance issues.

8. Tension 3 Tensions between
The state/country/nation as the primary unit of analysis and
Increasing recognition of the regional and global drivers of change and bad governance.
Third and final tension
I have talked about fragile states as if they fit into a convenient box and of course they don’t. Country classifications are important. The Fragile States mantra has had a powerful international mobilising and awareness raising effect and at least the label indicated what we are most interested in : the nature of the state. Five years ago there was no real international donor debate about these countries. But all classifications tend not to allow very much flexibility about seeing states on a continuum of change or state institutionalisation.
The current crisis in Ethiopia illustrates the point. Overnight from Good Performing Donor Darling to Donor disaster or Fragile State. This is not just a conceptual leap but has very real implications for donors who have to respond to a MDG agenda one day to a political governance agenda the next.
A related tension is that donors see the state as the unit of analysis, but we know we need to look at regional issues, the global drivers of bad governance (and the role OECD countries themselves play).

9. Tension 4 Tensions between
The principle of ownership and transparency and
not sharing the results of studies which include sensitive and searching questions, which impact upon vested interests.
Third and final tension
I have talked about fragile states as if they fit into a convenient box and of course they don’t. Country classifications are important. The Fragile States mantra has had a powerful international mobilising and awareness raising effect and at least the label indicated what we are most interested in : the nature of the state. Five years ago there was no real international donor debate about these countries. But all classifications tend not to allow very much flexibility about seeing states on a continuum of change or state institutionalisation.
The current crisis in Ethiopia illustrates the point. Overnight from Good Performing Donor Darling to Donor disaster or Fragile State. This is not just a conceptual leap but has very real implications for donors who have to respond to a MDG agenda one day to a political governance agenda the next.
A related tension is that donors see the state as the unit of analysis, but we know we need to look at regional issues, the global drivers of bad governance (and the role OECD countries themselves play).

10. Tension 5 Tensions between
The need to harmonise and consolidate analyses, avoiding proliferation and
The need for diverse perspectives, views and opinions.
Third and final tension
I have talked about fragile states as if they fit into a convenient box and of course they don’t. Country classifications are important. The Fragile States mantra has had a powerful international mobilising and awareness raising effect and at least the label indicated what we are most interested in : the nature of the state. Five years ago there was no real international donor debate about these countries. But all classifications tend not to allow very much flexibility about seeing states on a continuum of change or state institutionalisation.
The current crisis in Ethiopia illustrates the point. Overnight from Good Performing Donor Darling to Donor disaster or Fragile State. This is not just a conceptual leap but has very real implications for donors who have to respond to a MDG agenda one day to a political governance agenda the next.
A related tension is that donors see the state as the unit of analysis, but we know we need to look at regional issues, the global drivers of bad governance (and the role OECD countries themselves play).