Aid Effectiveness or Development Effectiveness?

Hot Discussion in Times of Turbulence

IDEAS Conference 2011, Amman

Presenter:Daniel Svoboda, Czech Republic

Background

The year 2010 is over and it is time to finalize summative (or impact?) evaluation of the Paris Declaration on Aid

Effectiveness (PD) and of the Accra Agenda for Action (AAA).

The targets are still on the horizon and the PD’s Theory of Change is still not clear enough.

The cuts of the ODA budgets are increasing despite the global commitments and despite the crises developing world is

facing, exclusive eligibility criteria and administration requirements are stronger, and abusive North/South world

divide is becoming carved in stone in ODA jargon…

Challenge

Can we revise the “logic model” of the PD and AAA, update the expected results or indicators and continue in

the same direction?

Or, is the right time to revise the objectives, starting with participatory identification of desired development

impacts, long-term and mid-term outcomes and appropriate strategies?

Can the evaluations of PD and AAA help in this regard?

Questions

The PD targets seem to be mainly about efficiency of money transfers to local governments and they

do no care so much about bringing sustainable benefits for the target groups – people in developing countries, men and women, their children, boys and

girls, larger families, orphans, widows, disabled people, marginalized ethnic groups and grassroots

organizations.

Questions

Do we even know?

i) Who are the concrete signatories of the PD/AAA?

ii) How big is their ownership, accountability for results, decision-making power and level of engagement in local or international development?

iii) Who are their key partners, aliens, allies?

iv) Who are the clients of PD/AAA evaluations?

Preconditions

Preconditions for increasing genuine ownership, multiple accountability and development impact through PD/AAA evaluations:

• First of all, we must be able to recognize and define the desired impacts - better lives of people. But how to measure happiness, satisfaction, feelings or mental and behavior change? We must ask the people!

• Secondly, we must be able to define effectiveness - right outcomes, clearly contributing to sustainable benefits - to better lives for targeted people. It needs an appropriate Theory of Change taking into regard peoples´ weaknesses, strengths and motivations, and their direct engagement!

• Thirdly, only after that, the time comes to focus on efficiency or on “aid effectiveness” in the wording of the PD.

CSO Development Effectiveness

Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) have recognized the challenges of the PD and launched their Open Forum for

CSO Development Effectiveness. Through bottom-up multidimensional and multi-actors consultations, they were already able to reach a consensus on framework principles of development effectiveness but they also

agreed that no development actor can reach the development impact alone.

CSO Development Effectiveness

The agreed (Istanbul) principles are as follows:1. Respect and promote human rights and social justice2. Embody gender equality and equity while promoting women

and girl’s rights3. Focus on people’s empowerment, democratic ownership and

participation4. Promote Environmental Sustainability5. Practice transparency and accountability6. Pursue equitable partnerships and solidarity7. Create and share knowledge and commit to mutual learning8. Commit to realizing positive sustainable change

CSO Development Effectiveness

The current task for the Open Forum for CSO Development Effectiveness (www.cso-effectiveness.org) is to find an appropriate mechanism how to evaluate application of

these principles and their real contribution to development impacts. The consultations now continue at national and thematic levels. In this regard, the evaluators´ community and the IDEAS can contribute to introduction of the right indicators and right evaluation (cause-effect) questions and methods and thus to prove or improve the

Open Forum’s Theory of Change.

Code on Effectiveness - CZ

The Czech NGO platform FoRS – Czech Forum for Development Cooperation (www.fors.cz) already piloted

the task and proposed own Code on Development Effectiveness, including indicators and evaluation

procedures.Our aim is also to influence the “Busan Agenda for Action” in the sense of prioritizing development impacts in all new

international commitments.

Code on Effectiveness - CZ

Here is the example of the Principle 5 of the FoRS Code on Development Effectiveness:5. Accountability for Impacts

FoRS members are accountable for positive and negative, intended and unintended impacts of their interventions, and

other actions, on the situation of their target groups and other development actors. They commit to take their part of accountability for sustainability of positive impacts and

therefore they care about the changes in lives or attitudes of the target groups even after completion of their projects.

Code on Effectiveness - CZ

Indicators:• Participatory assessment of reached, envisaged or possible

impacts after project completion is included in both internal and external evaluations

• All project final reports present the opinion of the target groups on project progression and results

• Indicators of impacts – indicators of changes in lives of the target groups are included in all project documents

• FoRS members are accountable for impacts of their actions, they use the evaluation results and they actively solve possible negative consequences of their work *

Code on Effectiveness - CZ

… FoRS members commit to introduce the agreed principles in their work and to periodically evaluate application of the

principles in development practice. The results of self-assessment will be available at FoRS Annual Assemblies. The list of organizations that submitted their evaluation will be

available at the FoRS webpage. … A significant breach of the highlighted indicators (*) can lead to cessation of membership

in the platform. … All indicators are conceived to be measurable and answerable in categories “no – partially –

mostly yes – completely yes”. … Members are encouraged to add information whether the organization strives for

improvements, or any other comments.

Code on Effectiveness

Can similar commitments of all other development actors contribute to more

effective development?

Thank you for your attention!

Daniel Svoboda: svoboda@dww.cz