05/07/2011
Improving Capacity
Development in Aid
programmes: challenges
and approachs
Enzo Caputo
economic analysis and policy – PhD
WORKSHOP TC/CD – Brussels 4-5 July 2011
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New focus on Capacity Development
in the EC development approach
SOME KEY REFERENCES TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT:
• The Backbone strategy and the related reform
• The EC sectoral evaluation on Technical Cooperation and
Capacity Development
• The large thinking process on the aid effectiveness and in
particular Budgetary Support
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Two key issues for a shared
approach
1. Which are the enabling factors (namely
external) of Capacity Development, and
aid effectiveness [if we consider CD as an
essential component of AE]? and
2. How do we identify and assess CD
outcomes, per se and in relation with aid
results.
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Issue 1 : the opportunity framework
Internal capacities grow interacting with
external opportunities
• Aid quality policies and criteria have emphasised internal
capacity dynamics in systems and institutions and
therefore have focused on improving ownership.
• The external opportunities with which internal dynamics
interact are considered too far to be reached through aid.
• Indeed, internal capacities may only adopt strategies that
correspond to the opportunities and risks of the existing
contexts.
• How, such opportunities and risks may be considered
while supporting and evaluating Capacity Development?
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Literature references on the
opportunity framework
• The development literature on CD is almost silent on the
opportunity framework and the interactions between internal
capacities and external opportunities.
• The broader literature on development*, instead, has
produced the concepts of empowerment, which is a strong
synonymous of capacity (including capacity development),
agency and opportunity framework.
• And the specific literature on private enterprise and
entrepreneurship development has produced a wide thinking
on the interaction between “capacity space” and “opportunity
space”**
*See: S. Ibrahim and S. Alkire (2007) and A. K. Sen (1985 and 1989)
**See: G. B. Dagnino (2003). The issue of the opportunities for entrepreneurs was first raised by
J.A. Schumpeter, (1934).
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The Opportunity Framework as a mix of a country/ region
historical momentum and its international partnerships
• The OF is partly given and unchangeable, as far as it is
determined by the historical momentum of the partner
country/region. It needs to be well understood through an
adequate political economy assessment.
• Partly, the OF is affected by the existing and/or future
international partnerships between the country/region and
the same countries (or groups of countries) which provide
the aid.
• As far as such partnerships are able to provide new
development opportunities that fit the historical
momentum, the OF for Capacity Development is high and
the objectives of CD support programmes may be
ambitious.
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Historical examples and new cases of partnerships
that contributed and may contribute to the
establishment of OFs highly conducive for CD
• The case of the post 2nd world war reconstruction
and the US supported partnership (including the
role of the World Bank).
• The case of EU enlargement (especially the first
round of CECs candidates).
• The recent cases of the Euro-Med integration
especially in Tunisia and Morocco.
• The EPA process in the ACP countries
• The new G8 commitment for the southern
Mediterranean countries.
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The consideration of the OF in an evaluation
of the EC budgetary support in Tunisia
• The EU partnership in 1995 had established a framework of
opportunities for Tunisia, based on a strong integration in the
EU market and a comprehensive association to the EU,
through:
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Dismantling trade barriers;
Restructuring and upgrading the financial and industrial systems;
Increasing domestic market competition;
Modernising and opening the education and training systems.
• Such opportunities corresponded to the momentum of the
country (10 years of stabilisation, vocation to export, propension to
international partnerships and innovation, need to expand the economy to
tackle access of poor and youth).
• And provided the government with the necessary guarantees
(access to large markets, standards and rules, know-how, technical and
financial support) to embark in change (risk reduction).
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How the aid worked in Tunisia: CD support
interacted with the OF
• Aid was deeply owned, because it was requested and negotiated as a tool for the
implementation of the opportunities established by the EU-Tunisia partnership.
• It was highly effective, since it provided a practical dimension to and enhanced the
credibility of the partnership.
• The “revolution” in Tunisia is a consequence of the dramatic change of the Tunisian
society in the last fifteen years, the international integration and modernisation
(growth of a large middle class) that took place mostly thank to that partnership.
• Many say that aid to Tunisia should have included more distributional and
governance-related objectives. This may be a mistaken perspective, charging aid
with a disproportioned responsibility. When aid included such objectives (e.g. Grain
Market liberalisation and most Governance projects), it just failed.
• The problem is that such objectives were weak in the partnership, for lack of
economic guarantees (Grain Market and agricultural products) and, in the case of
governance, for the compliance of many EU MS with the regime.