Facilitating national processes of governance assessment

1. Facilitating national processes of governance assessment Ruben de Koning, Research Associate at the Oslo Governance Centre Ruben.dekoning@undp.org

2. 1: Mapping UNDP engagement with land governance Figure 1: Governance dimensions addressed in current land related project activities in 5 UNDP regions

3. 2: Land projects and activities where monitoring and assessment comes in • 8 running project (2007) • Armenia, monitor global environmental management (Rio Conventions) through multi- agency information management • Laos, Lesotho, Lithuania, Serbia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Central African rep., National Capacity Needs Self-Assessment for Global Environmental Management (NCSA), climate, biodiversity and degradation • Thailand, indicators for sustainable development • 9 pipeline activities • Afghanistan, monitoring land use to halt degradation • Indonesia, monitoring protected areas management • Vietnam, monitoring sustainable land management • Armenia, monitoring land use through multi-stakeholder collaboration • Benin, national self assessment land governance reform • Venezuela, establishing indicators and strategies for land reform • East Timor, assess land ownership, tenure and property rights • Tajikistan, public forums for assessing and informing land policy making • Turkmenistan, government capacity on land information management and monitoring

4. 3: UNDP Governance assessments, objective, reason and context • Objective – strengthen capacities of national stakeholders to develop and apply methods and approaches for measuring and monitoring governance • Government, statistics offices, CSO’s, elected representatives, etc. • Inclusive consultative framework for assessment • Aligning with national development plans • Reason – limitations of existing, often external, governance indicators, indexes and assessments • International ranking; agenda-setting, naming and shaming • National donor driven assessments; tied to aid conditionality • Both do not generate national demand for, nor build capacity to supply governance evidence • Context – changing aid modalities: national ownership and capacity development, aid harmonisation, result management and mutual accountability • Paris Declaration on aid effectiveness (2005) • General Assembly resolutions (2004, 2007) • Third High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Accra (2008)

5. 4: Governance assessments based on government-CSO partnership • Government in driver seat, but multi-stakeholder approach • Balancing evidence to allow diverse voices to be included • Civil society to provide unofficial data but faced with: • Limited freedom of expression and access to information and public policy processes • CSO deficits in expertise, credibility and political independence

6. 5: Guiding principles for selecting indicators in governance assessment • Using disaggregated indicators to reflect concerns of vulnerable groups • Process oriented, as much as input and output • Data rely on peoples experiences, as much as expert perception • Valid indicators that are practical, cost effective and sensitive to country context

7. 6:Mongolia’s National Governance Assessment Process (1) • 2004-2005, development and first measurement of indicators in participatory manner, through: • Independent analysis of national and international documentation • Expert interviews during national conference (100) • Governance questionnaire for citizens (1000) and parliamentarians • Focus group discussions with vulnerable groups

8. 7: Diversity of Indicators in Mongolia

9. 8:Mongolia’s National Governance Assessment Process (2) • 2006 results provide evidence for National Plan of Action to Consolidate Democracy in Mongolia • 2007-2008 institutionalisation of DG indicators in form of MDG 9 on human rights, anti-corruption and democracy (3 targets and 9 indicators)

10. 7:Forest Monitoring models • Independent Forest Monitoring: role negotiated with state, monitoring state agencies • Global Witness (Cambodia, Cameroon) • Private auditing companies • External Monitoring: no negotiated role, monitoring forest practices • Telepak / Environmental Investigation Agency (Indonesia) • Embedded Monitoring: State initiated multi-stakeholder partnership, various functions in forest governance • National Forest Control System (Costa Rica) • Multi-sectoral Forest Protection Committees (Philippines)

11. Relevant references • UNDP. “Governance Indicators: A User’s Guide”, UNDP, (2007 2nd edition). www.undp.org/oslocentre/docs07/undp_users_guide_online_version.pdf • UNDP. “Measuring Democratic Governance: A Framework for Selecting Pro-Poor and Gender Sensitive Indicators”, UNDP (2006). www.undp.org/oslocentre/docs06/Framework%20paper%20-%20entire%20paper.pdf • UNDP “Practice Note on Capacity Development”, (2008). http://www.capacity.undp.org/indexAction.cfm?module=Library&action=GetFile&DocumentAttachmentID=1507 • UNDP. “UNDP Practice Note on Capacity Assessment” http://capacity.undp.org/index.cfm?module=Library&page=Document&DocumentID=6004 • UNDP. “Supporting Capacity Development: The UNDP Approach” (2007). http://capacity.undp.org/indexAction.cfm?module=Library&action=GetFile&DocumentAttachmentID=2141 • “UNDP and Civil Society Organizations: A Practice Note on Engagement”. http://www.undp.org/partners/cso/publications/UNDP%20CSO%20Policy.doc • UNDP. “Mobilizing Poor People for Active citizenship: a discussion Paper”. www.undp.org/oslocentre/docs08/activecitizenship.pdf • Website OGC: http://www.undp.org/oslocentre/resources/publications.html • On forest monitoring: http://www.verifor.org/index.html