EVIDENCE-BASED POLICY ANALYSIS IN SOUTH AFRICA: Critical assessment of the emerging GWM&ES

1. EVIDENCE-BASED POLICY ANALYSIS IN SOUTH AFRICA:Critical assessment of the emerging GWM&ES Fanie Cloete Department of Public Governance (UJ) fcloete@uj.ac.za (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

2. Outline • Evidence-based assessment • M & E as higher order management function • The Emerging GWM&ES • Assessment of the GWM&ES • Complex adaptive systems (CAS) • Policy and GWM&ES as CAS • Conclusions (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

3. Evidence-based policy assessment 1 • Evidence-based analysis largely theory before info revolution • Info society enabled effective evidence-based assessments • = approach that helps people make well informed decisions about policies, programmes and projects by putting the best available evidence at the heart of policy development and implementation (Segone 2008: 27) • = not opinion-based policy practice, which relies heavily on either the selective use of evidence (e.g. on single studies irrespective of quality) or on the untested views of individuals or groups, often inspired by ideological standpoints, prejudices, or speculative conjecture (Segone 2008:27). (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

4. M&E as higher order management function • M&E = not an isolated activity • M&E = integral part of good policy management process • M&E = an applied research and planning function needed to ensure goals are achieved. • It is a higher order management function that compiles evidence of progress towards goal achievement and interprets the data to determine the extent of change (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

5. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

6. Emerging GWM&ES in SA 1 • SA behind many developed states but ahead of many developing states • Until 2005 no coordinated M&E function in govt: Isolated line function M&E by PSC, Treasury, DEAT & other depts • Then: • Mil goals: 2015 • WSSD: 2002 • Presidency: POA • Donors • Resulted in GWM&ES: 2005 (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

7. Emerging GWM&ES in SA 2 • Presidency coordinates GWM&ES • Emerging framework intended to provide min structure and min uniform procedures (eg indicators, Treasury performance reporting framework, SASQAF) • Implemented in decentralised way, maintaining existing systems & procedures asap • Establish reporting system from community & eventually NGOs through prov, national depts to Presidency. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

8. Main GWM&ES stakeholders • Presidency: GWM&ES Policy Framework, PoA, NII, Mid-term dev indicators, 10 & 15 Yr Reviews • PSC: Guidelines & evaluations • Treasury: Perf reporting framework • StatsSA: SASQAF • DPSA: PERSAL, BAS data • DEAT: SoE, NFSD • DPLG: Prov & Loc Govt Key perform indicators • PALAMA: M&E Training • Line function depts: Nat, prov, distr, local • Businesses, NGOs, CBOs, (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

9. Structural components of the GWM&ES (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

10. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

11. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

12. Treasury performance information model (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

13. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

14. Pres Mid-term dev indicators • Economic growth and transformation • Employment • Poverty and inequality • Household and community assets • Health • Education • Social cohesion • Safety and security • International Relations • Good Governance • One environ indicator only (greenhouse gas emissions) (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

15. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

16. Complex adaptive systems 1 • Simple, complicated, complex • Cooksey 2001: complexity = “…a non-linear systems-oriented perspective that attempts to conceptualize, understand and intervene in organizational systems at multiple levels…in full recognition of the dynamic linkages and influences that operate within and between aspects of those system levels through time and space” & “…guiding instead of prescribing, adapting instead of formalizing, learning instead of defending, complexifying instead of simplifying and including instead of excluding” (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

17. Complex adaptive systems 2 Van Buuren & Gerrits (2008: 382) …(e)very decision can be regarded as a temporarily stable state of equilibrium in which streams of negotiation, deliberation and fact-finding are connected stepping stones in an ongoing policy process which at the same time is influenced by parallel policy processes competing for the same resources (attention, money, legitimacy, support). Decisions that are made persist until a sufficient amount of system pressure (internal or internal) destabilizes the policy system towards a new state of equilibrium… (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

18. Complex adaptive systems 3 Teisman & Klijn, 2008: …(w)e already know that managers are not the rational beings presented in many managerial handbooks and that they try to avoid choices or act according to the circumstances. The complexity theory gives us a different image of the manager as someone who is trying to survive in the ‘fitness landscape’ that he is creating jointly with other agents, by slightly bending and changing the conditions and using the moments and possibilities perceived. This will, almost certainly, also provide us with different prescriptions for these managers..(2008:297). (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

19. GWM&ES assessment 1 • GWM&ES not integrated, coherent system • Regulated by collectivity of different sectoral policy docs from different stakeholders not coherently integrated • Many details still fuzzy or absent • Still emerging system: no time frames • SASQAF problems with stats quality • Not enforced • Rollout to provs & lower problematic • No vision: what to M&E: outputs, outcomes, etc? • Focus mainly on how: (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

20. GWM&ES assessment 2 • No link to African or other eval guidelines • Mid-term Dev Indicators very crude, incomplete & unsystematic • Turf battles detrimentally affect system implementation (eg PSC & DEAT). • Implementation capacity limited • Massive training effort needed by PALAMA (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

21. GWM&ES assessment 3 • A policy system = a complex adaptive system • Evidence-based policy assessment relies on integrated higher order M&E function in govt • GWM&ES = emerging, complex adaptive system: • many simple variables/components • of an open system subject to external influences, • interacting with each other in a dynamic, rich historically determined and non-linear manner, • defying full understanding, • operating far from equilibrium (hovering on the edge of chaos), • but surviving and expanding in a self-learning and self-regulatory manner (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

22. GWM&ES assessment 4 • GWM&ES does not have a formal hierarchical structure • operates as loose network of autonomous agencies periodically interacting with one another. • No clear line of authority • frequent turf battles cause confusion and conflict among stakeholders. • System still evolving, as new rules of the game are being formulated or clarified, changing power and authority relationships among the main stakeholders. • System has an inherent survival capability • Learning lessons in a self-regulatory manner illustrates complex nature of system • The complex nature of the system justifies the decentralised implementation approach • Optimal balance between centrifugal and centripetal forces in the system is essential for success. (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009

23. GWM&ES assessment 5 • GWM&ES improvement strategies: • Need for coherent and feasible, integrated and holistic national vision to guide M&E activities; • Environmental and sustainability indicators to be integrated into Mid-term dev indicators, distinguishing output from outcome and impact indicators. • Fast-track roll-out of system to prov & local govt levels • Improve capacity of M&E Coordinating Unit in the Presidency • Improve inter-govt communication and marketing for GWM&ES. • Reduce internal turf battles and overlapping M&E mandates among main stakeholders • Build organisational culture of network co-operation rather than hierarchical competition (c) F Cloete: GWM&ES as CAS, Cairo 2009