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Key Text Where Does Development Success Come From? Explanations and Practical Implications

Author: A Bebbington and W McCourt
Date: 2006
Size: 45 pages (450 KB)

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Summary

What are the key ingredients of successful development policies? This paper from the Institute for Development Policy and Management (IDPM) uses seven case studies in Africa, Asia and Latin America to explore the nature and explanation of development policy success. Ultimately, success is determined by the balance of power, committed leadership and good institutional design.

Successful policies should have the following features: a) they should target the enhancement of human capabilities, in particular for the people who have the greatest capability deficits; b) they should do so on a large scale; c) they should be implemented over at least ten years, and preferably across at least one change of government; and d) they should preferably succeed against the odds. The balance of power is critical to whether a policy succeeds or not. It creates environments that are more or less propitious to different policies and determines which groups and which ideas will prevail. The power of different actors ebbs and flows over the lifetime of a policy.

Power over policy has many sources but the power of organisations and coalitions to drive policy is the most significant.

Actors gain power as they become organised. Getting organised increases policy leverage.
The ability to develop policy coalitions is also important. Policy success is not impersonal and cannot be understood without referring to named individuals.
Leadership styles can be ‘distributed’ or ‘sequential’. Leadership types can be transformational, transactional or technocratic and are variously important at different policy stages. All these styles and types of leadership grow out of the coalitions that they personify. They do not float freely above them.

Policy needs to be designed to provide incentives to the individuals and groups whose participation is crucial for success. Social activists, government and development agency officials all need to identify the policy leader who will be most effective in getting a policy on to the statute book. That leader should stay close to the people who chose him.

State officials should develop antennae to enable them to pick winners on which to base their policies.
Policies are more likely to materialise and to be sustained by making common cause with groups outside government who share commitments, and by giving these groups a formal institutional role.
Social activists should think about moving from opposition to constructive engagement with like-minded state officials. There will be frustrations in working with the state but there will also be potential rewards.
Activists should avoid the vicious circle where dissatisfaction with state corruption and inefficiency leads to setting up parallel structures that further erode state capacity.
Activists should stay engaged through implementation, firstly by lobbying to be included in a formal institutional structure, and then by giving feedback that will contribute to the policy staying on track.
Development agencies should understand that successful policy comes from inside. They should commission studies that will help them understand long-run policy success and pick winners.

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Source: Bebbington, A. and McCourt, W., 2006, 'Where does development success come from? Explanations and practical implications', IDPM Working Paper, no. 70, Institute for Development Policy and Management, University of Manchester
Author: Willy McCourt , willy.mccourt@man.ac.uk ; Anthony Bebbington , tony.bebbington[at]manchester.ac.uk
Institute for Development Policy and Management (IDPM), http://www.sed.manchester.ac.uk/idpm/