Governance and Development: changing EU policies

Abstract

This introductory article to the special issue on European Union, development policies and governance discusses how notions of (‘good’) governance have come to dominate development discourses and policies since the mid-1990s. The article argues that governance was part of the so-called Post-Washington Consensus, which understands governance reform as part of the creation of market societies. Although academics have commonly emphasised the fact that governance concerns the rules that regulate the public sphere, the dominant understanding of (good) governance in policy circles revolves around technical and managerial connotations. The second part of the article introduces some important features of EU development policy, and argues that this is essentially neoliberal in nature and favours a technocratic approach to governance reform. The EU's main instrument in relations with developing countries is the Country Strategy Paper, which includes a set of governance indicators for the assessment of the political situation in partner countries. In addition, the European Union has developed a ‘governance profile’, which consists of nine components.

Notes

The articles in this special issue have greatly benefited from the support received from the working group on North–South Development Issues that was part of the EU-supported Network of Excellence on Global Governance, Regionalisation and Regulation (Garnet). The articles were discussed at two workshops held at the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) in July and November 2008, as well as at the fourth Garnet Annual Conference in Madrid in November 2009.

1 For instance, see SN Sangmpam, ‘Politics rules: the false primacy of institutions in developing countries’, Political Studies, 55(1), 2007, pp 201–224.

2 Among others, see D Craig & D Porter, Development beyond Neoliberalism? Governance, Poverty Reduction and Political Economy, London: Routledge, 2006.

3 JE Stiglitz, More Instruments and Broader Goals: Moving toward the Post-Washington Consensus, WIDER Annual Lectures 2, Helsinki: UNU World Institute for Development Economics Research, 1989, p 1.

4 See, for instance, Craig & Porter, Development beyond Neoliberalism?, p 93; and Z Öniş & F Şenses, ‘Rethinking the emerging Post-Washington Consensus’, Development and Change, 36(2), 2005, p 285.

5 World Bank, Building Institutions for Markets: World Development Report 2002, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002, p 99.

6 C Burnside & D Dollar, Aid, Policies and Growth, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 1777, Washington, DC: World Bank, 1997; and Burnside & Dollar, Aid, Policies, and Growth: Revisiting the Evidence, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3251, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2004.

7 See, for example, W Hout, The Politics of Aid Selectivity: Good Governance Criteria in US, World Bank and Dutch Foreign Assistance, London: Routledge, 2007.

8 European Commission, Governance in the European Consensus on Development: Towards a Harmonised Approach within the European Union, Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, COM(2006)421 final, 30 August 2006, p 12.

9 World Bank, Assessing Aid: What Works, What Doesn't and Why, New York: Oxford University Press, 1998, p ix.

10 European Community, Development Policy of the European Community—Statement by the Council and the Commission, 2000, pp 3–6, at http://ec.europa.eu/development/icenter/repository/council20001110_en.pdf, accessed 28 August 2009.

11 G Hyden, J Court & K Mease, Making Sense of Governance: Empirical Evidence from 16 Developing Countries, Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2004, p 16.

12 Cf R Robison, ‘Strange bedfellows: political alliances in the making of neo-liberal governance’, in W Hout & R Robison (eds), Governance and the Depoliticisation of Development, London: Routledge, 2009, pp 17–20.

13 In this issue the term ‘European Union development policies’ will refer to the policies implemented at the level of the Union. Formally speaking, on the basis of the Treaty of Maastricht of 1992, development policy is part of the first ‘pillar’ of the European Union. This pillar is also referred to as the European Community, and is regulated by articles 177–181 of the Treaty Establishing the European Community. The common development policies of the EU are implemented by the European Commission. Where analyses refer to the assistance policies of the member states in addition to Community policies, this will be mentioned explicitly.

14 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD.Stats, Table 2A: ODA disbursements, at http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DatasetCode=TABLE2A, accessed 28 August 2009.

15 European Commission, Highlights—Annual Report 2006 on the European Community's Development Policy and the Implementation of External Assistance in 2005, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2006, p 12; European Commission, Annual Report 2006 on the European Community's Development Policy and the Implementation of External Assistance in 2005, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2006, p 9; and European Commission, Annual Report 2009 on the European Community's Development and External Assistance Policies and their Implementation in 2008, SEC(2009)831 final, 30 June 2009, p 196.

16 European Community, Development Policy of the European Community, pp 3–6.

17 European Union, ‘The European Consensus on Development’, Joint Statement by the Council and the Representatives of the Governments of the Member States Meeting within the Council, the European Parliament and the Commission, Official Journal of the European Union, 24 February 2006, C46/01, pp 1–19.

18 Ibid, p 2.

19 Ibid, pp 3–5.

20 Ibid, pp 11–15.

21 European Commission, Increasing the Impact of EU Aid: A Common Framework for Drafting Country Strategy Papers and Joint Multiannual Programming, Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament, COM(2006)88 final, 2 March 2006, p 5.

22 Ibid, pp 12–14.

23 Ibid, p 14.

24 European Commission, Staff Working Document Accompanying the Communication ‘Governance in the European Consensus on Development: Towards a Harmonized Approach within the European Union’, SEC(2006)1020, 30 August 2006, p 11.

25 Ibid, emphasis added.

26 D Kaufmann, A Kraay &P Zoido-Lobatón, Governance Matters, Policy Research Working Paper 2196, Washington, DC: World Bank, 1999. The dataset is available at http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.asp, accessed 8 December 2009.

27 The Communication on ‘Governance in the European Consensus’ announced the introduction of an incentive reserve related to countries' governance plans, amounting to [euro]2.7 billion out of the [euro]22.6 billion allocated to the 10th EDF. The incentive reserve would be distributed with the use of the governance profile on the basis of ‘the assessment of the [governance] situation and the reform commitments given in the dialogue’. European Commission, Governance in the European Consensus on Development, p 12. A recent paper by Molenaers and Nijs indicates that the governance incentive has, so far, amounted to little more than a formal exercise. See N Molenaers & L Nijs, ‘The bumpy road from rhetoric to reality: the EC on the slippery slope—does the governance incentive tranche strengthen or weaken aid effectiveness under the umbrella of the Paris Declaration?’, paper presented at the 12th EADI General Conference, Geneva, 24–28 June 2008.