From Good Governance to Development? A Critical Perspective on the Case of Norway’s Oil for Development

Abstract

Good governance is a key buzzword in development aid discourse. It is a catch‐all term denoting capacity building, poverty reduction and democracy, where the latter two elements function as legitimising factors. This paper discusses the Norwegian aid programme Oil for Development’s understanding of good governance. Good governance discourse rests on a vision of African states as ‘failed’, and explains the lack of development as a product of poor governance. In Oil for Development, good governance simultaneously works as a condition to qualify for aid, a tool to implement aid and a goal for aid. Oil for Development sees good governance as mainly technical capacity‐building, aiming to maximise government revenues from oil and clarifying roles in the state apparatus to contribute to a balance of power between the state and the oil industry. Poverty reduction and democracy building enter as legitimising elements providing the programme’s rationale. This approach to development rests on a hope of a ‘trickle‐down’ effect from increased capacity in the state apparatus to poverty reduction. This expectation is unlikely to materialise, as the formal structures of Oil for Development seeks to strengthen are trumped by informal ones. Further, the programme pretends to build its approach on an international consensus among researchers on governance, which effectively depoliticises aid and sees governance as an issue for experts. What constitutes ‘good’ in governance is however not a straightforward issue of clarity in roles and increased capacity.

Keywords:

• Oil for Development
• Norwegian aid
• good governance
• resource curse

Acknowledgements

This study was made possible by a grant from Refleks programme of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I want to extend my gratitude to Håvard Nilsen of Res Publica for his support and helpful commentaries to the project throughout, and Øyvind Eggen of the Norwegian Institute for Foreign Affairs (NUPI) for diligent and indispensable supervision of the project. Hilde Solli and Daniela Ramirez Camacho also provided me with valuable assistance. Christopher Rowland of Kultrans at the University of Oslo graciously commented on the manuscript in its last stages. The usual caveats apply.

Notes

¹ I interviewed adviser on good governance and Timor‐Leste, Liv Marte Nordhaug, senior advisor on Angola, Ghana and West Africa Svein Erik Heglund (2009) and director Petter Nore (23 July 2009). The minister of the environment and international development, Erik Solheim, was interviewed through email correspondence. The interviews were conducted in Norwegian, and all translations are mine. Quotes from other Norwegian sources are all translated by the author.

² This is not the place to critique the failed state thesis, as this has been done elsewhere (see for example Migdal, 2001 and Mamdani, 1996). Suffice it to say it privileges the European experience and assumes all states are the same.

³ The literature on the resource curse concerns petroleum resources and other natural resources such as diamonds. In the following, I will refer to the oil curse, inasmuch as Oil for Development works with oil rich countries.

⁴ EITI was initiated by Tony Blair in 2002, and now holds office in Norad. EITI cooperates closely with Oil for Development.

⁵ See report to the Storting number 15 (2008–2009) Interests, responsibilities and opportunities. The main features of Norwegian foreign policy (Utenriksdepartementet, 2009b) and Report to the Storting number 13 (2008–2009) Climate, conflict and capital. Norwegian development policy adapting to change. (Utenriksdepartementet, 2009a).