Corruption and its role in development
The use of public office for private gain benefits a powerful few while imposing costs on large swathes of society. Transparency International publishes an annual Corruption Perceptions Index which measures the perceived levels of public-sector graft by aggregating independent surveys from across the globe.
OECD countries appear less in the top 25 which is largely formed mainly of failed states, poor African countries and nations that either were once communist or are still run along similar lines. Comparing the corruption index with the UN’s Human Development Index (a measure combining health, wealth and education), demonstrates an interesting connection. When the corruption index is between approximately 2.0 and 4.0 there appears to be little relationship with the human development index, but as it rises beyond 4.0 a stronger connection can be seen whereby corruption at this level impacts negatively on development. As development experts, we should be interested in this dynamic.
The work done by the Effective States and Inclusive Development research centre investigates what political contexts are needed for development to succeed. Transparency International looks specifically at sectors where we should be shining a light to ensure transparency of action, objective and lack of corruption and that progress or action doesn’t work against development goals.
Corruption in Defence and Security is Dangerous, Wasteful and Divisive:
- Public trust: Corruption erodes the public’s trust in the armed forces and, in some cases, can undermine trust in the government as a whole.
- Government integrity: The government exists to serve its people, and defence and security establishments to protect them. When defence and security establishments are corrupt, the integrity of the government is undermined as leaders abuse the power entrusted in them for personal enrichment.
- Economic impact: Corruption is costly and a waste of a country’s scarce resources as defence and security are expensive areas of a national budget, even when conducted with integrity.
- Threat to security: Corruption is a danger to security and anti-terrorism policies, even contributing to regional and international instability.
- Peace keeping: A critical element in the conflict resolution and/or immediate post-conflict phase is the role of the military and a compromised defence force impacts a country’s ability to restore peace.
The need for transparency in the pharmaceutical industry:
- Provision of services: Corruption weakens the quality of services and in some cases can deny access to healthcare
- Economic impact: Corruption in the sector has a corrosive impact on health, negatively impacting public health budgets, the price of health services and medicines, and the quality of care dispensed.
- Knowledge is power: There is a knowledge gap between the providers and users of healthcare, leaving patients subject to the knowledge they are provided by healthcare providers, suppliers, and regulators. This inequity of information is open to exploitation for private gain, opening possibilities of corruption.
- Temptation: The volume of funds involved in the sector provides incentive for private gain. Due to the high number of people involved in decision making, and the often bureaucratic nature of the pharmaceutical and health sectors, it is susceptible to individual discretion and regulatory capture.
Find out more about Transparency International’s work in defence and the pharmaceutical industry and listen to the full lecture here:
Britain in the EU and the importance for development
Last week, I added my name to letter calling for the UK to remain in the EU. You can read the letter, signed by leading development experts, in The Guardian newspaper.
I, and my peers signing the letter, believe that for UK development agencies, the EU membership is essential to tackling global problems.
We know that the UK is global leader in development and leaving Europe would set us back as well as diminish our ability to influence European responses to development. Being part of Europe is a practical way to extend our influence and tackle global problems and so EU membership is vital to the UK’s ability to tackle global challenges, specifically cooperation within the EU will be essential to tackling the humanitarian emergency in Syria, the migration crisis, and the wider issues of peace, security and development in the Middle East and north Africa.
Simon Maxwell, the former director of the Overseas Development Institute who helped to organise the letter, said: “The signatories to this letter represent the UK’s global leadership in international development. As practitioners and advocates in international development, our strongly held view is that the EU needs UK heft and engagement to achieve its global goals – and that the UK multiplies its impact when it works with and through the European Union.
“We now urge the huge numbers of people who support development work in the UK, locally and nationally, to give the EU’s role in international development the profile it needs as we campaign to remain in the EU.”
Analysing fire risk response in Macedonia
By Laura Hirst
An initial investigation of fire and rescue services, community participation and humanitarian assistance
Fire risk and the impacts of fire hazard in resource poor urban settlements in the ‘Global South’ are hugely neglected within academic discourse, policy and practice. The various adverse effects fire risks have on well-being and wider development issues have not been systematically explored despite fires being a common occurrence in cities worldwide. Whilst large scale fires often make the headlines (see here and here for a few examples), and can lead to the displacement of entire communities, serious physical injury and deaths, the everyday risk and impact of smaller scale fires are less reported yet also severely jeopardise health, livelihoods, housing, markets and well-being on a number of levels. The strategies available to low-income groups in terms of response to fire risk and fire hazard have also been under-explored. This reflects a general lack of attention given to inclusive urban governance, disaster risk reduction and public service provision that takes into account the participation of resource poor urban communities.
Operation Florian is one international humanitarian organisation working on these issues, through the provision of equipment and training to improve firefighting and rescue capabilities in communities abroad. Whilst operating from an ostensibly technical perspective, Operation Florian has increasingly come to recognise the importance and potential for incorporating a bottom-up perspective in its work with communities and partners. This desire to develop a more grounded approach led to a successful proposal for a North West Doctoral Training Centre ESRC CASE PhD studentship project, led by Tanja Müller (GDI), Alfredo Stein (PEM) and Steve Jordan (Operation Florian), exploring fire risks, well-being, bottom-up politics and pathways towards community involvement in fire and rescue services in resource poor urban settlements.
Operation Florian training exercise in Macedonia
I began work on the project in September last year, and I have since been getting to grips with the functioning of fire and rescue services and the work of Operation Florian. Whilst Zimbabwe is the case study for my empirical research, in November 2015 I joined an Operation Florian team on a project visit to Macedonia, where the organisation has been working for the last eight years, to learn more about the NGO’s approach, methodology and achievements, as well as about specific issues in terms of fire risk and response faced in the country.
A week living in a volunteer fire station in Sveti Nikole, and driving across the country visiting a range of fire services as well as observing meetings with different ministries to discuss future work, provided a rich overview of the work being done by Operation Florian. I was able to see first-hand the achievements and challenges encountered at different levels by fire services, and by Operation Florian as an external humanitarian actor, and a glimpse of potential entry points for ongoing work. Operation Florian has delivered an impressive set of technical and capacity building programmes supporting fire and rescue services throughout the country as well as engaging in national level networking and policy work in a context of delegated decentralisation and fractured responsibility for such services.
For me though, perhaps the most interesting entry point for future engagement from a bottom up perspective, are the volunteer fire services (DPDs) that are scattered around Macedonia. These services support professional fire services and have traditionally carried out the bulk of community safety work. The position they occupy between civil society organisation and service provider provides opportunities for local participation and engagement of communities. This has been employed to great effect in the capital Skopje, where Operation Florian has worked with a volunteer fire service to carry out participatory risk assessments, successfully bringing together diverse groups of citizens to work and lobby on certain issues. The DPDs seem to me to be an important entry point for improving and developing community engagement work and fire safety for both professional fire services and Operation Florian but also for supporting wider, ongoing processes of democratic and participatory decentralisation in Macedonia.
Tetovo fire fighters and Operation Florian volunteers with a donated vehicle
My report reflecting on Operation Florian’s work in Macedonia elaborates on the context of Operation Florian’s work there, its outcomes and future engagement. At the same time it is hoped that this learning can support Operation Florian to think about how it seeks to engage with and support community-led processes in its work more widely. I had the opportunity to discuss some of these issues with members at the Operation Florian annual general meeting in January, where I presented the findings of my report. The importance of taking into account complex political contexts in the country of operation was considered, and discussion arose around how a very specific, (and to-date) technically based NGO could engage with this. The difficulty of working in a country with fragmented public services was also highlighted, and raised discussion around how Operation Florian could strategically work within this context to support local citizens and their demands. The opportunity to share my work, and receive feedback was invaluable at this stage in the research, grounding my findings and providing new information and ideas. The report has also since been shared with Fire Aid, a network of UK based organisations involved in providing fire and rescue aid and training to over 30 countries.
My exposure to the work in Macedonia has been a great first step in the collaborative process of working with Operation Florian. As the project progresses with a closer focus on the context of Zimbabwe and an investigation into everyday fire risk, community involvement and the role of fire and rescue services, I’m looking forward to working closely with Operation Florian to make sure my research can feed into their organisational learning and development of new methodologies that allow for pathways of community participation in reducing fire risk in resource poor communities.
Operation Florian has a long-standing engagement with fire and rescue services in Zimbabwe, in Bulawayo since 2011, and in Harare since 2013.
Laura Hirst presenting at the Operation Florian AGM
Laura Hirst is a first year PhD student at the Global Development Institute, investigating fire risks, well-being and pathways towards community involvement in fire and rescue services in resource poor urban settlements. Her research is funded by a North West Doctoral Training Centre ESRC CASE studentship, in partnership with Operation Florian. Laura has a background in community-led development and participatory urban planning in the Global South. Prior to joining GDI in September 2015, she worked at the UCL Development Planning Unit and UCL Urban Laboratory, and with the Philippine Alliance, a partnership between five organisations working with resource poor urban communities to provide sustainable housing solutions across the Philippines.
Frustrated youth and failed democracy
The dynamics of well being, aspirations and politics in Egypt.
What is the impact of the Arab Spring on Egyptian citizens? How did the uprisings affect people’s aspirations and their relationship with the state? The literature on the Arab spring focuses mainly on the causes and dynamics of these uprisings and the roles that different groups (e.g. youth, women and workers), political organisations (e.g. the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis), state institutions (particularly the army) and social media played in them.
To date there have been very few grounded studies examining how political changes affect people’s wellbeing and aspirations. People’s voices are still missing! This research seeks to fill in this gap by exploring ‘how’ rapid political changes affected deprived communities in Egypt. Building on primary data collected through extensive fieldwork in 2006/7 and in 2015, this research tracks people’s wellbeing perceptions and aspirations in Egypt pre- and post- the Arab Spring uprisings. It articulates: (1) the main elements of a good life that people value, (2) their main problems and (3) their (unfulfilled) aspirations. The study contrasts voices in rural and urban contexts, namely in: (1) Manshiet Nasser (one of the largest slum areas in Cairo) and rural villages in Menia (one of the poorest governorates in Upper Egypt) thus presenting an inter-temporal and intra-case study analysis of political change in both settings and over time.
Theoretically, this research links the literature on wellbeing, aspirations and political change and explores the role of the state in fulfilling (or frustrating) people’s aspirations. Empirically, it builds on its unique dataset on people’s perceptions before the Arab Spring and is hence able to create a more dynamic picture of how wellbeing perceptions and aspirations change over time. Understanding these changes and tracking them is crucial to narrow down the gap between people’s aspirations and state policies; an essential step for future political stability.
MDGs to SDGs: all change or no change?
Watch Professor David Hulme as he addresses at Bradford University on the shift that has occurred from the Millennium Development Goals.
Solidarity in times of the ‘refugee crisis’: the emergence of a politics of resistance?
Even as – at least when listening to the media – it seems that Europe faces a unique challenge with the increasing numbers of refugees (or as the British media prefers to call them, towing the government line, migrants), who flee war in Syria and destitution in other places, it is pertinent to remember that people have fled persecution and hopelessness since times memorial. But each contemporary ‘crisis’ presents itself these days as something quite extraordinary, something that has not happened before. Not so long ago, it was Israel’s turn to ‘discover’ its refugee crisis, when African refugees, mainly from Sudan and Eritrea, arrived at its shore or rather across the desert from Sinai.
Photo: Stefan Boness, http://www.iponphoto.com
This was the first time that an increasing number of non-Jewish people sought refuge in Israel. The Israeli government reaction, perhaps predictably, has been, not unlike that in the UK in relation to contemporary refugee movements, rather hostile, calling the new arrivals ‘infiltrators’ or worse and building fences – metaphorically and literally. At the same time, and in line with happenings elsewhere – one only needs to look at the outpouring of compassion in Germany last summer – a myriad of new civil society organisations has sprung up that focus on refugee issues.
In Israel, these organisations are more often than not funded by Jewish organisations from the diaspora, mainly in the US and some European countries, and this implies that many young, idealistic volunteers form those ‘donor countries’ show up on their doorsteps for an ‘internship’ of some kind, whether there is a need or not. Some of those interns thus work in meaningful positions that require a set of skills, others are simply driven by the wish to do ‘something good’ (often combined with brushing up their CVs). As according to a staff member of an Israeli refugee-NGO, ‘we do not have anything to do for them, really, but also cannot refuse them because we need the donor money’, they end up doing things like taking refugee-babies for a walk, while their mothers are encouraged to do ‘ethnic knit work’ in this freed-up time. Put shortly, often little attention is being paid by such activities to what refugees might want or need, and a lot of well-meaning engagement might in fact turn out to be rather patronising.
One example when those dynamics became apparent was in 2011 when I chatted with a group of Eritrean refugees at the bar of a Tel Aviv nightclub at the launch event for the Refugee Voice newspaper, on the face of it a joint enterprise between refugees and Israeli activists. Very few refugees attended the event, which felt more like a party for the volunteers. Those who did attend stayed among themselves, and when speaking to them told me they preferred to go out to different bars that were not only cheaper but where they could talk to each other quietly. At some point, the newspaper was being presented and the person who gave the speech was an Israeli volunteer. She started by thanking everybody for their input, as ‘I could not have done this without the help of …’ (at which point everybody who contributed an article to the newspaper, refugees and Israelis alike, were mentioned by name). Thus, the newspaper was not presented as a truly joint enterprise in which ‘we’ (Israelis and refugees alike) came together on an equal footing, but as something that was instigated by Israelis concerned with refugee rights quasi on their behalf. In a rather paradoxical way, the claim for universal rights was enacted in this patronizing fashion that indirectly upholds unequal status between refugees and those who advocate on their behalf. This perception was confirmed by some of the Eritreans who did engage with Refugee Voice as an organ to give visibility to their cause. One of its contributors remarked that ‘the newspaper is too timid, it does not really address the important issues we face, just gives some stories of suffering’ – and in doing so enforced what may be called the ‘white-saviour-complex’.
Examples like this raise important questions about the possibility of real solidarity and joint political action that ultimately poses a challenge to exclusions and the denial of fundamental rights – what one could call a politics of resistance. The example above – and a number of others I discuss in my latest publication – do not suggest that civil society engagement is per se futile and patronizing. Some Israeli civil society organisations do indeed use their professional expertise to fight in concrete ways for the rights of refugees and with them – most prominently in the legal field where some small but, given the hostility of an overbearing Israeli state, very important victories have been achieved against a government determined to negate these new refugees any rights.
But overall, a big question mark remains about patterns of engagement and the motivations behind with those who, captured brilliantly in the World Press Photo of the Year 2015 by Warren Richardson at the Hungarian-Serbian border, simply hope for a better life, a life on their terms, a life that is driven by their aspirations. Crossing a border fence is just the starting point here, and much will depend on what type of reception lies beyond it. I have explored these themes in more concrete detail in my latest article that focuses on the specific dynamics of claim-making within the Eritrean refugee community in Tel Aviv, but that holds wider lessons for arriving at new meanings of solidarity and creating a politics of resistance.
The article, Tanja R. Müller, ‘Acts of citizenship as a politics of resistance? Reflections on realizing concrete rights within the Israeli asylum regime’, Citizenship Studies (2016), 20:1, 50-66 is available here (please feel free to email me for a pdf if you cannot access it).
This post was first published on the author’s own blog.
Optimistic rebels vs. the anti-politics machine
The secret has been out the bag for a while now. Time was when the very mention of the words ‘inequality’, ‘distribution’, ‘power’, or, god forbid, ‘state’ in polite development conversation would see canapés dropped in shock and waiters scurrying to fetch the smelling salts. But as a critical mass of wide-scope research, specific on-the-ground knowledge, and social movement and civil society campaigning has grown into an irresistible chorus, the tide seems slowly to be turning. The world of international development, famously labelled ‘the anti-politics machine’ by James Ferguson, is talking about politics, about social justice, state capacity, redistribution.
It was this that I found myself particularly reflecting upon listening to Winnie Byanyima’s invigorating keynote lecture at the launch of the Global Development Institute. The Oxfam International Executive Director – and University of Manchester graduate – ostensibly centred the lecture around an exposition of a vision that Oxfam is branding the Human Economy. However, in truth what stood out was that the terrain covered in outlining this vision fell first and foremost within the ambit of the political.
Reminding the audience that “poverty and extreme inequality are not facts of life coming down from the sky like rain”, but rather the result of political choices and governmental failures, Byanyima unpacked the Human Economy idea through a series of fundamentally political issues: fighting gender injustice; accountable democracy as “the most powerful equalising force ever invented”; the need for governments to rebuff the blackmail tactics of tax-dodging multinationals; the painfully obvious anti-egalitarian effects of privatisation and sky-high fees in education (the air in the University of Manchester lecture theatre felt particularly electric at this point…).
This political focus was evident in the sharpest moment of clarity and insight, which, as often, came in the more spontaneous environment of the post-lecture Q&A session. Responding to a question on what Oxfam can actually achieve, Byanyima answered with arresting frankness that the organisation is undergoing major internal change and will be de-emphasising “being with communities, supporting small communities to find clean water, to build classrooms”. This is a striking comment from the head of a development NGO, given the sector’s characteristic emphasis of its unique selling point of intimate links with real situations and people on the ground. It is worth quoting at length what Byanyima outlined instead:
“We must go out there and tackle power”
“We really must go out there and tackle power. Inequality is an issue of power imbalance, and we must recalibrate power. Go to business, go to governments, increase the power of people over them. It’s very political, it’s about campaigning… We are now investing much more in building huge constituencies with workers, students, working to support the growth of social movements against injustice.”
Herein perhaps also lies the answer to another interesting audience question, from a student worried that academic work and a life of ‘just writing articles’ may offer little towards meaningful change in the world. The launch of an institute for the academic study of global development seems a good time to pose this question. But if, as Byanyima argued, questions of politics and power are integral to the reproduction of inequality, injustice, poverty, and to overcoming them, then we need to understand how these dynamics work; how migration, or climate change, or transnational finance are reshaping our societies; how various actors – including universities and NGOs – are connected in often complex webs of power and influence. We need to be able to make compelling arguments about alternative future directions that stand up to detailed scrutiny. This is what rigorous, critical research can offer. There needn’t be a sharp dividing line between the worlds of academic and practitioner/activist, but equally, each can make distinctive contributions that the other can’t.
Byanyima issued a rallying cry for ‘optimistic rebels’ within both activism and academia, and this is a good candidate for a motto as the new GDI gets down to producing knowledge, insight and argument about the deep and complex basis of and alternatives to the inequities all around us. As Winnie Byanyima commented at the outset of her lecture, this is, in fact, what Manchester has long been all about.
Chris Lyon is a PhD candidate at GDI. The working title of his thesis is Exploring a relational conception of social justice: liberals, radicals, and Brazil’s ‘new social contract’
Watch: Oxfam’s Winnie Byanyima launch the Global Development Institute
Watch the official launch of the Global Development Institute, with Oxfam’s Winnie Byanyima, the President & Vice-Chancellor of the University of Manchester, Nancy Rothwell and David Hulme, director of the Global Development Institute:
Storify: The Global Development Institute Launch with Oxfam’s Winnie Byanyima
Thanks to GDI master’s student Rachel Louise Sadler for developing this story.
From Manchester to Dhaka. How a master’s led to a work experience with the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD)
By Julia Taub
Many people often wonder what they will do when they finish their studies. I spent most of my master’s year worrying about what would be next. Would I be able to get a job? Would this master’s help? Over the last few months my questions have been (partially) answered, via an internship with the International Centre for Climate Change and Development in Dhaka.
When I first arrived in Manchester I never imagined I would end up working on climate change. That changed when I met my tutor Dr Joanne Jordan. Many of my courses engaged with climate change vulnerability and adaptation, which was Joanne’s area of expertise. I realised that there was more to the climate change sector than just climate science and mitigation, and that adaptation and vulnerability reduction fit well with my development interests.
I decided to focus my dissertation on local-level adaptation, and particularly community-based adaptation (CBA), which turned out to be an emerging area of critical research. So, without fully understanding the specifics of CBA, but keen to learn more, I decided to spend the summer writing my dissertation on its role in reducing climate change vulnerability in Ethiopia. During this time, I spoke to Joanne about potential job opportunities for after completion of my master’s. I was excited to hear about the GDI-ICCCAD 6-month internship programme that she has recently established.
I discovered that ICCCAD will be hosting the 10th CBA conference in April 2016, an international event bringing together researchers, policymakers and practitioners from across the world to share their experiences and the latest developments in CBA. I was keen to get involved in the conference as it would be an excellent opportunity to expand my knowledge and learn from experts in the field.
Gobeshona Conference 2016, image courtesy of ICCCAD
Under international climate change expert and pioneer of the 1.5ºC campaign, Dr Saleemul Huq, ICCCAD seemed like an excellent experience for someone trying to break into the climate change and development sector. I spoke with Saleem and he was keen to have me come for an initial period of 6 months and agreed that I could get involved in CBA10.
But I was nervous. I didn’t have a lot of experience, only academic knowledge. I would be working with professionals. However, when I arrived at the start of November, I discovered that there was no need for all those fears. Almost everyone at ICCCAD is a young professional trying to develop the skills and experience needed before moving on to other jobs or to master’s or PhD programmes. ICCCAD is a very supportive training ground!
I took on the role of events coordinator for CBA10. But, since no one here does just one thing, I also jumped at the opportunity to help develop a Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) programme. One of MEL’s first projects will be to work in partnership with the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) to evaluate the CBA conferences.
Carbon Pathways Policy Dialogue, image courtesy of ICCCAD
I have now been here for 3 months and have learned how to negotiate with rickshaw pullers and market sellers. I’ve picked up a few key phrases in Bangla (and laugh with others when I don’t say things quite right), and am used to the attention/questions/stares that come with being a foreigner here. I have even been on a local bus! As living and working here is providing much vital in-country cultural experience, I have decided to extend my stay until the end of August. There have been many opportunities for networking at various events and I feel as though the time is going by too quickly.
There is so much more to do and learn and if I leave in right after CBA10, which was the initial plan, I would be missing many opportunities. I am learning loads and am sure that ICCCAD will pave the way into what I hope is a long-term career in the climate change and development sector – a career that I would have never imagined had I not done my master’s at the Global Development Institute. I am sure that my relationship with GDI will not end now that I have completed my master’s. At one event I met someone that works for USAID in Bangladesh who also did his master’s at Manchester and in another month or two, I will be meeting up with Joanne in Dhaka for the second time since I arrived. I am sure that it is only a matter of time before I connect with others who have connections with GDI in one form or another.
To learn more about the GDI-ICCCAD internship exchange programme established for the MSc in International Development: Environment, Climate Change and Development, contact Dr Joanne Jordan joanne.jordan@manchester.ac.uk