Last updated on June 11, 2011
That is a new idea advocated by Nemat Shafik, the outgoing Permanent Secretary in charge of the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) in a new working paper. For Shafik,
- The United Nations should be in charge of peace and security issues and humanitarian affairs;
- The World Bank and regional development banks should be in charge of development finance;
- Bilateral agencies (e.g., USAID and DFID) should be in charge of delivering health and education interventions; and
- Foundations and philanthropies should be in charge of development innovations.
This strikes me as a sensible idea. The division of labor suggested by Shafik would increase accountability — something that is in short supply in the development world. The only difficulty is that such a division of labor will be extremely difficult to enforce if it comes to pass, what with everyone trying to get credit for “helping out.”
(HT: Roving Bandit.)
While the idea of a formal Division of Labour sounds conceptually appealing, I think it has some important limitations.
Ideally any division of labour should be based on who is best at what – but this isn’t a fixed thing that neatly falls along the lines outlined above. It also might vary from situation to situation based on historic and cultural ties, geopolitics and so on. For technical assistance the most relevant sources of expertise might come from other developing countries but support from bilaterals is often tied to technical assistance from their own country which might not be the best or the most relevant.
Governments also might be well advised to see support and advice from multiple sources in order to best make their own choices rather than relying on having to go to who the donors mutually agreed would be the source of reference.
Also putting “all your eggs in one basket” by choosing to take only one partner and one approach to a development issue (say local health care reform) is also risky since this is likely to be a big win or a big lose depending on whether or not the approach works. Hedging your bets by working with several partners and trying various approaches at the same time until the best approach becomes clear is probably a safer and more effective (if less efficient) way of proceeding.
To my mind a good division of labour might be better determined by competition among different potential providers rather than by top down decision, and some degree of competition and overlap between aid providers can actually be a good thing to encourage them to specialize in what they are good at – and to better ensure they are meeting the needs of beneficiaries.
The challenge with this is that the performance or even the financial operation of many of the players is not easily monitored. For me a greater effort on aid transparency and accountability – and using this to enable a greater choice on the part of both beneficiaries and donors would be a better way of divvying up the action.