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Governance and Poverty Reduction

Linking democratic governance to poverty reduction has two core objectives:

  • To strengthen responsive institutions that deliver to the poor and vulnerable/marginalized groups at all levels (international, national, and sub-national or local). 
  • To enhance participative processes which strengthen the relationship of civil society to national, sub-national (or local) and international policy making circles in order to ensure representation in and accountability of economic policy. 

An enhanced linkage of democratic governance and poverty reduction policies is a guarantee that we face up to the challenges of sustainable human development with special consideration of dynamics of inequality and exclusion, gender inequality, violent conflict and environmental degradation. 
In doing so, the centre has four areas of engagement, linking democratic governance to poverty reduction with the aim of developing policy analysis, advocacy and program tools:

Governance in the MDGs

This is an initiative that started in 2007 aimed at contributing to the development of means that foster responsive institutions of service delivery and enhance inclusive participation in the fight against poverty.  It is meant to provide policy guidance for, scope experiences on and develop program tools of how to bring democratic governance into global efforts at poverty reduction and achieving the MDGs. This is set within a context of an emerging global discourse on the need to address political considerations of power relations and dynamics of inequality and marginalization in the context of poverty reduction strategies and MDG planning and costing.  The role of rule of law in the inclusive fulfilment of the MDGs, including the role of the formal and informal justice systems in protecting individual and collective rights, is also important here. 

Objectives:

  • To contribute to conceptual clarity on the importance of democratic governance for achieving the MDGs. This entails an empowered and engaged society that is able to hold the state accountable and demand effective institutions through participative processes (such as national and local elections) and effective, representative institutions (such as parliament and local councils). 
  • To provide clarity on the various ways of bringing democratic governance into the MDG-based planning processes and into delivery and monitoring, be that via Poverty reduction strategies, direct budget support, sector support or other aid instrumentalities
  • To capture UN-wide attempts at linking democratic governance to MDG reporting, MDG-based national and local planning and to document innovative approaches and partnerships.
  • To provide practical tools for linking MDGs to democratic governance assessments

Democratic Governance Assessments

Reflecting the critical outcome of the Millennium Declaration and the World Summit 2005 which highlighted democratic governance as a requirement for inclusive development and the achievement of the MDGs, countries are increasingly pressed to assess and measure their progress towards democratic governance as both end and means. A direct effect of this encouraging trend, UNDP Country Offices register a rising demand to assist national counterparts develop their capacity to engage in nationally owned and driven democratic governance assessments. In response, capacity development for country-led governance assessments and measurements are a priority in UNDP Strategic Plan for 2008-2011, and they are also a flagship support area for the UNDP Democratic Governance Group (DGG) and its Oslo Governance Centre (OGC), which   has been supporting national initiatives for monitoring and measuring governance focused on the development of national governance indicators since 2003.


Through the Global Programme on Capacity Development for Democratic Governance Assessments and Measurements, UNDP seeks to assist developing countries produce disaggregated and non-ranking governance indicators to enable national stakeholders to better monitor performance in democratic governance reforms. The aim of the Programme, co-ordinated by the Oslo Governance Centre, is to develop the capacities of government, the national statistics office and civil society in the collection, maintenance and analysis of governance related data and to assist the development of an inclusive and consultative framework for the systematic assessment and monitoring of democratic governance goals and targets expressed in national development plans. The Global Programme from 2008 to 2011 is a continuation of the work that formed part of the Governance Indicators Project from 2004 to 2007.


More information can be found on our Democratic Governance Assessments page.

Democratic Pro Poor Land Governance

A Cross Practice Initiative (CPI) on democratic and pro poor land governance has been launched since 2006 between the Democratic Governance group [through OGC] and the Energy and Environment group [through the Drylands Development Centre DDC]. The initiative promotes and aims to build UNDP capacity related to the cross-cutting issues of mutually reinforcing democratic governance/pro-poor land policies. In forgoing years, the CPI has, among others, resulted in a UNDP-wide survey on land governance activities; a workshop on “Pro-poor land governance: exploring opportunities for concerted action” that took place in Oslo (January 2007), and the publication and presentation of several commissioned briefs and discussion papers. OGC services in 2008 will include program support and knowledge management and production. OGC will be able to deliver on these with extensive partnerships with BDP colleagues, regional bureaux, and regional centres, as well as other UN agencies. OGC hopes to nurture and broaden partnerships with Nordic and southern institutions outside the UN.

Objectives

  • To explore the main features of a democratic and pro-poor approach to land governance
  • To  identify challenges to inclusive participation and responsive institutions as well as innovative solutions which enhance accountability of land policies
  • To enhance country office capacity to program for land policies in ways that promote poverty reduction, pro-poor and gender empowerment, civic engagement
  • To assess possibilities for enhancing the legal empowerment of the poor.

More information can be found on our Land Governance page

 

Democratic Governance of Non Renewable Natural Resources NRNR

There is increasing recognition that achieving the MDGs and long term sustainable development require the harnessing of domestic resources, including the expansion of domestic fiscal space.  Windfall from non renewable natural resources (NRNR) presents a window of opportunity to do just that. Enhancing democratic governance of expenditure of NRNR revenue is critical in this regard. This project addresses the need for policy and technical assistance in order to better ensure that revenue from NRNR contributes equitably to improvements in people’s lives as reflected in the achievement of the MDGs, balancing rising demand for energy with environmental sustainability and sensitivity to social and economic inclusion of women, indigenous peoples and vulnerable groups.  A number of countries have been found to have UNDP programmatic presence that would benefit from better documentation of global experience and better management of knowledge.  This project intends to address this need -in cooperation with regional bureaux and regional centres, other UNDP bureaux and multilateral organizations and research/think tanks, both in the North and the South.

Objectives

  • Global documentation and critical assessment of existing policy guidelines and technical tools to support spending of NRNR revenue on equitable social service delivery, local development and environmental management.
  • Global documentation and critical assessment of field experiences fostering civic engagement and enhancing accountability of non renewable natural resource revenue expenditure for equitable social service delivery, esp. at the local level.
  • Knowledge management through development of portal, communities of practice and global/regional partnerships with private sector and national / international CSOs.

 

For further information please contact: