How to Add Existing Field in One2Many Tree View in Odoo 17
2008 02-education-swa ps-africa-csos-mundy
1. EDUCATION SWAPS IN AFRICA: LESSONS FOR CSOS
BY
KAREN MUNDY & MEGAN HAGGERTY
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
INTERNATIONAL FORUM ON CIVIL SOCIETY AND AID EFFECTIVENESS
GATINEAU, QUEBEC FEBRUARY 3-6, 2008
1. SUMMARY
Internationally-funded sector programs in education have spread rapidly across Africa
since 2000. These programs are sharply influenced by the aid effectiveness agenda: they
revolve around a nationally developed, and comprehensive education sector plan; they focus
most centrally on the realization of universal access to good quality basic education (both as a
basic foundation for development and a fundamental human right); and they move in the
direction of harmonization and alignment of bilateral and multilateral assistance in the education
sector around the national sector plan. For some countries, including the four discussed in this
paper (Burkina Faso, Mali, Kenya and Tanzania), such sector programs have led to significant
increases in the number of children in school.
Education sector programs in Africa have also incorporated a significantly new emphasis
on the inclusion of civil society actors - in policy dialogue, and in program implementation.
However, the recognition given to civil society actors in the education sector (by government
and donor organizations) has remained uneven, and there is a strong sense among CSOs that
their traditional roles (as service providers), and the funding base for these roles, is eroding.
Furthermore CSOs’ capacity for sustained voice and representation in the planning and
implementation of education sector SWAPs has remained quite limited, although this varies by
country. The expectation remains that CSOs can play a significant role in holding donors and
governments accountable to their sector promises.
This case study reviews the CSO experience in four countries, based on fieldwork in
Kenya, Mali, Tanzania and Burkina Faso in 2006. It answers two primary questions:
• Have CSOs gained a seat at the new education sector policy table – if yes or no, what
factors limit or encourage their effective engagement?
• What kinds of gaps in capacity do CSOs have in this new policy environment?
We suggest that CSOs in Tanzania and Burkina Faso have managed to achieve a
considerably degree of voice in the new SWAP-directed education policy arena. In both
countries, a cohesive national CSO umbrella network in education has emerged to represent a
broad range of CSO actors. Kenya and Mali have seen more fragmented CSO engagement in the
national policy arena. In all cases, though CSOs are included in policy dialogue, there is limited
transparency or regularity in the processes through which CSOs are selected for engagement in
the SWAP process, either by donor organizations or by their home governments.
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2. Our research also reveals a mismatch in the roles for CSOs as outlined in the education
sector plans, expressed by the national governments, and perceived by the international donors
and civil society itself. Although the importance of CSOs in democratic engagement and
empowerment of marginalized peoples is recognized by donors and civil society alike,
governments tended to perceive CSOs’ proper role as service providers, filling the gaps not yet
covered by the government. Governments are often uncomfortable with CSOs’ attempts to act as
citizen watchdogs or challenge the established national plans of the government. Donor
organizations, for their part, continue to fund CSOs primarily as service providers, even though
they offer much rhetorical support for the notion of CSOs as agents of citizen voice and
oversight.
Key Lessons:
• To differing degrees across our case studies, CSOs have demonstrated they can play a
significant important role in providing a form for citizen-led accountability that enhances aid
effectiveness. Through promoting citizen awareness of education rights, monitoring
government policies and plans, and sharing information on education policies with the public
and media, they have the capacity to considerably enhance aid effectiveness.
• Coordination among civil society actors can improve their voice and recognition in the new
aid context. However, such coordination is difficult to achieve for several reasons.
International funding for CSO activities other than direct service provision is limited. CSO
capacities in the areas of policy dialogue, using research, and mobilizing public voice are
recent and weak. Historical divisions and tensions among different CSO groups, especially
between teachers’ unions and NGO service providers, and between INGOs and national
NGOs, also limit coordination and voice.
• There is a clear need for transparent procedural frameworks for civil society engagement at
the national level, including rules around the selection of CSO representatives, and
establishing regular opportunities for CSO-government and CSO-donor consultation.
• Donor organizations also need to establish a well-informed and coordinated strategy for
supporting CSO involvement in the education sector, as well as transparent rules and
processes to select CSOs they interact with and support. Because CSO engagement, capacity
and coordination in the education sector varies widely across countries, there is a need to
carefully tailor any effort to support better CSO recognition and voice to national contexts
and histories. Furthermore, support for CSOs should allow and encourage CSOs to play a
more significant “mutual accountability” role – in tracking and monitoring the quality of
international aid to education and its effectiveness.
• Decentralization of the administration and financing of education are among the most
common reforms in education SWAPs. While this opens up new opportunities for CSOs to
engage with citizens at the community level, it also stretches their capacity for coordination,
oversight and advocacy at the national level.
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3. 2. COUNTRY CASE STUDIES
The countries of Burkina Faso, Mali, Tanzania and Kenya have all moved towards
greater political freedom in recent years, and as part of this process new national development
plans have given greater attention to the basic right of citizens to education. All four countries
have Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) that emphasize the importance of basic
education. Each has an internationally-supported national education sector program that focuses
on the expansion of quality education at the primary level – these programs have engendered a
significant degree of donor coordination at the national level, with a donor committee and annual
donor reviews of the sector in each country. Kenya and Tanzania have made public
commitments to abolish primary school fees; Mali and Burkina Faso have taken a more
gradualist approach, continuing to rely on private, community or NGO-funded schools for a
significant share of educational expansion.
In all four countries, the terms “partnership” and “participation” of non-governmental
actors feature prominently in the national education sector plans – a fundamentally new
departure from past policy deliberations. However, the way in which partnership and
participation is defined remains vague. All four countries acknowledge a new role for civil
society in the development and monitoring of national policy goals, though this is often
expressed as improving the accountability of decentralized levels (especially in Mali).
Partnership is also described in terms of the community and private sector inputs that are seen as
essential to achieve the goals outlined in the plans. Only Tanzania’s sector plan specifically cites
“advocacy” as a legitimate role for CSOs in the education sector.
Reference to partnership in most sector plans tends to be aspirational and to assume
harmonious, collaborative interaction with CSOs. There is little discussion of competing
interests or goals – as for example, between NGOs and teachers’ unions, where a history of
donor intervention (supporting NGO and community schools and non-unionized teachers)
continues to divide civil society.
While all sector plans mention the value of stakeholder consultation, none of the sector
plans we reviewed provided clear frameworks or benchmarks for civil society consultation and
engagement in national policy settings. There is a further complication here: while sector
programs tend to emphasize a new accountability role for civil society actors, this is mainly
envisaged at the local or community level – through parent councils, district committees, etc.
There is little clarity about how/whether local level accountability structures will feed into
national level CSO capacity to act as a watchdog over national and international commitments
and promises in education.
Civil Society Engagement in the Education Policy Arena
Huge variation exists across our case countries, both in capacities and interests of
different types of CSO actors, and in terms of intra-CSO relationships, capacity to mobilize
around a common agenda, and ability to affect education policy. The brief summaries provided
below only begin to demonstrate these differences. These distinctive civil society experiences
highlight the fact that there are challenges to both more contentious and more collaborative
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4. forms of CSO engagement. They also suggest that support for civil society engagement in the
policy arena will need to take into account specific country contexts, and must not assume
harmonized interests or abilities of CSOs.
In Tanzania, CSO engagement is relatively well-coordinated and includes impressive
use of evidence-based policy advocacy. The CSO coalition, the Tanzanian Education Network
(TEN/MET), is effective in mobilizing a wide range of members around a common policy
platform. TEN/MET includes INGOs in its membership, and has benefited substantially from
INGOs, who have provided both financing and international leverage for key policy tasks.
However, TEN/MET’s leadership is primarily drawn from national and subnational NGOs and
significant attention is paid to building links to subnational groups. In spite of this strength, there
is a perceived weakness in the capacity of the CSO coalition to reach rural and more
marginalized CSOs and citizen groups. Of the four countries, TEN/MET is the most effective
critic and watchdog over national and international basic education commitments. However,
CSO efforts to play watchdog roles have not been well-received by government, with tensions
heightened in 2005-2006 when the government placed an interdiction on a national watchdog
(Haki-Elimu) and tried to prevent its participation at the policy table, despite the watchdog
having been chosen by TEN/MET to represent the network. In addition, because the
government-donor-CSO deliberations mainly take place around (access to) basic education, other
levels of education change have until late been largely ignored. In 2006, TEN/MET began to
receive a pooled fund from donor organizations to support its advocacy, research and
mobilization activities. This funding promises to further enhance TEN/MET’s voice and
capacity, and guarantees it a degree of autonomy from both government and individual donors
not realized in our other country cases.
In Burkina Faso, CSOs were initially marginalized in the policy discussions that led to
the formulation of the education sector plan in 2002 (despite rhetoric encouraging an increase in
their involvement in the final document). Teachers’ unions in particular were excluded because
of the government’s recognition of their opposition to aspects of the plan. Burkina Faso has since
developed a national education CSO coalition, the Cadre de Concertation en Education de Base
(CCEB), which is relatively cohesive and effective. CCEB is especially active at the regional
level, which now is the location of much education decision-making. Its members work
cooperatively and effectively to generate civil society voice on issues of gender, curricular
reform and regional planning. CSO consultation at the national and regional levels in Burkina
Faso is now routine, with CCEB playing a role in relating regional to national levels of decision
making. In contrast to Tanzania, relations with government are non-conflictual. Furthermore, a
unique feature of the Burkina sector program has created a new space for CSO initiative, through
the establishment of a CSO-government governed pooled fund for nonformal education projects.
However, in contrast to many other civil society coalitions, CCEB has not made universal free
access to primary education a central part of its mobilization efforts. The coalition still has a
limited a capacity for monitoring national educational quality and equity issues, and limited
ability to engage a wider public on education issues.
In Kenya, civil society organizations came together at the time of the countries first fully
free multi-party elections, and formed the ElimuYetu Coalition (EYC). This coalition played a
very important role in lobbying citizens and political leadership – its campaign and research on
school fees and declining enrollments helped influence the winning political party to declare
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5. abolition of elementary school fees upon its election. However, EYC has since lost much of its
capacity and voice. It does not seem to play an effective watchdog role in the context of the new
sector program, and has remained highly dependent on its hosting organization, the INGO
ActionAid. Competition for funding, and varied views about the right direction for future
education sector expansion within education civil society seems to explain this deterioration.
While some CSOs have emerged as trusted policy partners in the recent education SWAP
(around issues such as gender and early childhood education), there is little overall capacity for
monitoring government and donor commitments to universalizing good quality education. Some
of this weakness reflects larger tensions between the government and CSOs: there continues to
be a perceived threat of government reprisals over critical advocacy and monitoring work, and
CSOs have little traction with parliamentarians. Echoing a pattern we saw in other countries,
most CSOs in Kenya have tended to focus their energies on gaining individual leverage inside
the Ministry of Education, through complimentary service and contracting roles, instead of
through active advocacy and monitoring.
CSO engagement in education policy in Mali has a distinctive history. On the one hand,
the 1990s witnessed an impressive level of coordination among NGOs involved in the
community school movement, in part funded from international NGOs and donor organizations.
However, the 1990s also saw strong efforts to limit the power of Mali’s teachers’ unions and
national post-secondary student associations in educational decision-making. Perhaps not so
surprisingly, there are contradictory views from these different CSOs on the degree of voice they
had in the design of the education sector plan. Many local CSOs view the sector plan as being
largely donor-led, and modeled from a pre-established policy reform model. Teachers’ and
parents’ associations and some national NGOs feel they were not adequately consulted, and
continue to object to key aspects of the program. This is contrasted to the view of INGOs and
NGOs with strong international links and traditionally large roles in direct service provision, who
feel that the sector plan was the result of wide-consultation, and are pleased that the government
has adopted several of the lessons learned from the NGO-sponsored community school
movement, including building pro-active school level management structures for civil society
participation.
Although a number of CSO coordinating groups have emerged in Mali over the last 10
years, CSOs in Mali tend to bargain individually rather than collectively. At the time of our
research CSO engagement in Mali’s education sector program appeared fragmented and
disorganized. As well, our research found that many Malian CSOs lacked understanding of the
decision-making spaces within the sector program: few participate in the consultative structures,
joint evaluation missions or joint thematic groups. The fragmentation and lack of coordination
may help explain why donors and civil society actors alike noted an overall diminishing level of
CSO participation in the education policy arena, in contrast to the other cases.
3. LESSONS FROM THE COUNTRY CASES ON GOVERNMENT-CSO RELATIONSHIPS
Across our cases, there is a new recognition of CSOs as legitimate participants in
education sector programs, and new opportunities for CSOs to engage with governments and
donors in the education policy arena. However, governments often continue to view the
appropriate role for CSOs as primarily in service provision, as shown by one senior education
official in Kenya who thought it was the government’s role, not CSOs, to be the think-tank
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6. around policy development, ensure quality control, monitor and evaluate its own progress.
Governments view CSO watchdog activities (including monitoring, evaluation, and
identification of important issues missing from the sector plans) with caution and occasional
anger. In Tanzania, government representatives felt a watchdog CSO had betrayed the trust that
accompanied the CSOs’ invitation to the policy table when the watchdog used its access to
information to criticize the government.
According to CSOs, there was a clear desire by governments in all countries to retain
centralized control of planning and implementation, as in line with the Paris Declaration. In
several cases, this has led to government officials expressing new interest in tapping NGO
resources for national development plans, or having NGO contributions formally evaluated as
part of sector programs. For example, in Mali there was a failed proposal to have NGOs
contribute 1% of their budget towards government monitoring. Government attempts of control
have extended beyond financial considerations, however. The legal frameworks through which
CSOs must register in each country, although aiding autonomy and status for CSOs, have also
limited advocacy and political mobilization by these actors. The threat of deregistration has
historically been used in Tanzania and Kenya to silence oppositional actors.
Although CSOs reject the notion of being simply subcontractors for complementary
service provision, many of those interviewed (particularly well-established NGOs/INGOs) were
pleased to work collaboratively with the government to meet the sector goals. Nonetheless,
several CSOs told us that they perceive a direct tension between their service provision/
subcontracting roles and efforts to monitor and advocate for change in governmental policies.
In all our case countries, the government controls which CSOs get invited to the policy
table, and for which purposes. This can create winners and losers among CSOs, especially where
there is no national education-CSO coordinating group in place. CSOs also distinguished
between being “consulted” and being “participative”, noting that CSO presence at the policy
table does not equate with influence. While most governments consult a variety of CSO actors,
there is significantly more consultation with national and international CSOs holding
‘complementary’ views, and with organizations that speak the language of international
education sector programs and reforms. However, CSOs should not be viewed as powerless,
especially where there is active coordination among CSOs. For example, in response to the
Tanzanian government’s attempts to limit the participation of one watchdog at the policy table,
the Tanzanian Education Network en masse boycotted the annual joint evaluation of the
education sector (attended by all donors and government), stating that the network should be the
ones to decide which of their members represent them at the policy table. This forced both
donors and the government to address CSO concerns. However, the significant potential that
CSOs with large memberships– such as teachers’ unions, faith-based groups and parents’
associations – have in terms of leveraging public engagement on such educational issues as
equality and quality of services, is both underutilized by CSOs and under-appreciated by
government and donors.
Finally, we noted that across all our case studies CSOs rarely engage in relationships with
parliamentarians or parliamentary committees. There is a neglect of formal political and
parliamentary channels for representing citizens and guaranteeing their basic human rights
(including the right to education). Government-CSO relations in education are usually confined
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7. to interactions between CSOs and the Ministry of Education, with some interactions with local
elected officials (particularly for fundraising), but rarely with the Ministry of Finance (which
often controls education expenditure, and shapes the use of direct budgetary support).
Overall, our case studies suggest the need for a number of improvements in the
relationships between governments and CSOs in the education sector. These include:
• Legal frameworks that allow civil society to freely represent their constituents, without
the threat of deregistration.
• Formal processes for CSO selection that articulate how individual CSOs are chosen to
represent civil society at the policy table, and any limitations the government places on
their participation. (Obviously, a jointly agreed selection process would be best).
• A clear timetable laying out scheduled meetings with governments, donors and civil
society, allowing all parties equal access to information and opportunity for CSOs to get
proper feedback from their constituents.
• More active engagement with Parliamentarians. There is a need for governments to
enhance parliamentary oversight on education, and for CSOs to more actively engage
elected representatives.
4. LESSONS FROM THE COUNTRY CASES ON DONOR-CSO RELATIONSHIPS
Relationships between donor organizations and CSOs have changed rapidly in the
context of the new sector programs. Despite donors’ overall commitment to CSO engagement in
implementation, monitoring and evaluation, CSOs in all case countries documented a drop in
international funding for their activities (sometimes precipitously), as aid moved sector funding
and (in the Tanzanian case) general budget support. Several Malian CSOs expressed frustration
at donors’ tendency to fund their own country’s NGOs rather than directly funding Southern
groups. CSOs also noted a decline in opportunities to meet with international donors and
technical partners following the introduction of the sector plans. As one Burkinabe CSO
commented, “Sometimes one has the impression that the donor agencies consider NGOs a bit of
a nuisance...that they see us as either agitators or that we are standing cap in hand for their
[sector-targeted] money.” Only in Tanzania did CSOs expressly mention donors as cautious but
significant allies, keeping them informed of policy discussions and rescheduled government
meetings, and sharing documents and information.
A significant finding across our case countries was that donors lack a well-informed and
coordinated strategy for supporting CSO involvement in education. Nor do donors have
transparent rules or processes to select which CSOs they interact with and support. Donors knew
comparatively little about national and subnational CSOs and their capacities, nor about
education sector CSOs funded by other branches of their own organizations. Except in Tanzania,
donors have generally shown limited interest in providing core funding that might enable
national CSOs to engage in sustained and autonomous programs of research or advocacy. Our
general impression was that donors wanted to support CSOs, but are not sure how to proceed in
the new policy context.
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8. A final caution was expressed by CSOs in regards to their autonomy and relations with
donors. CSOs believe they have a legitimate role in monitoring donors and their commitments to
sector programs in education, although donors’ beliefs in this regard were unclear. However, the
fact that many CSOs rely on international donors for their funding limits their capacity to play
this “mutual accountability” role. An interesting effort has been launched, under the
international Global Campaign for Education, to link Southern education-CSO coalitions with
Northern education coalitions. Although still in its infancy, this is a promising model for
enhancing “mutual accountability” – providing a direct link between the citizens of countries
receiving education aid, and citizens in donor countries capable using information about aid
failure generated by Southern CSOs to hold their own governments accountable.
At times it is in the political interest of both donors and governments to ignore the areas
where the government has failed to meet its targets, while highlighting the successes. For
example, in Tanzania, donors and governments alike celebrate the incredible strides the
government had made in increasing access to primary education. The Tanzanian government
uses education as its poster child, demonstrating its good work. Donors, similarly, have used the
Tanzanian success to demonstrate to their home constituencies that their aid was being effective.
It is important to recognize that it is not in the political interest of either group to clearly show
the areas where the government has not made progress. Civil society actors have been more
critical.
External actors face a delicate task when supporting the more “political” of the roles
played by civil society actors. They must do so while continuing to support government
leadership and ownership of sector programs; in ways that do not imply partisanship; and that do
not carry the threat of sanction or hegemony. Nonetheless, our case countries suggest that
external actors can assist in seven important ways:
• Dialogue with governments about the establishment of legal frameworks, formal
processes and better government receptivity to CSO policy, oversight and public
deliberation roles.
• Argue for more transparent, regularized and democratic processes for the inclusion of
civil society representation in the formal processes engendered by national education
sector plans.
• Provide reliable core support for coalitions/networks in a way that ensures autonomy.
• Support neglected civil society actors or interests – such as teachers’ unions and smaller
subnational or thematic groups – to develop productive forms of engagement in national
policy deliberation.
• Support international linkages between Northern and Southern citizens and their
organizations, especially where governments inhibit CSO engagement, or where civil
society capacity is weak.
• Support civil society organizations’ capacities for coordination and policy voice.
• Assist CSOs that link decentralized forms of citizen input to national policy processes.
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9. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cross-case Analysis:
Mundy, K., Cherry, S., Haggerty, M., Maclure, R. & Sivasubramaniam, M. (2007). Basic
education, civil society participation and the new aid architecture: Lessons from Burkina
Faso, Kenya, Mali and Tanzania. Toronto: Comparative and International Development
Centre, OISE/UT, available at: http://cide.oise.utoronto.ca/civil_society
Field Studies:
Cherry, S. & Mundy, K. (2007). Civil society and the governance of basic education: Mali
country field study. Toronto: Comparative and International Development Centre,
OISE/UT, available at: http://cide.oise.utoronto.ca/civil_society
Haggerty, M., Manion, C. & Mundy, K. (2007). Civil society and the governance of basic
education: Tanzania country field study. Toronto: Comparative and International
Development Centre, OISE/UT, available at: http://cide.oise.utoronto.ca/civil_society
Maclure, R., Kabore, B., Meyong, C. & Lavan, D. (2007). Civil society and the governance of
basic education: Burkina Faso country field study. Toronto: Comparative and
International Development Centre, OISE/UT and University of Ottawa, available at:
http://cide.oise.utoronto.ca/civil_society
Sivasubramaniam, M. & Mundy, K. (2007). Civil society and the governance of basic education:
Kenya country field study. Toronto: Comparative and International Development Centre,
OISE/UT, available at: http://cide.oise.utoronto.ca/civil_society
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