Participative policy making has become an important feature within the development field. Participation is important because it gives a wider range of stakeholders a say in the policy process. This ensures policies are formed through bottom-up rather than top-down processes.

A recent study by the DFID funded Policy Innovation Systems for Clean Energy Security (PISCES) has developed a methodology for participatory policy dialogue. The initiative comes on the back of an aim to develop a methodology for participatory dialogue in the development of bioenergy policy in Kenya.

Dialogue is crucial within the policy-making process. It provides representation, consensus building, along with a consultative element. Successful dialogue is dependent on the ability to be able to identify the key stakeholders.

PISCES has looked closely at a number of commonly applied approaches that are used to identify stakeholders. The first is a sectoral based approach. This involves inviting representatives of key sectors to articulate their position on policy issues. Second, the open invitation approach often involves advertisements in the public media or calls for expression of interest.

Thirdly, interest groups can provide broad based knowledge and enthusiastic input into the policy process. However, they not always be classed as key stakeholders. The Final approach covered is the ‘closed’ invitation approach. This approach is often used by governments and is often without rationale and clear justification for being invited.

These methods of identifying stakeholders have a number of advantages. One of the clearest is the short time required from identification to bringing them together. Often interpersonal networks between stakeholders are already strong, and there is a great deal of familiarity between stakeholders.

However, there are also a number of disadvantages to these approaches. At the forefront is the tendency of these approaches to be subjective. This means that the process is often inherently biased and exclusive in nature, with unequal representation among stakeholders.

PISCES has identified that to get a wide range of relevant stakeholders there is a need for an innovative mechanism of selection. They propose a Market Mapping Approach. This approach was originally developed as a tool for identifying linkages and process issues within markets of products or services.

The concept is based on identifying the key actor’s associated with these linkages. This can be applied to stakeholder identification in the same way by identifying different relationships or linkages across a policy network.

These linkages are broken into three distinct levels. The first level is made up of key players who have a vested interest in the policy from its conception to its delivery. Using the Market Mapping Approach the importance of stakeholders is assessed through the relative importance assigned by the market.

The second level is made up of those stakeholders involved in regulating or enabling the market environment. These people shape the rules of the game. In the case of biofuels these stakeholders are involved directly and indirectly in the primary production of biofuels.

The third level of stakeholders is made up of those actors providing supporting services. These services can include transportation of goods, design, equipment production, retailers and information providers, among others. These stakeholders often influence market forces so there is strategic benefit for bringing them on board.

The Market Mapping Approach may provide a systematic method of identifying stakeholders. The rationale for using it is the ease with which linkages can be identified, through which the relative weights of the various actors become apparent. PISCES has found that this approach has brought new and important actors in to the policy process, many of which had been worryingly overlooked in the past.

Project records for PISCES are available on R4D through the following link: PISCES

Mental health issues are often not the first thing people think of when it comes to the challenges facing people in the developing world. Nevertheless, the DFID funded Mental Health and Poverty Project (MHaPP) continues to show that mental health issues reinforce the negative cycle of poverty in many developing countries.

The nature of policy design is an important element in successfully targeting mental health issues. Research by the MHaPP in South Africa has examined mental health policy and systems. The research focuses on South Africa’s Mental Health Act, no 17 of 2002, which seeks to develop community based mental health services and support. The aim is to get mental health service users back into community life, while also ensuring they continue to get the support they require.

However, despite the potential of this policy a number of challenges are faced in its implementation. Firstly, psychiatric hospitals continue to dominate as a mode of service provision in South Africa. Secondly, although deinstitutionalisation is taking place in the health service, this has not been matched by an increase in the level of community care. This is placing much of the burden on families and already stretched community health centres.

This research is indicative of the tensions that take place within the policy making process. The danger here is that a potentially beneficial policy initiative is not developed because of wider changes to health services in South Africa. There is clearly a need for the development of a community-based mental health  service. The research suggests that NGOs may be able to provide the initial management structures to provide this.

MHaPP provides a framework for the development of district mental health services. It suggests the necessary changes can take place by building on existing resources, and implementing a series of structural changes across the current system. However, the challenge now is to ensure that policy makers in South Africa understand the importance of these changes, and the effective implementation of the Mental Health Act.

If you would like to find out more, the project record is available on R4D through the following link: Mental Health and Poverty Project (MHaPP)

The Pathways of Women’s Empowerment, a DFID funded research consortium, has published an interesting policy brief on women’s political empowerment. The paper claims that the assumption that the number of women in public office can be used as an adequate measure for assessing women’s political voice does not hold true.

The view that female public officials, by virtue of their gender, will automatically seek to promote gender specific issues and women’s rights has been put under increasing scrutiny. This has emerged out of more in-depth analysis relating to the concept of ‘representation’.

In many electoral systems representation is where members of a political constituency vote for a representative to pursue their interests. In turn, this representative is accountable to the constituents and reliant upon their continuing support. This is a territorially based understanding of representation. However, many people who vote for women’s empowerment are not necessarily clustered in a territorially defined constituency.

Evidence from India, where 30 per cent of local council seats have been reserved for women and other excluded groups, shows that the reserved seat system works well for those groups that are geographically concentrated.  Yet, where a concentration of groups is not evident the reservation of seats is a less effective means to empower these people.

The paper questions whether the focus on women in politics is contributing to the erosion of the representative function of the state by assuming that women in office will bring rewards for women. It accepts that the having more woman in public office is a sign of progress, but that there is a need for a realistic assessment of what quotas are able to achieve in a context where politics is patronage based.

The paper suggests that an appropriate assessment might be made by directing the focus away from formal representation toward non-formal institutions where women’s engagement can be deliberated upon. Political parties, civil society groups, and media associations may provide the backdrop to form a better understanding of how women articulate and aggregate their interests.

The full policy brief can be found through the following link on R4D: Women’s political empowerment

Academic? Journalist? Policy maker? Charity worker? Student? … The list goes on, but if you need an invaluable source of research and knowledge on development issues carried out by leading thinkers, on a wide range of topics in the social and ‘hard’ sciences then R4D might just make your life a great deal easier!

R4D currently contains over 5000 projects from the mid 1990s onwards and over 21,000 documents. It provides project information, including data on the organisations and countries involved.  Furthermore, the database can be searched easily, and means you can access a great deal of development research all in one place.

Some of the recent research projects on the R4D portal include a discussion paper written by Brigadier General Jeffery Marshall (Director of Mobilization and Reserve Affairs at the US European Command), for the Crisis States Research Centre. This paper develops a set of detailed recommendations that aim to build the capacity of the African Standby Force and its ability to contribute to peacekeeping missions. This paper can be found here.

Another paper published by IDS outlines the unintended pluralisation of political representation that is taking place in Brazil as a consequence of participatory governance. The paper provides a strong message to both the developed and developing world that the ‘new governance’ approach carries immediate historical and political challenges for the future quality of democracy. This paper can be found here.

Finally, another recent study by the Research and Policy in Development Group (RAPID) at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) and the Science and Development Network (SciDev.Net) has developed a number of systematic guidelines on how policy briefs should be framed. The research outlines how this tool can provide an effective means to communicate research to policy-makers and development practitioners. The specific design of policy briefs has been identified as an important factor on the level of influence this tool can have. This paper can be found here.

If you want specific information on a  topic, or country you can subscribe to R4D. This provide you with up to date information on your area of interest on a regular basis.  So you will always be the first with breaking research news!

In the following video Benedict Tembo of the Zambia Daily Mail, speaking at the recent World Conference of Science Journalists, discusses what he has learnt at the event. In particular, he has found how valuable interaction with scientists and researchers is. He has also become more aware what DFID does in his country and signed upto R4D, which he believes will provide valuable knowledge and information to his future work.

A new DFID working paper explores the process of ’state-building’ – the process through which states enhance their ability to function – in development.

This paper provides a way for readers to understand states, and the processes that drive their development. It outlines language and key concepts for state-building; it examines those factors that are likely to influence the direction of state-building, including issues that are shaped by policy decisions; and it concludes with some implications of this work for donors.

Download the working paper
See more on DFID’s Research Strategy on Governance in Challenging Environments

The new research strategy More on the consultation process View outputs of DFID-funded research

DFID’s new research strategy is moving on from past work in the area of governance – “”moving into much more difficult territory” according to Senior Governance Advisor Richard Thomas:

This point is re-emphasized by Julius Court, DFID Governance Advisor: “Governance is perhaps the single most important factor determining whether a country develops or not, so understanding governance, particularly in the most fragile and conflict-prone States, that’s the real challenge for us going forward.” This will not be easy as the issues are politically sensitive. The “big challenge is that we are increasingly putting our money into fragile contexts,” and understanding those contexts is crucial both for people on the ground as well as for the effectiveness of DFID’s work.

Capacity development is at the heart of the new strategy. In the governance area, the aim is not to ‘roll out’ known western models. According to Thomas: the aim is to “enable people in different countries to find different local models of democratic development … We are certainly looking for alternatives that enable the freedoms to occur, possibly by a different route.”

The point is highlighted by Court: “the governance research supported by DFID is not intended to “impose any western models” on local situations. “What we really need to do is understand how those places work, what local processes have legitimacy, where can we build upon those, …”

Share your comments on the strategy

The new research strategy More on the consultation process View outputs of DFID-funded research

To prepare its future research strategy, DFID launched a public consultation exercise in 2007. This posting highlights some of the key messages of the outreach phase on what research DFID should support. It covers ’sustainable agriculture’, ‘climate change’; ‘governance’; and ‘other emerging trends and issues’. See also ‘killer diseases and healthcare.’

Researching sustainable agriculture

DFID should take a strategic long view in supporting sustainable agricultural development.

Focus on sustainable economic development, in particular on marketing of products for export, regional but also national.

Pay extra attention to work that will improve economic opportunities and growth.

Focus on efforts to help farmers get market security and maintain the environment.

Mechanism to transfer the knowledge and technology to small farmers and marginal farmers should be developed.

There are a lot of indigenous agricultural technologies that people have initiated, specially the poor. And we have to base research on those indigenous technologies.

Organic farming is highly neglected.

Improving research into the impact of climate change

Concentrate research on the possible resilient mechanism for rural poor to the impact of climate change on livelihoods.

The impact of climate change on poor communities is worthy of research, but it would be far more important to invest in demonstrations of adaptation to climate change.

DFID should fund research to develop coping mechanisms for coastal fishermen and small farmers.

Emphasis should be on how to improve the resilience and adaptation capacity of communities to drought and high temperature induced changes and variability.

Climate variability and climate change are very important issues for the fisheries sector.

Improving research into good governance

Conceptual frameworks which can help develop criteria and indicators of good governance in specific sectors of national economies should be developed. So we can ‘measure’ them in practice.

Good governance is typically situation-specific, so generalities are unlikely to be the most appropriate way for DFID to invest. Instead, DFID should invest in developing improved governance models in specific situations, and then building upward from that experience.

Other emerging global trends

Microfinance as a strategy for poverty-reduction

The cutting-edge science that is much needed is in the energy sector.

The most important global trend requiring DFID research is the transition from petroleum-based economic development to whatever comes next.

Exhaustion of fossil fuels and alternative energies, in particular, bio energy.

Migration is a very crucial issue for a country, not only the international migration but also the internal migration [to cities]

There are major conflicts surrounding faith. So it seems we need to understand better how faith interacts with development curriculum.

Between August and November 2007, some 600 people responded to an online survey through the DFID web site. A further 12-question survey coordinated by Euforic mobilised a further 100 contributions as well as longer submissions from DNet Bangladesh and the Forum for African Agricultural Research. A series of face to face meetings were also held in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Uganda.Get more information on DFID-funded research:

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This posting gives a flavour of the contributions to the initial DFID survey on the question: How can DFID improve research into good governance, including social and policy design areas?

Asked to suggest priorities for ‘research into fragile and post-conflict states’, respondents considered not just post-conflict justice and state building as important, but also the need to research the prevention of conflict. Several respondents pointed out that it was vital to learn from other countries’ experiences. There needed to be context specific research in countries which have come through periods of violent conflict and are now in the process of building new structures; it is necessary to carry out a careful empirical assessment of recent conflict policies and their contribution to prevention as well as recovery and to learn from failures as well as successes.

To promote accountable state and non-state service providers most respondents said that corruption had to be prevented or abolished. Many did not elaborate further. Among those who did, there was no clear consensus of opinion. A code of ethics and diversity polices in the workplace were mentioned by some, others cited the need to understand grass roots justice. Other key statements included the need for accountability to come from all organisations operating within a state not simply those belonging to the state.

On the more general question of governance and social challenges, four major categories emerged: the need for good governance, managing decentralisation, service delivery, and policy.

Good governance cut across all the suggested areas of research, with case studies mentioned as an important way to learn and apply lessons. A note of caution is that governance needs to be defined before other work could be done.

On managing decentralisation, grass roots participation and democracy at all levels were considered as essential. Suggested research directions mainly related to how interaction between central government and other players such as development agencies, NGOs, regional government, the media and the private sector could be evaluated and improved.

A final point: the role of media in addressing governance was highlighted by several respondents, who argued that more use could be made of local and international media, and that the role of the media and communications technologies in promoting accountable societies needs to be researched.

Between August and November 2007, some 600 people responded to an online survey through the DFID web site. A further 12-question survey coordinated by Euforic mobilised a further 100 contributions as well as longer submissions from DNet Bangladesh and the Forum for African Agricultural Research. A series of face to face meetings were also held in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Uganda.Get more information on DFID-funded research:

	View outputs of DFID-funded research
	Sign up for email alerts