Sustaining third world infrastructure investments: Decentralization and alternative strategies

The paper assesses the effectiveness of two institutional strategies, one centralized and the other decentralized, for sustaining infrastructure investments in the Third World and the organizations that have developed from them. It argues that each has been flawed. Institutional over-centralization, involving a centrally directed and hierarchical bureaucracy is widely found to have been ineffective in undertaking complex tasks of rural development under conditions of uncertainty and severely limited resources. It has failed to secure beneficiary participation, adequate maintenance and utilization of infrastructure, administrative co-ordination, responsiveness to local needs, as well as flexibility and adaptability. But decentralization has not been a widely successful solution. Decentralized planning, attempts to increase the role of beneficiaries in development projects, and localized training and organizational developments efforts have all produced disappointing results. There is a lack of theoretical understanding in this area. Human behaviour and relationships within organizations have been neglected. An alternative strategy, using the individual as the unit of analysis, is suggested. It requires ‘institutional analysis’ of the incentives and disincentives involved in getting people to perform specific tasks relating to specific goals.     

‘Consensus’ participation: an example for protected areas planning

This article forwards the argument that combining institutional and people participation is fundamental to the pursuit of ‘sustainability’. A generalized model of participation is proposed based on building consensus and preventing/resolving conflict between all stakeholders who might be influential in, or affected by, the effect of major developments on a society's goals for sustainability. This ‘consensus’ participation model seeks to overcome problems relating to the exclusive nature of community-based ‘popular’ participation (such as Participatory Rural Appraisal), and the narrow economic nature of current ‘stakeholder’ participation. The model is founded upon two ideas: that to achieve consensus requires stakeholders to negotiate and reach agreement collaboratively, and that certain stakeholders (e.g. the disenfranchised poor and entrenched government bureaucracies) are often polarized from a capability to contribute effectively to this process. In a manner similar to the introduction of methodologies to guide environmental management in project planning (environmental impact assessment, land use evaluation etc.), it is suggested that methodological frameworks are needed to aid the process of integrating ‘consensus’ participation within major development initiatives (large-scale projects, sectoral programmes, strategic land use or resource management planning, and regional and national policy formulation). Based on research in Zambia, an example of a consensus-orientated participation framework is presented, designed to guide preparation of strategic management plans for protected areas. The example is used to draw out some of the benefits of ‘consensus’ participation. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Welcome Mats and On‐Ramps for Older Adults: The Impact of the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid Expansions on Dual Enrollment in Medicare and Medicaid

For many low‐income Medicare beneficiaries, Medicaid provides important supplemental insurance that covers out‐of‐pocket costs and additional benefits. We examine whether Medicaid participation by low‐income adults age 65 and up increased as a result of Medicaid expansions to working‐age adults under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Previous literature documents so‐called “welcome mat” effects in other populations but has not explicitly studied older persons dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid. We extend this literature by estimating models of Medicaid participation among persons age 65 and up using American Community Survey data from 2010 to 2017 and state variation in ACA Medicaid expansions. We find that Medicaid expansions to working‐age adults increased Medicaid participation among low‐income older adults by 1.8 percentage points (4.4 percent). We also find evidence of an “on‐ramp” effect; that is, low‐income Medicare beneficiaries residing in expansion states who were young enough to gain coverage under the 2014 ACA Medicaid expansions before aging into Medicare were 4 percentage points (9.5 percent) more likely to have dual Medicaid coverage relative to similar individuals who either turned 65 before the 2014 expansions or resided in non‐expansion states. This on‐ramp effect is an important mechanism behind welcome mat effects among some older adults.     

Rural development projects in LDCs: Appraisal,participation and sustainability

Evidence on the performance of development projects shows that sustainability is seldom achieved. Project sustainability is influenced by ecological, social, political and economic systems. However, the blueprint approach to project choice tends to incorporate sustainability into the project cycle by considering only economic and environmental systems. This is done by adopting elaborate methodologies such as expanded CBA and EIA. This approach is unlikely to lead to sustainable projects. The ‘participation approach’ is more sensitive to the social and political systems than the blueprint approach. It involves people in decision-making and sees the achievement of sustainable projects as the result of people's empowerment and self-reliance. However, under certain circumstances, this approach can lead to environmentally unsustainable projects. Smaller scale projects tend to bring about sustainability, but government control might be needed to ensure this. Social obstacles exist in implementing participation but occur for top-down projects as well. Problems exist in combining the bottom-up and top-down approaches.     

Do Partners in PPPs view Public and Private Management Differently?

Differences between public and private management have been studied extensively by comparing sectors, but not within cross‐sectoral collaborative arrangements. As participants in such arrangements have actually experienced both management styles, examining their perceptions of how these styles differ may contribute innovatively to existing literature. This paper compares such perceptions between public and private sector project members (N = 63) involved in four PPPs in the Netherlands. We assess (1) to what extent and under which conditions these project members view public and private management differently and (2) how they evaluate these differences. By triangulating quantitative and qualitative interview data, we examine Boyne's classical hypotheses and find that more than two‐thirds of the statements making reference to these hypotheses offer support for them; more so, the vast majority of such statements evaluate sectoral differences negatively. Intriguingly, type of PPP is a stronger determinant of perceived differences than the manager's sector of origin.     

Integrated rural development in Tanzania

Tanzania did not have the kind of agricultural policies, popular participation, or government bureaucratic capacity necessary for integrated rural development projects to perform well. Nonetheless the World Bank, EEC, and United States each implemented such projects there during the 1970s. The implementation and achievements of the projects varied considerably due to differences in their design as well as decisions made by the implementation teams. However the experiences of all three projects demonstrate two things: no agricultural development project can adapt to producer price disincentives; and both participation and project management require a ‘critical minimum’ level of finance and resources which the Tanzanian bureaucracy does not have. The latter observation raises the question of whether donors should attempt to build management capacity in fourth world bureaucracies or, as Goran Hyden suggests, avoid the government and work through other institutions and local organizations.     

The role of monitoring and evaluation in project planning,in relation to the upgrading of unauthorized housing areas

This paper explores the role of monitoring and evaluation in the planning process with reference to urban development projects, especially those concerned with the upgrading of unauthorized housing areas. Monitoring, it is suggested, may be separated from evaluation, which may itself be subdivided into ongoing or formative and ex post or summative evaluation, and definitions of these terms are offered. Potential audiences for monitoring and evaluation research are identified and their interests discussed. Monitoring and evaluation requirements in relation to upgrading projects are then analysed in more detail, in terms of organizational requirements, methodology, and the utilization of findings. The discussion is illustrated with examples of the monitoring and evaluation systems established in upgrading projects in Zambia, Indonesia and the Philippines. Finally, some of the substantive issues which are relevant to the evaluation of upgrading are outlined and briefly discussed. These include the efficiency of project implementation, progressive development and self help construction as a means of increasing the low cost housing stock, community participation in planning and implementation, affordability and project impact.     

Network Structure,Strength of Relationships,and Communities’ Success in Project Implementation

Studies of network effectiveness in the collaborative public program setting commonly have found that actors with more organizational partners, more indirect (bridging) ties to other partners, and more cohesive relationships among partners have greater success in implementing projects. This article contributes to this literature by developing and testing hypotheses about how strength of relationships, measured by frequency of contacts, moderates these results. In the context of community water supply projects in Nepal, the article shows that greater frequency of contacts between communities and organizational partners enhances the impact of having more partners and more cohesive relationships among partners but decreases the impact of having more indirect connections. For practitioners and network theorists, these findings highlight the importance of strength of relationships in the link between networks and performance.     

A planning-centred approach to project evaluation: Women in mainstream development projects

This article describes the process and outcomes of a “planning-centred” approach to three development projects in the Caribbean. A planning-centred approach to research involves the collaboration of planners and researchers in evaluation research, special attention to the dissemination and use of information and the promotion of contact between planners, sector specialists and recipients of development plans. The planning-centred approach to research is also conducive to understanding the role of gender in distributive processes. The paper describes the methodology of this form of project evaluation, alternative evaluation procedures and selected evaluation guidelines used by the agencies involved in the three Caribbean projects. The outcomes of a planning-centred approach are assessed. In the Caribbean projects the approach resulted in the better use of research information, better communication among planners, officials and project participants, greater sensitivity to women's participation in development and improved consciousness of the significance of gender for redistribute development programmes.     

The ‘new’ policy approach to housing: A review of the literature

A new convention of ‘self-help housing’ has become established over the past 20 years. However, a close examination of the literature shows that this approach is not widely implemented, but remains largely at the level of showcase projects; moreover the lowest income groups are usually not the principal beneficiaries of sites-and-service schemes. The literature gives evidence of powerful political, administrative and economic interests against the large-scale legal delivery of sites-and-services, and in favour of the continued dependence of the poor on illegal access.     

Administration of pastoral development: lessons from three projects in Africa

Administrative problems are a major cause of the poor performance of pastoral development projects in Africa. This study focused on two aspects of project administration: policy development and organizational structure. From the literature, 11 actions in these 2 areas were identified that were supposed to enhance project performance. These 11 propositions were tested against evidence from 3 pastoral development projects in Africa funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development. Eight of these actions were strongly associated with improved project performance. These results become the basis for guidelines to improve design and implementation. © 1996 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Income and assets of Social Security beneficiaries by type of benefit

The SIPP data have provided a first look at the relative economic status of various types of Social Security beneficiaries. They have shown that the different types of Social Security beneficiaries face very different economic circumstances. Retired workers and wife beneficiaries have the highest family incomes adjusted for family size. Aged widows and minor children have the lowest family incomes, with high proportions of poor or near poor. And disabled workers are in between, but also have high proportions of poor or near poor. Retired-worker and wife beneficiary households also have considerably more asset holdings than disabled-worker or widow beneficiary households. Beneficiaries with high family incomes are very likely to live with relatives and to rely heavily on the relatives' income. The high-income families tend to have non-means-tested sources of family income other than Social Security amounting to substantial proportions of their total income and to have high asset holdings. Conversely, beneficiaries with low family incomes are very likely to live alone or with nonrelatives, to rely heavily on Social Security and means-tested benefits, and to have low asset holdings. A majority of ever-poor beneficiaries (with the exception of widow beneficiaries) are poor in only some months of a year. This situation is not consistent with the stereotype of beneficiaries living on fixed incomes. But the change in poverty status is often due to a change in the income of other family members rather than of the beneficiary. And in some cases, a change in poverty status occurs with little or no change in income as the cost of living rises.     

Can service providing NGOs build democracy? Five contingent features

This article studies the role of service providing NGOs in the Middle East in promoting democracy. Challenging the assumption that service providing NGOs are apolitical, the authors argue that service providing NGOs play important roles in promoting democracy. They do so by serving as public arenas, or spaces in which members and beneficiaries practice democratic habits such as discussion and debate, collective problem solving, free expression, rights claiming, and the like—all of which contribute to the cultivation of a participatory form of democracy. Drawing upon existing literature, interviews, and participant observation of NGOs in Egypt, Lebanon, and Palestine, the authors argue that five features shape the role of service providing NGOs in promoting democracy. These include: (1) organizational readiness, or the organization's embeddedness in its beneficiary community and its organizational capacity; (2) organizational governance, or organization's commitment to participatory representation and transparency; (3) the nature of service an organization provides; (4) an NGOs' collaboration with other NGOs and the government; and (5) donor risk tolerance. The article's analysis contributes to our understanding of the varied, and often overlooked, roles of service providing NGOs, advancing the literature on NGO-state relations, NGO-donor relations, and democracy promotion.     

PROSPECT lost: when a pilot project does not look to learn

If a development project is destined to reach only a selection of its intended beneficiaries or to give them only momentary or uncertain benefits, there is a strong rationale for making it instead a project of trials from which lessons can be taken for obtaining the impact that it may not otherwise have. Because the fundamental problems and opportunities of development are very complex by their nature, interventions that seek to test practice knowledge and to learn above all else may have the greatest potential for benefit in the long term. A project that wishes to create experience from which others can learn will engage in research, so it must be conceived, led and conducted as such. This means it must be designed with knowledge of research. It must be led with an appreciation and understanding of research method. Specific research activities must be conducted that produce knowledge and promote its up‐take, so that learning is a principle project outcome. The large urban anti‐poverty project, PROSPECT, conducted in Lusaka, Zambia, illustrates this argument. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Project identification,formulation and start-up by voluntary organizations (NGOs) in Thailand's rural development

This paper presents an overview of issues in NGO project identification, formulation and start-up in the context of rural development in Thailand. It identifies the types of projects, the methods used to identify them, the initial activities in projects, the problems faced in project formulation and the influence of various factors on the process, e.g. government regulations and the NGO staff in the organization. There is limited pressure on NGOs from the government even though recent regulations may lead to more control of their activities. The importance of leadership training in the initial stages of a project is emphasized. In particular, when comparing small with larger NGOs, the technical inputs in project identification and formulation seem to be a constraint for small NGOs. Usually project identification methodology consists of following up on existing projects. In larger NGOs more bureaucratic or formalized methods are used and the ideology of the organization is more important.     

Benefit adequacy among elderly Social Security retired-worker beneficiaries and the SSI federal benefit rate

Both target effectiveness and administrative simplicity are desirable properties in the design of minimum benefit packages for public retirement programs. The federal benefit rate (FBR) of the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program has been proposed by some analysts as a potentially attractive basis of establishing a new minimum benefit for Social Security on both of these grounds. This type of proposal is related to a broader array of minimum benefit proposals that would establish a Social Security benefit floor based on the poverty rate. In contrast to Social Security, the SSI program is means tested, including both an income and asset screen and also a categorical eligibility screen (the requirement to qualify as aged or disabled). The SSI FBR provides an inflation-adjusted, guaranteed income floor for aged and disabled people with low assets. The FBR has been perceived by proponents as a minimal measure of Social Security benefit adequacy because it represents a subpoverty income level for a family of one or two depending on marital status. For this same reason it has been seen as a target-effective tool of designing a minimum Social Security benefit. An FBR-based minimum benefit has also been viewed as administratively simple to implement; the benefit can be calculated from Social Security administrative records using a completely automated electronic process. Therefore-in contrast to the SSI program itself-an FBR-based minimum benefit would incur virtually no ongoing administrative costs, would not require a separate application for a means-tested program, and would avoid the perception of welfare stigma. While these ideas have been discussed in the literature and among policymakers in the United States over the years, and similar proposals have been considered or implemented in several foreign countries, there have been no previous analyses measuring the size of the potentially affected beneficiary population. Nor has there been any systematic assessment of the FBR as a measure of benefit adequacy or the tradeoffs between potential target effectiveness and administrative simplicity. Based on a series of simulations, we assess the FBR as a potential foundation for minimum Social Security benefits and we examine the tradeoffs between administrative simplicity and target effectiveness using microdata from the 1996 panel of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). Our empirical analysis is limited to Social Security retired-worker beneficiaries aged 65 or older. We start with the assessment of the FBR as a measure of benefit adequacy. We are particularly concerned about two types of error: (1) incorrectly identifying some Social Security beneficiaries as "economically vulnerable," and (2) incorrectly identifying others as "not economically vulnerable." Operationally we measure economic vulnerability by two alternative standards. One of our measures considers beneficiaries with family income below the official poverty threshold as vulnerable. Our second measure is more restrictive; it uses a family income threshold equal to 75 percent of the official poverty threshold. We find that a substantial minority of retired workers have Social Security benefits below the FBR. The results also show that the FBR-based measure of Social Security benefit adequacy is very imprecise in terms of identifying economically vulnerable people. We estimate that the vast majority of beneficiaries with Social Security benefits below the FBR are not economically vulnerable. Conversely, an FBR-level Social Security benefit threshold fails to identify some beneficiaries who are economically vulnerable. Thus an FBR-level minimum benefit would be poorly targeted in terms of both types of errors we are concerned about. An FBR-level minimum benefit would provide minimum Social Security benefits to many people who are clearly not poor. Conversely, an FBR-level minimum benefit would not provide any income relief to some who are poor. The administrative simplicity behind these screening errors also results in additional program cost that may be perceived as substantial. We estimate that an FBR-level minimum benefit would increase aggregate program cost for retired workers aged 65 or older by roughly 2 percent. There are two fundamental reasons for these findings. First, the concept of an FBR-level minimum benefit looks at the individual or married couple in artificial isolation; however, the family is the main consumption unit in our society. The income of an unmarried partner or family members other than a married spouse is ignored. Second, individuals and couples may also have income from sources other than Social Security or SSI, which is also ignored by a simple FBR-based minimum benefit concept. The substantial empirical magnitude of measurement error arising from these conceptual simplifications naturally leads to the assessment of the tradeoff between target effectiveness and administrative simplicity. To facilitate this analysis, we simulate the potential effect of alternative screening methods designed to increase target effectiveness; while reducing program cost, such alternatives also may increase administrative complexity. For example, considering the combined Social Security benefit of a married couple (rather than looking at the husband and wife in isolation) might substantially increase target effectiveness with a relatively small increase in administrative complexity. Adding a family income screen might increase administrative complexity to a greater degree, but also would increase target effectiveness dramatically. The results also suggest that at some point adding new screens-such as a comprehensive asset test-may drastically increase administrative complexity with diminishing returns in terms of increased target effectiveness and reduced program cost. Whether a broad-based minimum benefit concept that is not tied to previous work experience is perceived by policymakers as desirable or not may depend on several factors not addressed in this article. However, to the extent that this type of minimum benefit design is regarded as potentially desirable, the tradeoffs between administrative simplicity and target effectiveness need to be considered.     

Military veterans and Social Security

There are 9.4 million military veterans receiving Social Security benefits, which means that almost one out of every four adult Social Security beneficiaries has served in the United States military. In addition, veterans and their families make up almost 40 percent of the adult Social Security beneficiary population. Policymakers are particularly interested in military veterans and their families and have provided them with benefits through several government programs, including Social Security credits, home loan guarantees, and compensation and pension payments through the Department of Veterans Affairs. It is therefore important to understand the economic and demographic characteristics of this population. Information in this article is based on data from the March 2004 Current Population Survey, a large, nationally representative survey of U.S. households. Veterans are overwhelmingly male compared with all adult Social Security beneficiaries who are more evenly split between males and females. Military veterans receiving Social Security are more likely to be married and to have finished high school compared with all adult Social Security beneficiaries, and they are less likely to be poor or near poor than the overall beneficiary population. Fourteen percent of veterans receiving Social Security benefits have income below 150 percent of poverty, while 25 percent of all adult Social Security beneficiaries are below this level. The higher economic status among veterans is also reflected in the relatively high Social Security benefits they receive. The number of military veterans receiving Social Security benefits will remain high over the next few decades, while their make-up and characteristics will change. In particular, the number of Vietnam War veterans who receive Social Security will increase in the coming decades, while the number of veterans from World War II and the Korean War will decline.     

Environmental Justice and Information Technologies: Overcoming the Information-Access Paradox in Urban Communities

Scientific studies and resident testimony suggest that urban residents in low-income and minority communities have been subject to an unequal burden of environmental pollution and inequitable environmental enforcement practices. A key component of the equitable development and implementation of environmental policies is the participation of citizens and community-based organizations in the policy process. Such participation rests upon equitable access to agency-generated environmental information and effective use of that information by citizens. This article focuses on the adoption of Internet technologies by environmental agencies as a mechanism for disseminating information and the implications for low-income and minority residents in urban communities. A framework is developed to guide a programmatic response to overcome these implications. The results from several community-based projects are described and analyzed for their capacity-building effectiveness. Analysis of the projects indicates improvement in community capacity for information access and use, which bolstered community participation in the environmental decision-making process.     

An overview of OASDI revenue, expenditures, and beneficiaries, 1974-85

This article compares the revenue, expenditures, and beneficiary population under the old-age, survivors, and disability insurance program in 1984-85 with the experience for earlier years. The tables and charts presented here examine such topics as the population covered by the program, the increase in the number of beneficiaries, the rise in average benefit amounts, and the growth in the proportion of dually entitled and very old beneficiaries. Like the preceding feature, the article is based on published data of the Social Security Administration's Office of Research, Statistics, and International Policy--in this case, they come entirely from various issues of the Annual Statistical Supplement to the Social Security Bulletin.     

The “Phantom Local” and the Everyday Distinction Practices of Humanitarian Actors in War: A Socio-Legal Perspective

ABSTRACT

This article is concerned the everyday practices of international humanitarian actors who deliver assistance in armed conflict zones. Drawing on original fieldwork conducted in South Sudan, it elucidates how humanitarian actors engage with the principle of distinction in international humanitarian law (IHL). The article considers how the desire to enforce distinction impacts humanitarian actors’ relationships with others, and introduces the concept of everyday distinction practices. These practices have an important performance component, designed to appease the “phantom local.” It is proposed that such practices may have adverse implications for the humanitarian–beneficiary encounter. By positioning war-affected populations as an audience for distinction, everyday distinction practices reconfigure the victims of war from being receivers of aid to perceivers of aid. By lumping beneficiaries together with armed actors as part of the “phantom local,” distinction practices also paint the victims of war as an object of mistrust, fear, and potential danger.