Challenges and lessons learnt from a sanitation project in rural Bolivia

The University of Arizona chapter of Engineers Without Borders USA has faced multiple challenges involving community participation in rural development, in the Andean community of Marquirivi, Bolivia, both in rural design and in community participation. Despite successful construction of a shower house in 2014, the EWB-USA UA team experience with community participation revealed the numerous complexities involved in engaging successfully with communities. The importance of previous aid in a community with development projects also emerged as critical in shaping actions. This article discusses lessons learnt and recommendations for rural infrastructure projects, as well as the EWB-USA model of sustainable development.     

An effective sanctioning actor? Merging effectiveness and EU actorness criteria to explain evolutions in (in)effective coercion towards Iran

EU sanctions invoked in response to the Iranian nuclear crisis (2006–2016) were long considered to be of limited effectiveness in halting Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Recently, however, sanctions seem to have contributed to a breakthrough in the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme. This article aims at explaining this evolution. It, therefore, designs a framework that explains why sanctions (fail to) change targets’ behaviour. Since the sanctions effectiveness literature lacks an integrated framework to explain evolutions in effective coercion, this article merges sanctions effectiveness variables and Bretherton and Vogler’s actorness criteria. Applying the resulting framework to two broad episodes of the Iranian case (2006–2013 and 2013–2016), this article provides a first test of the framework’s added value. It concludes that a full understanding of sanctions effectiveness requires consideration of external, internal, and in-between factors.     

At the root of participatory approaches: uncovering the role of accompaniment

This article examines the impact of a participatory development project in rural Uganda and offers explanations for the results obtained. Though successful in facilitating the creation of specific goods and services, the project did not fully realise its intended outcome: empowering local actors and generating lasting human development. These mixed results were the consequence of inconsistent dialogue and listening among the actors, often resulting in a lack of genuine accompaniment. In evaluating community engagement through the lens of accompaniment, the study considers the potential for participatory approaches to overcome often-asserted criticisms, namely the presence of dependency and elite capture.     

Legitimacy through targeted transparency? Regulatory effectiveness and sustainability of lobbying regulation in the European Union

Regulating interest groups’ access to decision makers constitutes a key dimension of legitimate and accountable systems of government. The European Union explicitly links lobbying regulation with the democratic credentials of its supranational system of governance and proposes transparency as a solution to increase legitimacy and regulate private actors’ participation in policy making. This lobbying regulation regime consists of a Transparency Register that conditions access to decision makers upon joining it and complying with its information disclosure requirements. The extent to which transparency‐based regulatory regimes are successful in ensuring effective regulation of targeted actors and in being recognised as a legitimate instrument of governance constitutes a key empirical question. Therefore, the study asks: Do stakeholders perceive the transparency‐based EU lobbying regulation regime to be a legitimate form of regulatory governance? The study answers by building on a classic model of targeted transparency and proposes perceived regulatory effectiveness and sustainability as two key dimensions on which to evaluate the legitimacy of the Register. The arguments are tested on a new dataset reporting the evaluations of 1,374 stakeholders on the design and performance of the EU lobbying regulation regime. The findings describe a transparency regime that scores low in perceived effectiveness and moderate to low in sustainability. Citizens criticise the quality of information disclosed and the Register's performance as a transparency instrument. The Register did not effectively bridge the information gap between the public and interest groups about supranational lobbying. In terms of sustainability, interest organisations appreciate the systemic benefits of transparency, but identify few organisation‐level benefits. Organisations that are policy insiders incur more transparency costs so they instrumentally support transparency only insofar it suits their lobbying strategies and does not threaten their position. Insiders support including additional categories of organisations in the Register's regulatory remit but not more types of interactions with policy makers. They support an imperfect regulatory status quo to which they have adapted but lack incentives to support increased transparency and information disclosure. Targeted transparency proves an ineffective approach to regulating interest groups’ participation in EU policy making, constituting a suboptimal choice for ensuring transparent, accountable and legitimate supranational lobbying.     

Power Sector Reforms and Technical Performance: Good News from an Instrumental Variable Analysis

Over the past three decades, various power sector reforms have overhauled the governance of electricity generation, transmission, and distribution in almost a hundred countries. Have these reforms produced benefits? Using instrumental variables, we improve upon earlier studies and demonstrate that power sector reforms enacted between 1982 and 2008 have both had large positive effects on the availability of generation capacity and reduced transmission and distribution losses. We also show that the positive effects on generation capacity are pronounced in developing countries and that hybrid reforms falling short of privatization and free competition are effective in improving generation capacity in particular. Overall, the results show that these reforms are an effective tool to remove an important constraint on economic growth.     

Shaping participation: an international NGO implementing a government participation policy

This article reports on a case study of how one NGO utilised a government participation policy to establish ostensibly participatory spaces in the Cambodian health sector. The ethnographic field study revealed how the NGO exerted influence in establishing and facilitating participative committees by controlling membership, resources, and meeting agendas. This resulted in limited citizen participation, with committees used to educate, lobby, and mobilise community leaders to work towards the NGO’s priorities rather than community identified needs. This case contributes to our understanding of insisted spaces and the role of third parties implementing government participation policies.     

Food insecurity and ART adherence in Swaziland: the case for coordinated faith-based and multi-sectoral action

ABSTRACT

Faith-based organisations (FBOs) have long been involved in HIV and AIDS impact mitigation and humanitarian relief, but most are not equipped to intervene in the structural drivers of food insecurity and attendant health inequities. Acknowledging limitations is as paramount a task for organisational effectiveness as maximising strengths. This article reports findings from a study of HIV-positive care supporters who volunteer with a church-run home-based care organisation in Swaziland. The article seeks to assess the impact of chronic food insecurity on antiretroviral adherence practices and how these individuals manage daily food shortages. Findings highlight the limited capacities of FBOs in highly vulnerable settings and the imperative for international and governmental coordination.     

Fostering uptake: lessons from climate change vulnerability assessments in Africa and Latin America

Findings from climate change vulnerability assessments can inform decision-makers in their evaluation of options to reduce the negative impacts of climate change. Certain attributes of an assessment can improve the use or uptake of its results. The science policy literature describes three characteristics – credibility, salience, and legitimacy – as being necessary for the uptake of scientific results for decision-making. We draw from the experiences of eight climate change vulnerability assessments conducted in Africa and Latin America for USAID (United States Agency for International Development) to explore the practical application of these three characteristics to fostering uptake of the assessment results.     

Sustainable development and the struggle for LGBTI social inclusion in Africa: opportunities for accelerating change

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Agenda 2063 chart a new development pathway for Africa. ‘Leaving no one behind’, or full social inclusion, is central to this effort. What will this mean for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or intersex (LGBTI) people in Africa who are among the most socially excluded members of the population? This article explores this through a discussion framed by the concept of social inclusion and the commitments regarding it that appear in the SDGs and the Agenda 2063. Although LGBTI inclusion across Africa is not explicit in either document, there are nevertheless important opportunities for linking continental LGBTI advocacy to the sustainable development enterprise.     

Harnessing the plurality of actor frames in social-ecological systems: ecological sanitation in Bolivia

This article uses a case study on ecological sanitation as a basis for lessons on identifying and harnessing the plurality of actor frames in social-ecological systems, thereby moving beyond the advocacy positions often taken by implementing NGOs. The study aimed to explore how perspectives between the implementing agencies of an ecological sanitation project in rural Bolivia and the owners of a urine-diverting dry toilet (UDDT) relate to each other, and how this influenced the outcome of the project. The article provides key elements and an example methodology for social learning in the context of multiple interpretative frames in development projects.