German Interventions to Support Decentralisation in Africa

The evaluation shows that, in the area of decentralisation, the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) has so far made only limited use of impact findings and implementation experience to inform its strategic development. German development cooperation (DC) has repeatedly made effective contributions to targeted improvements in the resources available to local authorities, increased political participation at local level, the introduction of participatory planning processes, accountability and better service delivery at subnational level. Nevertheless, these impacts have often proved short-lived, and contributions to higher-level development impacts can only rarely be demonstrated. No conceptual response to this is currently in place.

As a result, in the area of decentralisation, the BMZ supports authoritarian governments that are unwilling to reform in much the same way as it supports more democratic governments that are willing to reform. In DEval’s assessment, however, this means that the Ministry creates little incentive for genuine reform.

DEval therefore recommends that the BMZ use the evaluation to revisit its conceptual and strategic approach to decentralisation and align its existing portfolio accordingly. One way to do this would be to develop a new thematic strategy that takes account of the available impact findings and the implementation experience gained. This would allow the Ministry to address key questions regarding whether its stated impact ambitions can be achieved in the area of decentralisation and where and when it can uphold these ambitions. It would also help clarify which partners and partner countries the Ministry should support, when and in what way.

DEval therefore recommends, in substantive terms, that the BMZ distinguishes between different country types on the basis of governance assessments and previous cooperation experience. Depending on partner countries’ willingness to reform, German development cooperation (DC) should therefore pursue different strategies, projects and measures. This kind of differentiation could help the BMZ improve the incentives for reform in the area of decentralisation. It would also enable the Ministry to prioritise partner countries while retaining flexibility in how measures are implemented, helping to prevent the portfolio from becoming increasingly arbitrary.

The evaluation also shows that, in this thematic area, the BMZ and the state implementing organisations exchange information almost exclusively at the level of individual projects and therefore do not learn across countries. By contrast, further development based on comparative analyses of different country contexts is rare.

DEval therefore recommends that the BMZ and the implementing organisations establish new learning formats. These should be suitable for reviewing and developing the thematic area of decentralisation across projects and countries, with a view to development policy questions.

Finally, the evaluation shows that the framework conditions for decentralisation support have deteriorated in recent years. Many general budget support arrangements have expired, and several bilateral donors have withdrawn from the thematic area. As a result, joint engagement by multiple donors in the area of decentralisation has also declined.

DEval therefore recommends that the BMZ works to strengthen joint donor engagement with the remaining stakeholders in the thematic area. Externally set incentives for far-reaching institutional reforms in partner countries are likely to be successful only if they are supported by multiple donors. To this end, the Ministry should actively examine the extent to which it can increase its political leverage in alliance with others. The BMZ could take this support forward, for example, within the framework of European Union development cooperation and with a focus on the rule of law and good governance.