Introduction Afghanistan's state-building process has reached a
crossroads. With a constitution ratified and the
country's first elections in decades scheduled for
September - after being put back from June-July because
of the continued deterioration of security conditions -
the Bonn political process has entered its final phase.
Afghanistan can boast of many remarkable
achievements over the past two years: the adoption of a
national development and budget framework, the reform of
central government ministries, the return of millions of
children to school, the repatriation of 2.5 million
refugees and the resettlement of 600,000 internally
displaced peoples (one of the largest voluntary refugee
influxes in history), the introduction of a new currency
(the Afghani), and the adoption of a constitution
through a democratic process. However, in spite of these
advancements, security remains precarious, and the vast
majority of the population has yet to see a peace
dividend.
A renewed political process - one that
is inclusive of the country's ethnic and political
diversity and that reflects the realities of the
situation on the ground - is required to keep the
state-building process from veering off course. To forge
this new political agenda, it is necessary to take stock
of the lessons learned during the past two years. The
significance of this exercise transcends Afghanistan .
As the first state-building experiment of the
post-September 11 era, the Afghan experience could
potentially yield tremendous insight for the
rehabilitation of other failed states. Although one must
be wary when developing universalistic models for
processes that are so complex and context-specific, such
critical deconstructions are valuable nevertheless.
The principal challenges that confront
Afghanistan's state-building process can be summarized
under the following four headings: security sector
reform; public administration and civil service reform;
coordination and government ownership; and donor funding
and economic development. Setbacks, primarily relating
to the delivery of reconstruction assistance and the
complexity of re-engaging with a largely dysfunctional
state, have been encountered in each of these areas,
revealing deficiencies in the Bonn framework.
First, Afghanistan's security sector reform
process has proceeded at an excruciatingly slow rate and
has been marred by a lack of funding, inadequate
planning and coordination, and adverse security
conditions. Second, Afghanistan faces an acute capacity
deficit, particularly in regard to the government civil
service, a residual effect of the three-decade civil
war. Compounding this problem is the legacy of bloated
and cumbersome bureaucratic structures, plagued by
inefficiency and corruption, and an anaemic private
sector, the result of three decades of economic
stagnation and the large-scale exodus of human and
material capital.
Third, experience in other
post-conflict settings clearly dictates that a
state-building process will be hard-pressed to succeed
if it is not directed by indigenous institutions. Given
the poor condition of Afghanistan 's national
institutions, this means that the re-establishment of
core state capabilities - the glue that binds central
and sub-national governments - will take far longer than
originally anticipated. In essence, sustainable reform
cannot be achieved if it is donor-driven. Insufficient
coordination among the various stakeholders and programs
has also hindered reform efforts from their inception,
particularly in the area of security. Rivalries,
suspicion and a lack of communication between Afghan
government ministries and donor states has had a
negative effect.
Lastly, reconstructing a
post-conflict state and rejuvenating its economy is an
expensive and long-term proposition. By most established
measures, Afghanistan is one of the most impoverished
countries in the world, with up to 70 percent of the
population living below the poverty line. Until the
Afghan population is presented with the economic means
and opportunity to escape destitution, many will
continue to be drawn to violence and the illicit
economy, perpetuating the country's seemingly
interminable instability.
Reconstruction funds
are minimal, and it is vital that they are disbursed in
a manner that maximizes their impact. Presently, the
bulk of donor support delivered to Afghanistan has been
allocated to projects outside the National Development
Budget, either toward covert programs in the security
sector or toward favored donor contractors, agencies,
and nongovernmental organizations in the public sector.
By circumventing line ministries in the disbursement of
aid and largely bypassing the Afghan private sector,
donors have effectively disempowered the government and
divested it of its leadership role in the process. The
utility and impact of money channeled to indigenous
institutions far outstrips that of direct donor
investment. Although a rational sequence between the
volume of direct funding and the capacity of government
to manage such resources needs to be observed, there is
clearly a relationship between how and where resources
are targeted and capacities built.
Each of the
aforementioned issues is representative of broader
dilemmas prevalent in all state-building cases.
Addressing them will require a shift in conventional
donor approaches to state building. Of course, the
entire process is contingent on durable donor
commitments, something that is by no means assured. Only
two years after the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan,
initial signs of donor fatigue are apparent. The
creation of an accountable and efficient security
sector, a vibrant economy, and a stable and democratic
political system require the long-term vigilance of
Afghans, neighboring countries, the international
community, and donors.
The notion that states
can be rebuilt after decades of conflict in a two-year
period is fallacious and will only distort the process.
Afghans, whose expectations were heightened after the
Tokyo Conference in early 2002, will be the first to
turn their backs on the new administration, unless
improvements in security and access to basic services
are achieved. The forthcoming Berlin Conference,
scheduled for March 30-April 1, will debate the
political, security and reconstruction needs of
Afghanistan. The Afghan government, in partnership with
key international stakeholders, has presented an
investment program costing US$28 billion. For the
conference to be successful, the lessons learned over
the past two years need to be understood and heeded.
Contextualizing state building
Designing a stable and sustainable
state-building process requires a thorough understanding
of the historical, cultural and political context of the
country where it is applied. Its various pillars must be
tailored to meet local conditions and confront the
specific challenges to state formation, and they must be
established and owned by key reformers within the
administration. The Bonn political process, launched in
Bonn, Germany, in December 2001, in many respects does
not adequately address the realities of the situation in
Afghanistan. There are three areas in particular that
exemplify these shortcomings.
First, the Bonn
process did not include a strong regional dimension.
Afghanistan is at the heart of a complex web of
competing state interests in Eurasia. The interconnected
nature of the region - politically, economically and
ethnically - demands that any state-building program
engage regional actors. Second, the current
state-building process is rooted in the notion that a
robust central state is the only viable option for the
country. Although it is inaccurate to say that their
country lacks any tradition of political centralization,
Afghans have displayed an aversion to strong central
authority, particularly since the 1979 Soviet invasion.
The resultant tension, between traditional modes of
decentralized governance and the modern conception of a
unitary state, has come to the fore. In light of the
incongruity of the political process with existing
authority structures, it is hardly surprising that
centrifugal forces, in the guise of warlords, have
emerged. Constructing a robust central government is
essential, since this body is required to restore a
semblance of security, to serve as a conduit for donor
support, and to coordinate development programs and
activities. However, this does not obviate the need to
develop sub-national governmental structures or to
institute crucial administrative reforms at the
provincial, municipal and local levels. A multilayered
approach is needed to reconstruct Afghanistan's
political system, a nuance lacking in the current
strategy.
Finally, the Bonn process did not
adequately recognize the centrality of security to the
entire enterprise, for without security, economic,
development and democratization are unattainable.
Security continues to rate as the foremost concern of
the Afghan population. However, the issue was only
addressed superficially in the Bonn Agreement. It is
important to understand that the Taliban's initial
popularity, after they swept to power in 1996, was
rooted in their ability to solidify an elusive peace for
the country. It was the Taliban who ended the bloody
battle for Kabul waged by the major jihadi groups after
the Soviet withdrawal, and it was the Taliban who
disarmed the warlords. In many areas of the country,
security conditions have actually deteriorated since the
fall of the Taliban government. The impressive political
gains achieved in Kabul , most notably the ratification
of a new constitution, mean little to those communities
now gripped by a climate of fear.
The overthrow
of the Taliban in November 2001 was welcomed by most
Afghans, who after six years of Taliban rule chafed at
its authoritarian practices. However, the US-led
coalition, by utilizing regional warlords and power
brokers as proxies in the fight against the Taliban - a
continuing practice - effectively returned large parts
of the country to the status quo before 1994, just prior
to the Taliban's emergence on the political scene. The
only difference in the present situation is the relative
stability enjoyed by those in the capital, an island of
security guaranteed by 5,000 International Security
Assistance Force peacekeeping troops. It is not
surprising that, under such conditions, disillusionment
with the political dispensation is a growing sentiment
inclining some to speak nostalgically of Taliban rule
and to offer their support to antigovernment spoiler
groups.
The failures of the Bonn process to
address the unique exigencies of the Afghan situation
raise serious questions about the modern concept of
state building. It clearly demonstrates that the
application of state-building templates or formulas in
post-conflict states can be counterproductive and
dangerous.
Afghanistan: A Nation-state and
economy in transition The Bonn Agreement was
signed with an air of caution on December 5, 2001, by a
group of predominantly anti-Taliban factions. Hamid
Karzai was subsequently appointed as the head of state
of the interim administration on December 22, 2001, a
post he held for a period of six months. On June 13,
2002, after an emergency loya jirga or grand
assembly, Karzai was officially sworn in as the
president of Afghanistan 's transitional administration.
On January 3 this year, the next landmark of the Bonn
timetable was achieved with the adoption of a new
constitution by a constitutional loya jirga,
formally inaugurating the Islamic Republic of
Afghanistan. The constitution calls for the
establishment of a bicameral legislative branch
comprising a lower house (wolesi jirga) and upper
house (meshrano jirga).
Although
significant progress has been made to advance
Afghanistan's political reform agenda, it has become
apparent that parallel efforts to promote national
reconciliation are required in order to reconstitute the
machinery of the state. The Bonn Agreement remains
central to the political reform process, particularly
with elections forthcoming, but its overall impact has
been mitigated by the largely dysfunctional state of
Afghanistan's civil service and core state institutions.
Successful reform requires diplomacy, a constitutional
framework, consensus, and time. The implementation of
policy and institutional reform is dependent on the
provision of equal political support for all key
reformers within the new administration, a clearly
defined road map for restructuring national and
sub-national structures, a fiscal plan and
well-established national programs, and rules for budget
formulation and execution.
The political economy
of Afghanistan remains extremely complex, a result of
decades of internecine conflict, proxy war and a
ubiquitous disregard for central authority. As a
Central-Asian land bridge, Afghanistan has repeatedly
fallen prey to the interference of regional and global
states. The recently signed Declaration on Good
Neighborly Relations, a pledge of noninterference in
Afghanistan's internal affairs by its immediate
neighbors, is a welcome development, but it has yet to
stimulate an alteration in policy and action. Continued
external meddling and interference, particularly the
backing of warlords not aligned to the new
administration, has severely complicated the country's
security situation.
Poverty also remains a
paramount problem and threat to Afghanistan. According
to the United Nations Development Program's Human
Development Index, the level of poverty in Afghanistan
is second only to Sierra Leone. With an estimated
non-drug-related GDP of $4 billion, current per capita
income averages a mere $200. The Kabul government is not
just dealing with security and administrative reform
issues, it is also managing popular expectations for
growth and greater equity. After 2001, over 5 million
Afghans (almost one-quarter of the population) were
either refugees, economic migrants or internally
displaced persons - further illustrating the massive
scale of the challenge at hand. The linkage between
enhanced security and poverty-reduction plays out
ironically in the context of government efforts to
eradicate the production of the opium poppy, which
simultaneously constitutes a potent security threat but
offers a lifeline for the rural poor.
One of the
key themes to emerge during the course of the political
reform process over the past two years has been the
viability of state formation. The January Afghan
constitution, in spite of very real contestations
surrounding its ratification, has outlined a new state
structure based on a presidential democracy and
supported by a bicameral national assembly. Legally,
Afghanistan is a unitary state, but there is a strong de
facto decentralized system of governance that needs to
be reconciled with the authority of the central
administration. Such reconciliation will be essential to
guarantee security, to ensure respect for the rule of
law and fundamental human rights, and to facilitate the
remittance of customs duties to the central treasury.
Recent research demonstrates that despite years of
neglect and disloyalty to the central government, the
administrative procedures adopted some 20 years ago
remain functional. Proving to the Afghan people that
unitary state structures can provide them with the
rights guaranteed by the constitution will require both
political and budgetary unification.
The early
reform drive of the Bonn process focused on establishing
the basic framework for a central administration, an
effort that neglected provincial governance structures.
This was not an overt policy decision but instead
reflected the government's lack of wherewithal to
implement even the most basic of reforms outside of
Kabul - excluding employee payroll, which brought its
own set of difficulties. The National Development
Framework was established under the assumption that the
ministerial infrastructure would be streamlined;
however, the June 2003 loya jirga saw an increase
rather than a reduction in the number of ministries, a
decision designed to bring more ethnic balance to the
cabinet. In many cases this has led to disputes over
official ministerial mandates, which could only be
addressed when the national budget emerged as a vehicle
for policy and institutional reform.
With the
system of government for Afghanistan now largely
determined - although there is likely to be ministerial
consolidation in the coming months - the focus of
international support has been on first identifying and
then increasing the effectiveness of the central
administration's core functions. This includes the 30
parent ministries, their provincial departments,
state-owned enterprises, municipal structures, and, in
the future, district administration.
In the
2002-2003 fiscal year, a total of $83 million in
domestic revenue was generated against an ordinary
budget of $350 million. During that time, months passed
when the Ministry of Finance had insufficient resources
to pay the very meager wages of its civil servants -
around $40 per month. In the last fiscal year (ending
March 20) and against an ordinary budget of $550
million, the Afghan administration has pledged to
achieve revenue earnings of $200 million - a target the
government is likely to meet. A new currency has been
introduced, new budget management procedures have been
established, and a framework for priority administrative
reform and restructuring has been launched. Priority
areas of reform have encompassed:
Support for
the development of centralized expenditure-recording
systems, payment-processing and reporting systems for
budget expenditures, audit capabilities, a fully
computerized accounting system for both revenue and
expenditures, and efforts to enhance consolidated budget
management. Reforms have focused on the Ministry of
Finance and the Central Bank.
An Independent
Administrative Reform and Civil Service Commission was
established to oversee the reform of the civil service,
including the restructuring of state administration. The
Priority Reform and Restructuring Decree (executive
legislation) has focused on reforms to key central
ministries and departments (such as customs and excise)
and will eventually become the vehicle of choice for
provincial reforms as well.
The fiscal plan,
however, remains a key area of concern for the overall
reform agenda, since reliance on international support
for the ordinary budget is set to continue for a number
of years. As the recurrent costs of new capital
expenditures are absorbed into the budget, the size of
the ordinary budget will double over the coming years -
all against a rather narrow revenue base. The pressing
need is not for tax reform but rather for tax
collection. In many cases the provincial governors
retain complete control over border revenues, depriving
the federal government of an indispensable source of
income. In the absence of reliable internal revenue
sources, the World Bank-administered Afghanistan
Reconstruction Trust Fund has become the main conduit of
budget support for the government and an important
vehicle to guarantee fiduciary control of expenditures.
Given the exponential link between growth,
increased trade and revenue-earning potential,
guaranteeing economic growth will be an essential
precondition for the formulation of a sustainable state
and for forging productive relations among the national,
provincial and district levels of government. A
functioning administration would centralize revenue
collection and eventually facilitate both central and
decentralized expenditures. Now that core economic
management functions of the central administration are
somewhat in place, efforts to stabilize the provinces,
through administrative reforms and enhanced budgetary
allotments, is an important next step in re-establishing
well-ordered center-periphery relations.
The
size of the illicit, informal economy is also an area of
emerging concern. In 2003, opium production was valued
at $2.5 billion (some 3,600 tonnes), and smuggling of
high-value commodities and arms amounted to a further $1
billion. Given that the Kabul administration plans to
eradicate opium production within 10 years and increase
compliance with new customs regulations, strong growth
in the rural and urban economies will be essential in
order to replace losses from illegal income sources. In
addition to radically rethinking agricultural policy,
attention will have to be paid to expanding legitimate
trade through trade facilitation measures and financial
market reforms, if the existing overdependence on
low-value, low-profit goods is to be overcome.
There have been several administrative
improvements, thanks to key reform ministers and the
active support of the international community. The
ministries of finance, rural development, commerce and
health are of particular note. By way of contrast, the
reform of the security ministries has lagged far behind,
both in terms of departmental restructuring and
recruitment procedures.
There has been a
resurgence in the Afghan economy spurred by good rains
in 2003, the homecoming of more than 2 million refugees,
and growing stability in some areas of the country. The
continued success of projects such as the National
Solidarity Program and the National Emergency Employment
Program will be essential to alleviate conditions for
the 53 percent of Afghans who live in extreme poverty.
Gender disparity will also need to be addressed to allow
the integration of women back into the social and
economic fabric of the country. The risk of not
providing income-generation support is all too clear - a
narco-mafia state will emerge, fueled by spiraling
trafficking of opium, arms and other commodities.
Rethinking reconstruction and public
administration reform From a reconstruction and
development perspective, the situation inherited by the
interim Afghan administration in early 2002 was far
worse than had been anticipated either by the incoming
cabinet or the international community. After 23 years
of war, basic security could not even be guaranteed in
the capital. Accordingly, the task of establishing an
effective program of reconstruction, growth and poverty
reduction over the medium term - an objective
necessitating extensive policy and institutional reforms
- appeared particularly imposing. Moreover, before this
task could be embarked on, the very legitimacy and
efficacy of the state had to be established, requiring a
National Development Framework (drafted in April 2002)
and the formulation of a tenable national budget.
After the 2002 loya jirga and the
formation of the interim administration, key reformers
were tasked with the wholesale renewal of state
institutions. The initial needs assessment for
Afghanistan presented at the Tokyo Donors Conference in
January 2002 grossly underestimated the costs of
securing the country's future, particularly in regard
to: (i) The costs of commencing operations, (ii) The
scale of reconstruction needs, (iii) The costs of
achieving and maintaining security, (iv) The costs of
security sector reform, and (v) The costs of adopting
and overseeing a new policy framework where the state
(and state-owned enterprises) would not crowd out the
private sector.
Another key constraint to
progress that emerged over time was the wholesale
absorption of highly qualified Afghan civil servants
into aid agencies (some international non-governmental
organizations now have up to 4,000 staff), a brain drain
that has contributed to a critical shortage of
English-speaking civil servants needed to engage with
the international community. In some key ministries the
number of English-speaking civil servants in early 2002
could be counted on one hand. This created a
communications bottleneck, given that all reconstruction
documents were written and circulated in English.
The interim Afghan administration inherited
wholly dysfunctional government institutions. There was
no national framework for development, no national
budget to cover recurrent and development needs, no cash
in the treasury, no payroll system. Moreover, provincial
customs duties, a vital source of revenue for the new
administration, were not being voluntarily remitted to
the central treasury by provincial governors. The
functionality of key institutions, from the cabinet
down, could be characterized as poor, and there were
several currencies in circulation - symbolic of a
heavily divided state. Women, who had been excluded from
public life by the Taliban, were granted few positions
within the new administration, beyond a few who staffed
district kindergartens.
In April 2002, the
interim administration introduced a draft National
Development Framework and, in October, a draft national
budget. Together, the two documents sought to channel
donor assistance toward focused public investment
programs. A meeting held in October - convening the
cabinet and other key stakeholders, referred to as the
Implementation Group - gave the cabinet a forum to
present its agenda for reform to the international
community. This was itself a remarkable achievement,
given the difficult conditions. At the same time, the
government, spearheaded by the minister of finance,
organized consultative groups to foster cooperation
among lead ministries and donors in relation to the
initial 12 public investment programs. This period
involved a rapid re-evaluation of the overall
functioning of the public administration, creating
widespread uncertainty. It was, nonetheless, an
essential process. In spite of the importance of these
developments, which demonstrated the growing competence
and assertiveness of the government, very little donor
assistance was actually provided as direct budgetary
support, effectively undermining the implementation of
key reforms and threatening the sovereignty of the new
administration.
After rethinking its approach
toward reconstruction and having reformed its public
administration, the interim government identified the
budget as the key instrument of policy and institutional
reforms. The Ministry of Finance focused, in
collaboration with lead program ministries, on building
core financial management capacities and identifying
policy and institutional constraints in order to
expedite the execution of the budget. In spite of
concerted efforts to enhance effectiveness, the pace of
change was unsatisfactory, due to the weak fiscal
position of the new administration. Nevertheless, the
cabinet's presentation of the national budget and the
consultative group model did allow key national
priorities to be articulated, and these have
subsequently been supported in various degrees by the
aid community.
The National Development
Framework, focusing on three core pillars of investment
- social and human capital, physical reconstruction and
natural resources, and the private sector and good
governance - has, coupled with the National Development
Budget, become a key force in the reform agenda.
However, major constraints to effective budget
formulation have emerged, including: (i) The narrow
revenue base for autonomous development, (ii) The
uncertainty of external resources, either for direct
budget support or assistance projects, and (iii) The
lack of capacity (public or private) in project design.
As far as budget execution is concerned, most
constraints are either institutional - government
capacities in contract management and the slow process
of aid engagement - or security-related. Widespread
insecurity in the south has limited both government and
aid agency activities.
In terms of developing an
efficient and effective central state, many nascent
institutions, particularly at the provincial level, are
constrained by the lack of resource transfers,
particularly in regard to operations and maintenance
costs. Other problems include insufficient qualified
staff, reflecting uncompetitive salary structures, and
poor coordination between different budget entities.
However, the Independent Administrative Reform and Civil
Service Commission and the Priority Reform and
Restructuring framework have spearheaded the reform of
over 20 key government departments. These reforms have
promoted more focused departmental functions around an
emerging policy agenda, have facilitated recruitment of
higher-qualified staff (a result of the new interim pay
scale), and have fostered the sequential focusing of
investment across the breadth of key departments. This
strategy was adopted following the determination that an
across-the-board reform program would be neither
politically acceptable nor financially feasible.
The National Development Framework, the National
Development Budget, and the Priority Reform and
Restructuring process have, over a short period of time,
been institutionalized at the core of the reform and
reconstruction process. The Afghan Transitional
Administration has adopted these policy tools to carry
out key provincial reforms as part of an emerging
provincial stabilization program. A re-examination of
the reconstruction and public administration reform
agenda in the provincial context can be expected to
assess several other issues, including: (i) The reform
of security institutions, (ii) The development of core
financial management capacities at the central ministry
and provincial department levels, (iii) The lowering of
the fiduciary threshold for provincial expenditures
(until capacities can be built) to allow greater
transfer of operations and maintenance costs, (iv)
Allowing the provincial governor and departments a
greater say in national budget formulation and an
oversight role in budget implementation, (v) The
targeting of key provincial departments by the Priority
Reform and Restructuring process, (vi) The
simplification of investment programs, (vii) Greater
reliance on regional technical capabilities (in
Pakistan, India, etc), and (viii) The rationalization of
sectoral sequencing of reform priorities.
Taking stock of security sector reform
Security sector reform is the key to ensuring
sustainable security in post-conflict settings. The
concept, first elaborated in the late 1990s, refers to
the transformation of a country's security apparatus
with the aim of ensuring that it is managed and operated
in a manner consistent with democratic norms and
principles. Responsible and accountable security forces
reduce the risk of conflict, provide an effective safety
system for the citizenry, and foster an environment
conducive for development activities.
The
immediate popularity of the concept derived from its
integration of a number of key donor priorities into one
overarching model: (i) The reduction of military
expenditures and their reallocation to development, (ii)
Conflict prevention and post-conflict management, and
(iii) Improvements in the efficiency and effectiveness
of government oversight and control over security
institutions. Over the past decade, security sector
reform has evolved into a catch-all term that can
encompass virtually any aspect of state building with
security implications, a trend that has complicated its
implementation. Accordingly, the record of security
sector reform in post-conflict states has been mixed, as
the Afghan experience attests.
Afghanistan is at
the forefront of the global "war on terror" and at the
core of concern over international and regional
security. Accordingly, it has been subjected to
intensive international and regional intervention and
competition, which has exacerbated existing societal
cleavages, created artificial divisions, and altered
domestic power dynamics. Halting this destructive
pattern and restoring a semblance of security and
stability to this troubled country is unmistakably the
most imposing challenge to Afghanistan 's state-building
process. It is a challenge that the international
community simply must overcome, as the costs of failure
- the reemergence of the country as a haven for
terrorists and its degeneration into a narco-mafia
state, serving as the principal supplier of opiates for
the world market - are clearly more prohibitive than the
costs of action.
Over the past two years the
security situation across many areas of Afghanistan has
deteriorated significantly. The causes of Afghanistan's
security crisis include the resurgence of
anti-government spoiler groups, the burgeoning narcotics
trade, the entrenchment of regional power brokers or
warlords, and the rising incidence of banditry and
general criminality. After 23 years of internecine
warfare, Afghanistan's security sector is in disarray.
The acute lack of resources and capacity confronting the
country's security institutions necessitates long-term
international investment. Although the pace of security
sector reform in Afghanistan has been much slower than
planned, significant gains have been made that have laid
a solid foundation for continued reform. Achievements
include: (i) The inauguration of an Afghan National Army
and police force, (ii) The design and implementation of
a national disarmament, demobilization and reintegration
program, (iii) The formulation of a National Drug
Control Strategy, (iv) The initiation of a comprehensive
review of the country's judicial infrastructure, and (v)
Steady progress in de-mining. These are important steps
toward establishing security and the rule of law in the
country, but to guarantee and accelerate further
progress on this path, a shift in course will be
required.
The main impediment to the
implementation of security sector reform in Afghanistan
and other post-conflict countries is the lack of an
overall strategic framework to guide the process, a
product of the ambiguity that still surrounds this
nascent pillar of state building. Although the strategic
framework that is devised must be tailored to meet local
conditions, there are a number of universal guidelines
that should be observed in the formulation of security
sector reform programs.
Indigenous
ownership: The only actors that can effectively
and sustainably manage security sector reform are local
institutions and governmental bodies. Although
international financial and technical support of the
process is indispensable, domestic actors should
maintain ultimate authority over the direction of
reforms. To promote local ownership, a strong
centralized security institution should be erected to
devise policy and oversee its implementation. In the
Afghan context, the National Security Council was
designed to fill this role. The purpose of this body is
to craft government security policy and coordinate the
activities of government institutions, donor states,
nongovernmental organizations and intergovernmental
agencies on issues pertaining to security.
Donor coordination: Inadequate
donor coordination is a widespread and debilitating
problem afflicting developing countries. It has had a
particularly adverse impact on Afghanistan 's security
sector reform process due to the multisectoral donor
support scheme erected to facilitate international
assistance. This scheme divided responsibilities for
each of the five pillars of the reform process among the
five main states funding the security sector: the United
States (military reform), the United Kingdom
(counternarcotics), Germany (police reform), Japan
(disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of
ex-combatants), and Italy (judicial reform). The success
of security sector reform depends on orchestrating
synergies between the various pillars of the process.
The different institutions that constitute a security
sector are intricately interconnected, so any reform of
the system requires consensus to be established around a
unified framework. Unfortunately, competing interests
within the government and among donor states have
obstructed coordination and have disjointed the process.
If the actions and agendas of the various donors are not
harmonized, the process risks collapse.
Integrated political process:
Security sector reform cannot be implemented during a
conflict. A genuine political solution to hostilities,
incorporating all relevant actors, must be achieved for
any changes to take hold. Security sector reform should
occupy a central position in any post-conflict peace
agreement and must be integrated into the subsequent
political process, guaranteeing that all parties to the
conflict accept and engage in the reform programs.
Allowing powerful actors to remain outside the process
at its outset offers them the option of assuming a
spoiler role at a later juncture, an eventuality that
has come to pass in Afghanistan with detrimental
implications.
The Bonn Agreement was not a peace
agreement in the classic sense. Not all parties to the
conflict were present at the December 2001 conference,
and the delegates who attended were not fully
representative of the diversity of the Afghan
population. The agreement also failed to
institutionalize security sector reform and tie the
major power brokers to it. The provisions that did
address the security sector - most notably in reference
to disarmament, demobilization and reintegration - were
vague and open to interpretation, making them more of an
impediment to implementation than a vehicle to
legitimize the process.
Periphery
stabilization: Security sector reform processes
have a proclivity to dedicate a disproportionate amount
of resources and attention to stabilizing and securing
the core of a country, the capital and major population
centers, as opposed to the periphery. This opens up a
political space for spoilers to operate, and it
fragments the process along a rural-urban axis. Creating
robust national institutions, though essential to
nurturing a viable central government, will have little
impact in stabilizing a country if these institutions
lack authority and legitimacy outside the capital, as is
currently the case in Afghanistan. Because the
peripheral provinces serve as the principal revenue base
for the central administration, enhanced loyalty to the
central government is also essential for the state
budget and can boost ongoing efforts to clamp down on
the illicit informal economy.
Administrative reforms:
Post-conflict states invariably face significant
administrative and bureaucratic deficiencies. This
problem is particularly acute in Afghanistan , where
after 23 years of civil war most of the machinery of
state has collapsed, and indigenous capacity has been
severely depleted. The current government is beset by
problems of bureaucratic inefficiency, disorganization,
corruption and nepotism. To institute the rule of law
and create viable and politically reliable security
forces, central security institutions must be reformed
to make them efficient, accountable, transparent and
broadly representative. To achieve this objective: (i)
Salaries of all security forces must be raised to a
level commensurate with the costs of living and paid on
a timely basis, (ii) A comprehensive training and
retraining program for civil servants and security
forces must be designed and launched, (iii) Unqualified
personnel must be re-deployed or removed - a severance
scheme should be introduced to remove employees who are
politically unreliable or who lack applicable skills,
and (iv) The succinct recruitment procedures and
guidelines established by the Independent Administrative
Reform and Civil Service Commission must be applied in
the security ministries. It is vital that a meritocratic
system is established to attract bright and qualified
candidates, a process that will reduce cronyism and
nepotism and should build public faith in government
institutions.
Investment in traditional
structures: Security sector reform is rooted in
the underlying notion that traditional security
structures are outdated and anachronistic and should be
deconstructed and replaced with modern, Western-oriented
structures. In practice, supplanting organic structures
with formalistic security mechanisms can frequently do
more to disrupt communities than to provide stability.
In Afghanistan, there is a mistaken notion that all
traditional security systems have either been destroyed,
are dysfunctional, or are incompatible with
international norms of human rights. Not only are
traditional structures intact, functioning and, in many
cases, loyal to central administration, they present the
most viable option to promote security and stability in
some areas.
In light of the security crisis
facing Afghanistan , structures shown to be effective,
and that do not contravene international human rights
norms, should be encouraged, not displaced. This does
not obviate the need to introduce international models
and standards. A mixed, flexible approach is most
suitable.
Funding security reforms through
the national budget: Most aid committed to
Afghanistan's security sector is channeled through donor
agencies and programs - often covert in nature - rather
than to government institutions. This is a common
feature of post-conflict states, particularly those
subjected to external military intervention. Such
practices divest local actors of ownership over the
process, obstruct donor coordination, and arouse
suspicion of donor intentions among the local
population. A more effective policy would be to transfer
aid to national government institutions through
internationally administered trust funds. This would
permit robust international oversight of donor aid while
giving the government authority over aid disbursement.
It is vital that domestic institutions are empowered
through the delivery of aid and are increasingly
recognized as the engine of change by the populace.
Raising public awareness:
Following a civil conflict, residents lack faith in
security institutions and have minimal understanding of
their function and role in society. In states where
government security forces may have been guilty of
atrocities or acts of aggression, this crisis of
confidence is even more acute. Security forces such as
the police cannot function unless they have the full
support of the communities that they are obligated to
serve and protect. Restoring the public's trust in these
institutions and reinforcing the security sector's image
as the legitimate guarantor of the people's rights and
safety requires a concerted education and
awareness-raising campaign. This campaign, utilizing
various mediums of communication, should educate the
population about the structure, duties and
responsibilities of the security sector as well as the
inalienable rights of each citizen in relation to it.
Regional security framework: As
the process of globalization has progressively blurred
state borders, security issues have increasingly adopted
a distinct transnational character. The emergent threats
to the international system - terrorism, narcotics
trafficking and organized crime - do not respect
national boundaries. Accordingly, civil unrest in one
state is invariably perceived as a threat by its
neighbors and often by the entire international
community. This realization has led to both constructive
and unconstructive interventions in post-conflict
states. To ensure that interventions are constructive,
it is vital to bind all relevant regional and
international actors to a multilateral regional security
framework.
In Afghanistan, the need for regional
involvement in the security sector reform process is
clear; the influence and interference of neighboring and
regional states has been one of the paramount sources of
conflict and division in the country for the past two
centuries. Afghanistan 's geopolitical importance has
impelled regional states to surreptitiously compete for
influence and pursue their interests via proxies, a
tactic that has served to fragment the country along
ethnic, religious and political lines. To arrest the
growth of insecurity in Afghanistan , it is critical
that regional states cease all support for substate
actors - individual parties, tribes and warlords. A
significant step toward achieving this goal was made
with the signing of the Kabul Declaration on Good
Neighborly Relations, a pledge of noninterference by
Afghanistan's immediate neighbors - Pakistan,
Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, China and Iran -
signed on December 22, 2002. The international community
must exert pressure on the signatories of this
declaration, along with other states with a history of
intervention in Afghanistan, to observe the agreement's
fundamental principle: the inviolability of
Afghanistan's sovereignty. Similar steps must be taken
in other post-conflict states, whether it is Iraq or the
Democratic Republic of Congo, where the potential for
external interference is high.
International security assistance:
In post-conflict situations such as Afghanistan, there
will inevitably be some residual effects of the recent
conflict in the form of insurgency activity and
terrorism. Although this is to be expected, a minimum
level of security is required as a foundation to advance
state building. Domestic security forces will invariably
be unable to provide this base level of security five
years or more following the cessation of major
hostilities, the time it usually takes to complete
fundamental structural reforms and to reshape security
forces of a critical mass necessary to carry out basic
security functions. During this period, it is advisable
that international forces fill the prevailing security
vacuum. In Afghanistan, either an expansion of the
International Security Assistance Force )ISAF) or a
strengthening of the Provisional Reconstruction Teams
could fill this void.
There is, however, a
tolerance threshold for international intervention in
every country. If this threshold is exceeded,
peacekeeping forces could be depicted as occupiers
rather than as enforcers of peace and stability. In
countries with a long history of external interference
and intervention, such as Iraq and Afghanistan, this
threshold is low. Although there is widespread public
support for an expansion of the ISAF peacekeeping
mission in Afghanistan, such enthusiasm would
undoubtedly evaporate if the size of the force surpassed
50,000 troops - an unlikely prospect. Dedicated
peacekeeping missions provide vital support for security
sector reform; however, to ensure that they bolster
rather than undermine the process, their size, mandate
and structure should be carefully molded to meet local
conditions.
Currently, the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization-led (NATO) ISAF peacekeeping mission in
Afghanistan comprises 5,000-6,000 troops and is based in
the capital. Its mandate is limited to maintaining
security within Kabul and its immediate environs,
contributing to the sharp disparity between security
conditions at the nerve center of the country and those
along the periphery. For Afghanistan to embark on the
next stage of the state-building process, the expansion
of ISAF to key areas across the country is urgently
required. Although NATO leaders have recognized this
need and committed themselves to fulfilling it, member
states have yet to contribute the requisite troops,
fueling the growing credibility gap in the eyes of the
Afghan populace toward the international community and
the government it supports.
Linking national,
regional and international agendas Afghanistan
lies at the crossroads of Asia - a land bridge across
which the famed Silk Road trading route once passed. As
a landlocked state, the political and economic linkages
between Afghanistan and its neighbors constitute a
significant determinant of patterns of economic growth,
security, and political development. Moreover, given the
porous nature of Central Asian borders and continuing
unrest over the contested Durand Line separating
Afghanistan and Pakistan, building a broad-based
consensus in the region around political economy issues
is essential. In light of the transnational nature of
security threats, whether spawned by drugs or terrorism,
collaboration between intelligence and other security
forces is a precondition for regional and global
stability.
Trade, economic growth and poverty
reduction are important crosscutting themes in
guaranteeing peace and stability within the region.
Indeed, improvements in the road and transport sector in
Afghanistan would enhance the competitive edge of all
economies that trade with and through Afghanistan .
Since trade relations, supported by improved trade
logistics, are a key to mobilizing economic interests
around peace, the Afghan administration, in partnership
with the international community, has endeavored to
strengthen bilateral and multilateral trading relations.
In pursuit of this objective, the Kabul government has
endorsed a progressive and open trading regime, has
simplified the new import tariff structure, and is
embarking on significant investments in both customs
modernization and trade facilitation. In many respects,
the trade regimes of surrounding states are far more
restrictive than Afghanistan's, and further measures
will need to focus on freeing up trade relations and
enticing the untaxed, informal economy into the formal
trading framework.
Another major area of concern
to be addressed is the scale of the illicit economy,
encompassing the trade in drugs and arms and the
smuggling of high-value commodities such as petroleum
and lumber. The value of these traded goods, which are
not included in trade flow estimates, is very
substantial - the opium trade generated approximately $2
billion in fiscal year 2002-03. Clearly, if Afghanistan
is to pull back from the brink of state collapse,
enhancing regional collaboration to address the
continued expansion of the shadow economy will be as
important as investment in the formal economy. As it
stands, the scale of the illicit economy threatens to
undermine the legitimacy and efficacy of the state. This
illegitimate economic activity has challenged nascent
efforts to establish the rule of law and has crimped the
taxable base at the disposal of the government.
Strategies to eradicate opium production and to legalize
the petroleum and lumber trade will need to be advanced
to combat this threat; however, such initiatives must
remain cognizant that the resulting losses in
livelihoods and their impacts on specific categories of
men and women will need to be addressed on a systematic
basis through targeted interventions.
In
developing a political-economic framework for
Afghanistan and its neighbors, the current value and mix
of traded commodities - whether exchanged between
countries, transited within the region, or traded with
the outside world - can provide an important indicator
of further opportunities for harmonization and
collaboration. According to a 2003 International
Monetary Fund trade report, it is clear that up until
2002, formal trade flows between Afghanistan and its
neighbors remained relatively small. At that time,
Tajikistan ranked as the Central Asian country with the
highest reliance on regional trade -over 20 percent of
its national total - followed by Turkmenistan and
Afghanistan at about 10 percent each. Since 2002,
Afghanistan's economy has seen a resurgence in growth.
Again, it is important to stress that these flows relate
only to formal trade; the picture would look very
different if all trade were being measured.
Based on formal trade figures for 2002, economic
policies in Afghanistan should strive not only to
strengthen trade within the region but to achieve
greater integration into the global economy. The large
Afghan diaspora offers a vehicle that should be
exploited to achieve this objective. Thus far, the
Afghan government has adopted uniformly applied foreign
trade policies, has signed new bilateral and trilateral
trade agreements, maintains its membership in the
Economic Cooperation Organization, and has applied for
membership in the World Trade and World Customs
organizations. Areas of regional collaboration,
regarding, for example, the Turkmen-Afghanistan gas
pipeline and the extraction of mineral resources, will
also emerge as priorities over the medium term.
The harmonization of security policies will take
many years and will require greater convergence in
political and economic interests. Moreover, if customs
and border controls are to be effective in reducing
illicit trading activities, if the uncontrolled flow of
arms and drugs within the region is to be reduced, and
if the informal economy is to be subsumed within the
taxable economy, then greater regional and international
support will be required. Reforms in the area of
financial markets and banking will also help to
legitimize capital flows.
Poverty often drives
both the informal and illicit economies. Therefore,
improving the trade position at the household level in
addition to the national level will be a key to
establishing the writ of the government and instituting
the rule of law. Strategic analyses at the regional
level - regarding which commodities will maintain a
comparative or absolute advantage when produced or
traded by Afghanistan both within the region and with
the wider world - will be important in determining
public sector spending and the policy reforms required
to facilitate growth. Clearly, the increasing economic
integration of women into the Afghan economy will also
have a very beneficial impact, not just in regard to
growth and equity but also in terms of accessing market
advantages.
Conclusion Afghanistan's
state-building process is entering a decisive phase.
Although the country has made remarkable strides over
the past two years, a number of factors, most notably
rampant insecurity and the slow pace of development,
have pushed the process to the precipice of collapse.
With the Bonn political process nearing its fruition and
a new donor conference to be held in Berlin at the end
of March, the Afghan government and the international
community have been presented with a unique opportunity
to right the wrongs of the past two years and to place
the country firmly on the road to peace and stability.
Accomplishing this goal requires a deep understanding of
both the successes and failures of the process over the
past two years. The lessons gleaned by such an analysis
are valuable not merely to guide the realignment of
Afghanistan's state-building process but to aid other
post-conflict states in such endeavors. Recent events in
Iraq and the Balkans demonstrate the urgent need for
greater knowledge and understanding of the complexities
of state building in the post-Cold War era. Accordingly,
the following set of broad recommendations has a dual
purpose, to steer policymakers in Afghanistan and to
offer insight that may be applicable in other
post-conflict settings.
Ensure national
ownership and coordination of reform One
universal lesson that can be derived from all
state-building endeavors is that the process must be
owned by domestic actors. Externally dictated nation
building is unsustainable and could provoke a violent
backlash. Incoherent and disjointed external assistance
- even if well-intentioned - can have a detrimental
effect on reconstruction efforts. Domestic actors are
best placed to coordinate the activities of donor states
and international organizations on the ground in order
to enhance the alignment of domestic and external reform
efforts. Providing donor assistance through the national
budget, targeted at public investment programs, will
most effectively put government back in the driver's
seat. It will take time to develop core administrative
capacities within the administration, and this
development will only be assured if the government is
invested with greater responsibility over resource
management.
Prioritize public administrative
reforms In the aftermath of a conflict, existing
institutions are characteristically dysfunctional, and
domestic capacity is meager. Although in Afghanistan the
core procedures of the former administrative system have
remained intact, bureaucratic structures are
disorganized and inefficient. This situation has been
exacerbated by the aid community, which, by offering
salaries deemed exorbitant by local standards, has
inadvertently sparked a debilitating brain drain from
the government. To ensure that Afghans are able to
assume control of the state-building project, it is
vital that concerted and early emphasis be placed on
civil service and administrative reforms, encompassing
such activities as the rationalization of pay scales,
the recruitment of qualified men and women, the
reshuffling of employees, and the implementation of
employment guidelines and criteria. Such measures -
combined with a well-supported "Afghanization" policy -
will not only reduce the potential for corruption and
mismanagement but will, over time, allay the legitimate
concerns of donors regarding the aid-absorptive capacity
of the government.
Develop unified
strategic framework for security sector Creating
robust domestic security institutions that are
efficient, effective, and democratically accountable is
the key to restoring stability in a sustainable fashion
in post-conflict environments. This is a long-term
process contingent on durable donor support, the
implementation of civil service and public
administration reforms, close coordination among all
stakeholders, and the formation of strong linkages with
the ongoing political process. As illustrated in
Afghanistan, the failure to meet these conditions can
precipitate a breakdown of the process. To avert this
eventuality, it is vital to erect an integrated
strategic framework to guide the process and exploit
synergies between its constituent programs. This
framework should be devised and operated by a domestic
body, such as the National Security Council, and should
be institutionalized in the prevailing political
agreement.
Orchestrate external security
support The reconstruction of local security
forces in a post-conflict state is a process that could
take five years or more to complete. Accordingly, a
security vacuum will inevitably prevail from the
cessation of hostilities to the point when reformed
security institutions can assume their rightful place as
guarantors of the country's security. During this
critical interim period, an external force will be
needed to fill the security gap. A minimum level of
stability is required to advance state building, a
baseline currently absent in countries such as
Afghanistan. The International Security Assistance Force
will continue to be required to fill this role in
Afghanistan, both centrally and at the sub-national
level.
Craft inclusive political
processes For a peace process to be sustainable,
it must be accepted and supported by all parties to the
conflict. If one or more parties remain outside the
process, they retain the option of adopting a spoiler
role at a later stage, an adverse situation that has
materialized in Afghanistan. The Bonn Conference, which
launched the current political process in Afghanistan,
was dominated by one group, the Northern Alliance or
United Front. Their predominant military position in the
country - achieved due to the patronage of the US-led
coalition - allowed them to significantly dictate the
structure of the ensuing agreement. Accordingly, the
political dispensation produced by the conference was
heavily weighted in favor of the leading faction of the
alliance, the Panjshiri Tajik faction. This inevitably
created widespread sentiments of mistrust and suspicion
and sparked allegations of disenfranchisement among
rival ethnic minorities. A realignment of political
power in order to embrace different groups and interests
- whether based on gender, ethnicity or religion - is
gradually emerging. Ensuring greater inclusivity in the
process has already become a central theme of the
forthcoming elections and is a prerequisite for the
establishment of a stable and viable nation-state.
Harmonize center-periphery
relations The paradigm of state building has an
innate proclivity for advancing strong centralized forms
of government. Accordingly, a disproportionate amount of
resources are spent on strengthening central state
institutions at the expense of provincial and
local-level structures. This has had the effect of
undermining local authority before a strong central
state has been able to assert itself. In countries such
as Afghanistan, where local forms of authority have
retained their legitimacy in many parts of the country,
suspicion and even hostility toward central state
institutions has emerged. Undermining local authority
structures in pursuit of a strong central state is, in
most cases, counterproductive. Equal support should be
provided to national and sub-national levels of
government and to both traditional and modern structures
in order to encourage the growth of civil society.
State-building processes must abandon their
centralist tendencies in favor of a multilayered,
center-periphery approach that embraces traditional
forms of authority. This does not obviate the need to
build robust central state institutions, which at this
early stage in the process are urgently required to
serve as interlocutors with the international community
and to coordinate reconstruction activities.
Nevertheless, parallel processes should be initiated to
nurture sub-national governance structures, since, in
the long-run, a greater degree of decentralization in
the system may be most apt for diverse countries such as
Afghanistan.
Engage regional actors and
support multilateralism The world today is more
interconnected than at any time in history. Economic,
political and security issues transcend state borders,
and the state-building process must reflect this new
reality by integrating regional and global actors. There
is no better example of the necessity of involving
regional states than Afghanistan, whose economy is
inextricably linked to that of Central Asia, Iran and
South Asia and whose principal security threats - drugs,
terrorism and crime - have assumed a distinct
transnational character. It is clear that to spark
economic growth and combat insecurity, a regional
approach to state building is required. This effort will
also necessitate evolving multilateral support,
particularly from the United States, the European Union
and the Persian Gulf states, for the ongoing reform
agenda outlined in the Afghan government's recent study
titled "Securing Afghanistan's Future: Accomplishments
and the Strategic Pathway Forward".
Solicit
durable donor commitments The entire
state-building endeavor is dependent on durable donor
commitments of funds. There is no quick fix for a
post-conflict state; it is a long and arduous process
requiring vigilance and commitment by all stakeholders.
Long-term donor commitments, of five years or more, help
build confidence in local leaders and enhance their
legitimacy in the eyes of the populace. In addition to
overall levels of donor aid, the nature of aid
distribution can determine the outcome of reconstruction
and development efforts.
Local actors - not the
United Nations, international nongovernmental
organizations or donor states - must be perceived by the
population as the engine of change. Fostering growth of
local capacity and initiative will require donor
assistance to be increasingly channeled directly to
domestic government bodies. Internationally operated
trust funds can provide an effective oversight mechanism
for aid disbursement without depriving the government of
authority over the dispensation of funds. The Afghan
Reconstruction Trust Fund is playing exactly this role,
but key players, most notably the United States and
Japan, have largely opted to ignore this route for aid
delivery, disbursing funds primarily to projects outside
of the agreed budgetary framework. Delivering donor aid
to the coffers of the government facilitates the use of
the budget as an instrument to promote vital reforms.
Implement economic reforms to stimulate
growth Endemic poverty and the sheer scale of
illicit economic activities (opium, arms trading,
smuggling, petroleum cartels, etc) continue to be
principal causes of instability in Afghanistan -
undermining revenue collection vital for a sovereign
state to evolve. The majority of Afghans have expressed
a willingness to give up their arms if alternative means
of subsistence were made available to them.
Unfortunately, such opportunities have yet to emerge.
Strong and equitable economic growth is a key to
supplanting the rule of the gun with the rule of law in
Afghanistan. To stimulate economic growth in Afghanistan
or any other post-conflict state, fundamental economic
reforms must be carried out to facilitate investment,
encourage trade, enhance market integration, and advance
development. Although growth cannot be achieved with
policy reform alone, a sound policy framework can
significantly enhance the comparative advantage of the
formal private sector to act as a stimulant of growth.
Manage expectations The euphoria
accompanying the end of hostilities and the beginning of
a reconstruction process often engenders unrealistic
expectations among the populace. In Afghanistan, both
Afghan elites and the international donor community
fostered such expectations in the waning days of the
Taliban regime. President George W Bush's allusions to a
Marshall Plan for Afghanistan and British Prime Minister
Tony Blair's pledge that the country would not be
forgotten elevated the hopes of many that the process
would not be permitted to fail. However, two years after
these bold proclamations, the vast majority of the
Afghan population has yet to see the fruits of
reconstruction. With the promises of both the Kabul
government and the international community shrouded in
doubt, the Afghan populace has become increasingly
disillusioned with the present political dispensation,
creating a dangerous credibility gap, as graphically
illustrated in the recent constitutional discussions.
Readjusting popular expectations at this late stage is
an imposing task but one that should nevertheless be
embarked upon. Reform, economic development, social
transformation and the provision of social services will
take considerable time to attain and will require the
unwavering support of key Afghan reformers and the
international community. Cognizant of this reality, it
is important that the expectations of the population be
tempered.
Mark Sedra is a research
associate at the Bonn International Center for
Conversion. He recently returned from Afghanistan, where
he spent two months assessing the needs of the Afghan
security sector on behalf of the UN and the Afghan
government.
Peter
Middlebrook is an independent consultant
who has been working in Afghanistan since early 2002. He
was centrally involved in coordinating the recent
exercise that produced the report titled "Securing
Afghanistan's Future: Accomplishments and the Strategic
Pathway Forward". He holds a doctorate in rural poverty
reduction and institutional reform from the University
of Durham (UK) and has worked on poverty and political
economy reforms in numerous countries over the past 15
years.
