Final Draft December 2009 Bhavna Sharma, Marta Foresti and Leni Wild Table of contents

6.2. Consultations

NSA consultations are the process by which NSA views and inputs are solicited for general as well as EC specific development processes. Such processes include National Development Plans and EC Country Strategy Papers. Furthermore, consultations also include NSA participation to debate the content of national and EC plans and policies, as well as participation in reviews (mid-term, full term and joint reviews), as well as discussing and negotiating their precise role in the implementation of development plans and programmes. The objective of consultations is to ensure ongoing and continuous engagement of NSAs as active participants in the development process and enhance ongoing dialogue between NSAs and the state. The EC’s role is to facilitate this dialogue and enhance opportunities and entry points for NSAs to engage in the development process.

Box 15: EC consultations guidelines
According to EC guidelines, consultations involve a two tier approach. Firstly, there are consultations around setting the development agenda via the National Development Strategies which should include as wide a range of NSA groups and views as possible. A similar type of process applies to the EC’s Country Strategy Paper process Secondly, there are consultations around EC programming where attention is specifically focused on including those NSAs that are directly involved in the issue/sector either as implementers, watchdogs/monitors or experts, including cross-cutting thematic issues (such as gender, the environment, conflict prevention, etc.).
However, consultations should be more than simply information sharing sessions and provide space for NSAs to make real contributions to the shaping of policies and programming, as well as set out a strategy for further engagement in the implementation and monitoring phases. The mid-term and final reviews of EC and joint donor programming have the potential to provide a significant role to NSAs, but the efficacy and impact of their role as monitors will be affected by their substantive engagement in the earlier stages of the development process (i.e. policy and programming design, development and debates).
Source: Source: Floridi, M. and Sanz-Corella, B. (2009) Capitalisation Study on Capacity Building Support Programmes for NSAs under the 9^th EDF, Brussels: EC.

Whilst the way in which a consultation process is designed and carried out will vary according to the context and NSA landscape in country, there are a number of technical and political issues to factor in to ensure a successful consultative process. These are summarized in Box 14 below:

Box 16: Checklist for good quality consultations
The India case study provided a number of useful reflections of what are the ‘key ingredients’ for good quality and meaningful consultations with NSAs. They include:

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  Raise awareness on the purpose, methods and timing of consultation processes with all stakeholders
  
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  Ensure that adequate levels of information are shared with NSAs, in a timely manner, including providing them with enough time to analyse the information and respond
  
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  Create time and space in the process to consider NSA views and amend policies or programmes accordingly
  
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  Ensure that a diverse range of NSA groups and voices are heard in the process
  
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  Provide adequate feedback on the results of the consultation and disseminate widely
  
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  Seek to create or strengthen political will and buy-in for the consultation process by state authorities
  
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  Facilitate dialogue between state and non-state counterparts by providing contacts, skilled people to chair and facilitate meetings, meeting spaces and resources
  
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  Facilitate discussions around the specific consultation methods and mechanisms to be used (e.g. seminars, workshops, meetings with specific chairs)
  
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  Build and strengthen NSA owned fora and platforms for dialogue, where they exist
  
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  Identify specialised networks or actors for consultations on specific issues/sectors
  
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  Consider holding consultation processes at decentralized and local levels, reducing the focus on the capital city and facilitating the participation of smaller and grassroots NSAs
  

Source: India case study, 2009.

A potentially useful approach for improving the quality and results of consultations is to learn some of the lessons of similar attempts of engaging NSAs in policy dialogue. For example in relation to PRS and participatory poverty assessments, the box below provides an overview of factors that have proven to be critical for effective Participatory Poverty Assessments. Some of these could be usefully taken in to account when planning EC consultations.

Box 17: Factors to consider to increase the impact of Participatory Poverty Assessments (PPAs)
Understand the political environment:

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  Undertake the PPA only after potential political implications have been thought through;
  
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  Use the institutional, formal, personal and informal structures and networks and understand the impact they have on policymakers
  

Create a conducive policy environment if possible:

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  Question the value of conducting a PPA where there is limited government support;
  
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  Build dialogue to create a more open climate so that governments feel less threatened by the resulting data;
  
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  Maintain a policy dialogue through continuous follow-up with various stakeholders;
  
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  Use personal judgement and attune stakeholder involvement to the overall political, social, economic, and institutional environment in country. There is no blueprint approach to the timing of stakeholder inclusion in the policy dialogue.
  

Promote ownership:

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  Include key policymakers from the beginning. Develop relationships with and understanding of key players;
  
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  Consider publishing joint documents (World Bank and government) where appropriate;
  
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  Know how to organise workshops with appropriate follow-up. Workshops are not the end of a process of participation. Final consensus might not be achieved so the documents should reflect the differing views. If people’s views are not included, that should be explained.
  

Strengthen the policy delivery framework:

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  Identify a credible institution where participatory research could be analysed, coordinated and disseminated. Investigate provincial capacities;
  
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  Work with institutions (universities, networks of social scientists, etc) already undertaking social research to ensure that research is not duplicated and the PPA becomes part of the body of social knowledge.
  

Source: McGee, R., and Norton, A. (2000) Participation in poverty reduction strategies: a synthesis of experience with participatory approaches to policy design, implementation and monitoring, IDS Working Paper 109, Brighton: IDS.

However, there are a number of significant technical and political challenges to conducting fair, transparent and substantive consultative processes that EC delegations face. Firstly, the time and resources required to initiate and conduct a consultation process are significant for EC staff already with full agendas and portfolios or work. Secondly, the capacity and skills required for successful engagement in consultation processes for both state authorities and NSAs are high and the less capable actors are often marginalised in the process. Thirdly, there are significant barriers of political will and power asymmetries in the relationship between the state and NSAs. Whilst this varies greatly between countries, the issue of political and power relationships between the various stakeholders and the risks they pose for the consultation process are rarely examined.

These issues create a tension in the desire to include NSAs in the development process and creating too high expectations in NSAs of the significance of their role and what they can achieve. Feedback from the EC’s India delegation suggests that often consultation processes become information sharing sessions, from the EC or government to the NSAs rather than more substantive agenda shaping processes. It was also felt that the guidelines on NSA consultations are too ambitious and that more narrowly focused and realistic processes and systems are required in order to facilitate a greater participative role for NSAs in these development processes.
Consultation processes in the context of GBS or SBS will vary. As GBS is widely regarded as a dialogue between governments, it will be particularly difficult for NSAs to be consulted within the GBS framework. However, a potential entry point for consulting NSAs may exist in dialogues with government and donor counterparts prior to the GBS negotiations. Thus, NSAs are consulted for their views and expert opinions on a range of issues to be discussed under the rubric of GBS. NSA consultation in sector approaches can be easier to organize and formalize, as sector approaches are designed to be led by governments but in partnership with other key stakeholders, including NSAs.