How donors can make a difference in countries moving toward democracy? This study from USAID’s Center for Development Information and Evaluation (CDIE) assesses the agency’s past and current investments in civil society in Bangladesh, Chile, El Salvador, Kenya and Thailand. It argues that the key lies in strengthening civic advocacy groups – the non-governmental organisations that champion governmental reform.
Support for civil society is a core component of USAID’s democracy and governance agenda. It reflects a growing realisation of the value to democracy of autonomous centres of social and economic power. The four-phase transition scheme advocated by USAID may seem to imply a linear progression to a democratic nirvana, but in fact the process is uneven, messy, and subject to setbacks. Indeed, many transitions may lead to some new hybrid form of authoritarian rule, and what initially appears to be a democratic transition may turn out to be a false start.
- There is a risk investments in civil society will be dissipated over a wide range of activities, yielding minimal results.
- Many political reforms undertaken in the case countries would not have made as much headway without donor pressure and support. Many civic advocacy organisations are small, often with only a few staff members, and directed by a charismatic leader.
- There may be little internal democracy or leadership turnover, and linkages to potential coalition partners or constituencies may be tenuous. Most are not membership organisations.
- Most civil society organisations depend in great part on donor financing. Strategies are needed to promote financial independence and sustainability.
- Many countries are undergoing significant economic and political reforms simultaneously, although often at different speeds. In these situations donors need to calculate whether vigorous pursuit of reforms in one sector is likely to destabilise and undermine commitment to progress in the other.
- Some countries are moving rapidly toward self-sustaining economic growth. In contemporary donor thinking, that often justifies the diminution or termination of development assistance, even though many of these countries are still in the early phases of democratic transition.
Given the nonlinear nature of change, the sequencing of donor activities in each phase must be flexibly managed to cope with unanticipated obstacles or to seize new opportunities. Nonetheless, the scheme provides a basis for advancing the following recommendations on donor investments. Donors need to:
- Follow a disciplined approach in ensuring that investments in civil society do not lose their focus and relevance to the reform process.
- Be prepared to exercise considerable leverage when supporting civic advocacy organisations engaged in fostering democratic transitions in the pre- and early transition phases.
- Exercise caution when investing in institution-building efforts in civil society during the early phases of democratic transitions.
- Devote significant attention to building a favorable policy environment for the growth of civil society, particularly with respect to expanding in-country funding sources for this sector.
- Be aware of potential trade-offs in countries undergoing political transitions while also engaging in fundamental economic reforms in the move from statist to free-market economies.
- Develop policy guidance that establishes criteria for a country to graduate from receiving democracy aid, to defend against premature termination.
