The relationship between business and development initiatives and systemic change is the core focus of this paper. The key question is to explore whether and how pro-poor business approaches can go beyond individual company value chains, to drive shifts in broader market systems. The study relies on analysis of a series of case studies to draw conclusions regarding the degree ...» more
Library
This e-library contains more than 4500 external publications on governance, social development, conflict and humanitarian issues. It includes academic and grey literature selected for its basis in good quality research and coverage of a range of perspectives. Policy-oriented summaries of each document are provided, plus links to the full text.
Religion and Mediation: The Role of Faith-Based Actors in International Conflict Resolution
This paper emphasises the importance of religion and religious actors in the process of mediation. We examine the general conditions that facilitate mediation in international relations and assess how much these hold true in the case of faith-based mediation. We find that aspects such as legitimacy and leverage have a major impact on the success or failure of mediation. We ...» more
The Small Entrepreneur in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Situations
This report is part of a broader effort by the World Bank Group to understand the motives and challenges of small entrepreneurs in fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS). The report’s key finding is that, compared to entrepreneurs elsewhere, entrepreneurs in FCS have different characteristics, face significantly different challenges, and thus may be subject to different ...» more
Understanding ‘Urban Youth’ and the Challenges they face in Sub-Saharan Africa: Unemployment, Food Insecurity and Violent Crime
This paper reviews how the various definitions of ‘youth’ relate to three dominant discourses about poverty and vulnerability in urbanising Africa: food insecurity; unemployment/joblessness; and violence/insecurity. Some, but not all of these discourses highlight young people. The paper’s discussion of common youth definitions seeks to identify if and when these are responsive ...» more
Strong Girls, Powerful Women: Program Planning and Design for Adolescent Girls in Humanitarian Settings
This report is intended to help humanitarian practitioners more effectively identify and address the unique needs of adolescent girls in displacement and crisis settings. It also provides donors and policy makers, who have the ability to drive change in humanitarian programming, with guidance on how to make sustainable impact for adolescent girls.This report synthesizes the ...» more
Disability Inclusion: Translating Policy into Practice in Humanitarian Action
An estimated 6.7 million persons with disabilities are forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, generalized violence and human rights violations. In 2008, the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) conducted a study and released a report on Disabilities among Refugee and Conflict-Affected Populations, which identified that persons with disabilities have ...» more
Theories of Change in international development: communication, learning, or accountability?
The Theory of Change approach – an increasingly popular management tool and discourse in development – aims to challenge and change implicit assumptions in world views and programmes, yet little is known about the extent to which it really does so. This paper analyses how Theories of Change are used in the day-to-day practice of an international development organisation, The ...» more
Closing the feedback loop: Can technology bridge the accountability gap?
Enhanced transparency, accountability, and government or donor responsiveness to people needs are imperative to achieve better and more sustainable development results on the ground. The rapid spread of new technologies is transforming the daily lives of millions of poor people around the world and has the potential to be a real game changer for development. Improved ...» more
Crime and conflict: the new challenge for peacebuilding
This report suggests that framing violent conflict as limited to war and civil war restricts our ability to address it: the approaches and lens of peacebuilding can enrich efforts to reduce armed violence and fragility linked to organised crime. It notes that this approach has not been widely tested, but that when it has, results are promising. Criminal networks and ...» more
The opportunities of digitizing payments: How digitization of payments, transfers, and remittances contributes to the G20 goals of broad-based economic growth, financial inclusion, and women’s economic empowerment
This paper synthesizes the evidence that the widespread adoption of digital payments in all their forms, including international and domestic remittances, can be instrumental in reaching the financial inclusion goals of the G20. It concludes that:Digitizing helps overcome the costs and physical barriers that have beset otherwise valuable financial inclusion efforts. Digital ...» more
Demand for Democracy Is Rising in Africa, But Most Political Leaders Fail to Deliver
Africans express growing attachment to democracy according to citizen attitude surveys conducted by the Afrobarometer in 34 countries. Seven out of ten Africans prefer democracy to other political regimes, and the proportion of deeply committed democrats (that is, those who also reject authoritarian alternatives) has risen steadily over the past decade.This Afrobarometer policy ...» more
Real-Time Evaluation of Humanitarian Assistance Revisited: Lessons Learned and the Way Forward
This paper argues that in order to improve the practical benefit of real-time evaluation (RTE), humanitarian organizations need to be even more selective and modest in its use. Wherever real-time evaluation is used, it should prioritise endogenous learning in organizations over questions of accountability and control.The study is based on a meta-evaluation of 44 RTE reports, ...» more
Effective law and regulation for disaster risk reduction: A multi-country report
This report is intended to help prepare and implement effective legal frameworks for disaster risk management (DRM) that are adapted to a country’s needs, drawing on examples and experience from other countries. It examines aspects of different countries’ legislation according to how they address relevant themes in the HFA, as well as issues identified by state parties and the ...» more
Gender Dimension of the Social Protection Index: Assessing Results for Asia and the Pacific
This paper presents the findings from a research project on the Social Protection Index (SPI) that assesses the extent to which gender has been incorporated in social protection programs. The SPI is a measure of central government social protection expenditures relative to all potential beneficiaries assessed against poverty line expenditures in a country. Important evidence of ...» more
Changing discriminatory norms affecting adolescent girls through communication activities – A review of evidence
This report presents findings from a review of evidence on the effectiveness of communications programmes for changing norms affecting adolescent girls in low- and middle-income countries. The studies in this review all examined communications initiatives that aimed to change norms on gender issues, reported on certain areas of adolescent girls’ wellbeing or included adolescent ...» more
Evaluating impacts of peacebuilding interventions
This paper examines the issues inherent in evaluating impacts of peacebuilding interventions and aims to ensure evaluation designs are appropriate, robust and conflict-sensitive. It offers a perspective on what impact evaluation means in a peacebuilding context, and highlights the importance of conflict analysis to understand and test the relevance of any intervention to the ...» more
The Price of Empowerment: Experimental Evidence on Land Titling in Tanzania
This paper presents preliminary results from a land titling experiment in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The experiment used targeted subsides to induce random variation in the price that land-owning households faced when purchasing a land title. In addition to these general price discounts, the paper reports impacts on overall demand for titling and female co-titling from ...» more
Delivering social protection in the aftermath of a shock: lessons from Bangladesh, Kenya, Pakistan and Viet Nam
Helping households cope with covariate shocks is one of the primary objectives of social protection policy. In contrast with idiosyncratic shocks that affect individuals over the course of their lifetime, such as loss of employment and ill-health, covariate shocks commonly affect entire communities or large parts of a country’s population at the same time. Examples include ...» more
Public Service Delivery: Role of Information and Communication Technology in Improving Governance and Development Impact
The focus of this paper is on improving governance through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in delivering services to the poor, i.e., improving efficiency, accountability, and transparency, and reducing bribes in delivery of services.India and a few other developing nations are home to a very large number of experiments in the use of ICT for sustainable ...» more
Evidence of development impact from institutional change: a review of the evidence on open budgeting
Despite the growing body of literature examining the effectiveness of transparency and accountability initiatives, there remains limited substantiation for whether and how open budgeting contributes to reductions in poverty and improvements in the lives of the poor. This paper reviews available evidence and concludes that institutional changes can contribute to higher-level ...» more
