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Mutual Accountability Seminar – 9th February 2006

Outline of Purpose:

  • To hear the main findings from the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) scoping work on mutual accountability, including feedback from the DFID sponsored workshop on country level mutual accountability mechanisms, involving government, donor and civil society representatives from Afghanistan, Vietnam, Tanzania and Mozambique, which was held in November 2005.
  • To discuss mutual accountability’s role in aid effectiveness and results, and how best to advance it both at international and country level.
  • To discuss implications for DFID.

DFID country offices participating:

  • Mozambique
  • Cambodia, and
  • Kenya.

Chair:

  • Sharon White, Director, Policy Division

Presentations

Paolo de Renzio from ODI gave a presentation on ODI’s synthesis note on Promoting Mutual Accountability in Aid RelationshipsPDF document(102 kb). The key messages were:

  • mutual accountability is key to aid effectiveness
  • current accountability of donors is weak
  • information availability, monitoring and incentives at the international level are weak
  • country level mechanisms have shown some successes which can be built on although information sharing is weak, and
  • that DFID can do more to promote mutual accountability.

Tessa MacArthur responded with the following comments and questions to start the discussionPDF document(53 kb).

Discussions

The following points were raised:

  • More work is needed to show the link between mutual accountability behaviour and practice to poverty outcomes and achievements of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
  • Mutual accountability should be viewed as an integral element of good practice in aid effectiveness, and should be enhanced through behavioural change.
  • Sometimes the issue is less about mutuality and more about donor accountability.
  • More independent monitoring and accessible information about aid quality and quantity at the international and country level would be useful, and more thought was needed on the type of institution that would be suitable for this.
  • It is useful to separate international mutual accountability from country level. Internationally mutual accountability rests on monitoring clear compacts such as the Paris Declaration and African Partnership Forum. At a country level mutual accountability may better described as a maturing of aid relationships. This is clear in the case of Vietnam, which is moving to graduate from aid, and in highly aid dependent countries such as Mozambique and Tanzania where donors are delivering aid more predictably and on budget.
  • Internationally, it was felt vital that the Paris Declaration reporting is disaggregated by donor (including DFID) as well as by country.
  • The ACP Secretariat’s role in mutual accountability could be further researched.
  • Mutual accountability is a political process. Donors need to identify opportunities for building political legitimacy and greater cartelisation/coordination among Southern partners.
  • Mutual accountability should be compatible with supporting greater domestic accountability. However, we cannot expect mutual accountability to be the hook for this or we will overload the agenda.
  • Some donors find the concept threatening, and stronger incentives at the international level were needed to promote mutual accountability.

Implications for DFID:

  • At a country level, DFID should invest in capacity building for aid management and mutual accountability, for example, the recent Rwandan aid management policy. DFID could also facilitate workshops between officials in different countries with minimal donor involvement.
  • Through DFID’s own behaviour, it could act as a ‘champion’ for other donors.
  • DFID could encourage the sharing of knowledge of donor behaviour in different countries so that there is a levelling up to the country where each donor behaves best.
  • DFID could consider incentives for generating better information on aid at the global and country levels.
  • DFID should do more to publicise its commitments, in order to be held to account by its domestic and international constituencies.

Next steps

Further comments should be sent to Tessa MacArthur. The Aid Effectiveness Team is now considering next steps with others, for example, support to country partners on lesson learning, research on international architecture and the multilaterals’ role in mutual accountability.