Dennis A. Rondinelli and G Shabbir
Cheema. Ed, 2003. Reinventing Government for the Twenty First Century; State
Capacity in a Globalizing Society, Kumarian Press, Bloomfield, USA
Derick W. Brinkerhoff and Benjamin L.
Crosby, 2002. Managing Policy Reform; Concept and Tools for Decision Makers in
Developing and Transitioning Countries, Kumarian Press, Bloomfield, USA
Peter H. Daly and Michael Watkins,
2006. The First 90 Days in Government; Critical Success Strategies for New
Public Managers at All Level, Harvard Business School Publishing, Boston, USA
When I came across with the idea of
strategic management in the context of ‘looking out’, ‘looking in’ and ‘looking
ahead’ in the book of Brinkerhoff and Crosby, I was contemplating many aspects
of management (Decentralization, Performance Management, Efficiency, Leadership
etc). In this process of identification and concentration, there are two basic
concepts, Learning and Capacity Building, which inspired me to
build my argument here further, considering the fact that both learning and
capacity building have been extensively highlighted as a process. However,
these two basic concepts have been broadly dealt by Rondinelli and Cheema in context
of state, while Daly and Watkins (The 90 Days in Government…) evidently shows
that learning enhances the performance and also motivates the individual to
change behavior. This is also true that both learning and capacity
building are effective tool, which generate effective involvement in subtle way
for policy change and implementation.
Since the book (Brinkerhoff and Crosby)
defines the ‘looking out’, as setting priorities, identifying
constraints, ‘looking in’ as to identify what to achieve, which kind
of institution structures require for developing processes and managing human
resources, and ‘looking ahead’ as envisioning sustainability. Without promoting
learning environment and consistent effort of capacity building, the journey
from policy idea to sustainability would be quite challenging in development
context. The human resources are important player here to build effective
institutional arrangement for making the policy effort sustainable. Therefore,
the role of policy champion is significant not merely for policy
implementation, but also to build his or her team.
In the book entitled “First 90 days in
Government...” says that learning is combined with increasing credibility and
good decision making capacity, which forms a kind of ‘virtuous circle’. In
these two books, the learning has been identified as a process and also seen as
strategic tool to understand the complexity of new situation and to identify
the opportunity in future.
When Rondinelli and Cheema suggest in
the book that globalization has forced the state to redefine the development
policy, where the local economy get integrated with global economy, human
resource to be developed and its capacity to be enhanced, market as
an important institution to be promoted and opening economy or introducing
liberalization to encourage competition and transparency. There is hardly any
alternative for the state to go away from these policy change.
This is generally believed the learning
is based on individual motivation in conventional sense. But learning is to
recognize challenges as well as opportunity. On the basis of recognition,
learning is shared and future action plan is structured. However, this is also
here to clear that failure is also a strong motivation for learning in
strategic management perspective.
Consequently, there are many states in
the global era facing the learning deficit and institution of economic
development need to be stimulated through a kind of policy arrangement where
learning and capacity building process get integrated with the vision of nation
building. The capacity building of technical and functional leadership is
essential in the era of globalization but for introducing creative change in
political and economic affair of state, there is need to adopt and assimilate
best practices from other part of the world. Therefore, all authors agree that
the decentralized governance encourage inclusiveness in decision making,
broadening and deepening the participation and active role of state in
establishing greater equity.
There are many management issues and
aspects, which directly or indirectly depends upon the learning and capacity
building component in broader perspective. This can also be said that learning
and capacity building are two side of the same coin. The learning builds
capacity of individual and organization. In this process, the organization
creates social and human capital.
In 21st century,
Governance is considered as the core value, which determines the outcome
indicators and integrates the process for the policy implementation.
Decentralization process not merely encourages the participation of each
stakeholder in decision making, but provides a wide range of choices to
individual, to organizations and also to states also. This can be vilausalized
in Daly and Watkins’s idea of STARS (Start Up, Turnaround,
Realignment and Sustaining Success ), which shows that every challenge
also comes with new opportunity.
The successful decentralization is
based on institutional arrangements and leadership (policy champion), where
state takes legislative measures and enforces rule of law. This does not simply
ensure that decentralization is panacea of successful implementation of policy.
But, as Rondinelli and Cheema argues that ‘strengthening the capacity of public
institutions’ would able to create enabling environment for successful policy
implementation and its sustainability. However, the building capacity of human
resource and involving private as well as non state actors in implementation
process also help in mobilizing resources and strengthening partnership.
The communication and knowledge sharing
is another aspect, which promote the learning and capacity building. In the
global era, the communication is also a strategy tool, where public awareness
and policy advocacy are combined. The communication establishes coordination
among the different stakeholders, between different institutions of governance
(law enforcing agencies, media etc) and also assists international community to
establish norms of global governance.
The five case illustrations in
Brinkerhoff and Crosby’s book and some chapters (Pro Poor Policies for
Development, Globalization and the Role of the State, Creating and Applying
Knowledge, Innovation and Technology) and in Rondinelli and Cheema’s
book identify that the challenges for implementation are enormous but waiting
for the right moment is not the solution. The strategic planning to involve
different actors and institutions would initiate a dialogue, which help in
truth building and information sharing. The widespread use of technology has
increased access of information among public. Technology empowers both the
community and the institutions in the same way.
This has been acknowledged that the
external factors are complex and resist the policy change. This is not the
issue of external factors or internal politics, this is human nature that
maintaining status quo is important for them and changes are seen as potential
tool of elimination. Why some policy is successfully implemented in one place
but miserably fail in other place? The answer lies in SWOT analysis, where
internal capabilities and external threats are identified, helps in process
mapping and also classify strategic issues in policy implementation.
Resolving the policy challenge, the
idea of workshop in Brinkerhoff and Crosby’s book is excellent master piece.
The workshop would be an opportunity to bring the community leaders together
and also to share the objective and goal of the project or program, which is to
be implemented in the near future. In using the workshop as a tool of
establishing collaboration, partnership and the learning from this effort, the
implementing agency to make the strategy for policy implementation. All three
books clearly pronounce that building partnership enhance the organization
capability to foster its values and vision.
In sum up, we can say that both
learning and capacity building are also not free from the challenges. However,
the emphasis of recognizing challenges in the failure is another motivating
factor for strategic planning and implementation. Therefore, a well established
monitoring and evaluation system in every organization are need of hour and its
indicators help in making effective implementation strategy. As Daly and
Watkins present that the change is imminent, so the capability enhancement of
individual should be consistent efforts at organizational level.
While Rondinelli and Cheema’s book broadly
recognize the value of learning and capacity building for making the good
governance possible. In the book, the participation, partnership, transparency
and equity are seen as guiding principles of good governance. The success of
these guiding principles depends upon, how the learning environment enables the
individual to make his or her decision and how his or her capacity is built to
provide them choices.
