Bangladesh : World Bank Country-Level Engagement on Governance and Anticorruption

Wescott, Clay ; Breeding, Mary

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ACCOUNTABILITY;    ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISMS;    ACCOUNTING;    ACCOUNTING STANDARDS;    ADB;   

RP-ID  :  66767

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Bangladesh is one of the world'spoorest and most densely populated countries, and subject toannual cyclones and flooding. Despite these challenges, itbenefits from strong economic growth, good performance onhealth and education, and poverty reduction, alongside weakgovernance and pervasive corruption. The reasons includestrong macroeconomic policy, pro-poor spending, credibleelections, export growth and remittances, improved capacityfor managing natural disasters, and a stronger civil societythan comparable countries. After over a decade of intenseengagement with the Bank on governance, Bangladesh adoptedin 2006 a governance-oriented Country Assistance Strategy(CAS) with four main objectives: to improve implementationcapacity; to 'tackle corruption' by fullyoperationalizing the Anti-Corruption Commission; to lay thefoundation for comprehensive legal and judicial reform; andto strengthen 'voice, empowerment andparticipation.' The choice of a wide range ofinstruments and areas of intervention was appropriate, giventhe political instability at the time of 2006 CASpreparation. The Bank signaled it was ready to engage in allareas, and could scale up or pull back depending on emergingpolitical and bureaucratic commitment. The 2006 CAS yieldedmixed results, and the subsequent Country PartnershipStrategy (CPS) has been more selective on GAC issues. At theproject level, governance has been a key priority, in linewith the South Asia region's heavy emphasis onGAC-in-Projects. Investments in GAC-in-primary education, alocal government project, anti-corruption efforts in thepower sector, and projects strengthening the investmentclimate have yielded positive results. Investments inGAC-in-roads projects have had mixed results in terms ofeffectiveness. GAC activities were mainly adopted prior tothe 2007 GAC strategy. Although Bangladesh was a CountryGovernance and Anticorruption (CGAC) country, the countryteam chose not to use CGAC funds because the country hadalready been intensively using GAC approaches well beforethe GAC strategy was adopted.