2003 Annual Review of Development Effectiveness : The Effectiveness of Bank Support for Policy Reform

Operations Evaluation Department

Washington, DC:World Bank

关键词: POLICY REFORM;    POLICY DIALOGUES;    INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK;    PROJECT EVALUATION & REVIEW TECHNIQUE;    DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANCE;   

DOI  :  10.1596/0-8213-5938-X
RP-ID  :  29894

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

The Annual Review of DevelopmentEffectiveness (ARDE) 2003, examines the effectiveness ofBank support to borrower countries, in particular, the helpto foster reform policies, and institutional frameworks. TheReview focuses primarily, although not exclusively, on theyears from 1999 through 2003. This is done to facilitate thejuxtaposition of recent evaluation evidence with trends inpolicy indicators. Recent trends in developing countries' policies suggestthat the variousdimensions of policy, and institutional performance have, onaverage, improved modestly, although recent reforms havetouched most areas of development policy. In most countriesthat accomplished strong reform over the period 1999-2003,change was driven by necessity, or opportunities such astransition from socialism, economic crisis, European Unionaccession, and change of government. Development researchsuggests that such factors tend to galvanize support forchange, and thus make the politics of policy reform easier.Countries whose policies improved over the period 1999-03,grew on average, at more than twice the rate of those thatdid not. Evaluation evidence links Bank support to recentimprovements in policy. At the project level, good countrypolicy ratings tend to be associated with good evaluationratings on project outcomes. The Bank was less successful inlinking its support to policy reform, in countries with no,or weak track records, or with deteriorating policyenvironments. The uncertainties associated with policyreform are reduced, when the Bank ' s support isaligned with country priorities that have been validatedthrough country-led, inclusive political processes. A starthas been made through the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRSP)process. However, the PRSP ' s potential as a vehiclefor fostering country ownership is undermined, according tosome borrowing countries, by its role as condition foraccess to external financial assistance. And, in countrieswhere recent outcomes of Bank assistance were evaluated assatisfactory, high quality, relevant, and timely, Economicand Sector Work (ESW) generally made a substantialcontribution. Therefore , it is suggested the Bank shouldnot normally engage in lending, before ESW has established abase of county and sector knowledge.