Bangladesh - Belgium

Citizens’ Voice and Accountability Evaluation – Bangladesh Country Case Study
BOX 1: Elements of the context analysis
(i) Political and institutional framework and actual operation
- An analysis of legal rights to information, participation, accountability
- An analysis of public oversight mechanisms spanning the executive, legislative,
judicial and other constitutionally mandated institutions
- An analysis of the distribution of powers across divisions and levels of
government, and opportunities/mechanisms for participation and public oversight
within this
- An analysis of the economic structures and institutions, including dependency from
natural resources, market regulations, how the economy is organised (e.g. is it
predominantly agrarian, urbanisation processes) and affect on class structure
(ii) Mapping and key features of main actors
- An analysis of the principal state and non-state actors, spanning governments
ministries, regulatory bodies, local administration, networks, social movements,
NGOs, those aligned with government and those not, and the historical reasons for
this
- An analysis of the aid architecture, including donors’ presence, principal fora for
strategic dialogue on poverty reduction and governance, the main instruments and
modalities for aid delivery as well as mechanisms for civil society support
(iii) Social and political landscape
- An analysis of the political landscape, including the alliances and sources of
power on which the current government depends, as well as the degree of political
control over the different branches of government (including the key public oversight
mechanisms)
- An analysis of informal power structures and institutions, including religious
groups, traditional institutions, networks related to the informal economy, patronage
and rent seeking arrangements, gender relations and culture.
(iv) Recent events that shape opportunities and risks for voice and accountability
The overview of the aid environment was intended to be a ‘light touch’ analysis.
There was no existing documentation mapping the entire CVA intervention portfolio
of donors so the tables presented in the context analysis had to be developed from
scratch by the team.
ii. inception workshop
The team deviated a little form the original intention of the workshop as defined in
the ODI Methodological Guidelines. It was not felt that a workshop would be the
best means to ‘map the CVA interventions of the country’ Rather the workshop
was used as opportunity to introduce a wide range of stakeholders to the concept
of the evaluation and to elicit their ideas about how best to select case studies.
We felt that if we got a diverse mix of stakeholders then we would be able to
derive criteria for selection of cases which would represent the wide the diversity
of CVA and not be skewed by donors’ perceptions and preferences. Rather than
selecting form the criteria provided, we decided to let the participants develop the
criteria themselves (although the facilitators kept in mind those suggested by
ODI 41 )
41 Levels of interventions (national and local);Different functions of state actors (executive, legislative, judicial) and
non state actors (NGOs, trade unions, media, political parties, social movements etc.) involved; Different
mechanisms at play e.g. local planning committees, trade unions, ombudsman commissions, the media,
parliamentary committees, electoral processes; The role played by donors, including active facilitation of the interface
between citizens and the state; Duration of interventions; Availability of key stakeholders.
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