Papers
Below you can find links to papers and articles about Development Effectiveness. Please browse at your leisure, and if you encounter any dead links, please let us know at info cso-effectiveness.org
New on the site!
- Multilateral Development Cooperation: Current Trends and Future Prospects by Shannon Kindornay and Hany Besada
- Multilateral Development Cooperation and the Paris Process: the road to Busan by Robert Picciotto
- Towards a New Development Cooperation Dynamic by Penny Davies
- HLF4 and the Future of the International Aid Architecture Backgrounder by the North-South Institute
- Greater Influence, Greater Responsibility: are INGOs’ Self-Regulatory Accountability Standards Effective? Working Paper by Lama Hammad and Bill Morton, The North-South Institute
- Partnering with the Private Sector: Local Perspectives on Optimizing Development Opportunities
- 2011 MDG Gap Task Force Report, Press Release and MDG Gap Fact Sheet
- Country Ownership of development: Political Correctness or a practical key to better aid? - Policy Brief from Danish Institute for International Studies (order free copies of the evaluation report here
- Governance, Accountability and Development Effectiveness: a presentation by Samuel Zan Akologo, National Catholic Secretariat Accra, Ghana
- CSOs and the International Dialogue Peacebuilding and Statebuilding: Policy Brief 1, Policy Brief 2, Policy Brief 3, Policy Brief 4, Policy Brief 5
- Local Perceptions of International Engagement in Fragile States and Situations and Perspectives on the Paris Declaration: policy briefs of CDA Collaborative Learning Projects in the lead up to the 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness.
- Aid Effectiveness in Emergencies: the role of NGOs: Panel Discussion sponsored by the Ditchley Foundation
- From Aid Effectiveness to Development Effectiveness: a 2011 policy brief from the North-South Institute
- Reality of Aid Reports: biennial report on aid and development cooperation issues from NGOs worldwide
Background documents
- The Paris Declaration and the Accra Agenda for Action
- A Paris Declaration for International NGOs? OECD Development Centre Policy Insight
- Civil Society and Aid Effectiveness Synthesis of Findings and Recommendations - OECD DAC’s Advisory Group on Civil Society and Aid Effectiveness
- Results of HLF Round Table 6 "The Role of Civil Society in Advancing Aid Effectiveness"
Civil Society
- Civil Society Statement on the occasion of the 7th Southern Africa Civil Society Forum
- The Tunis Consensus - Targeting Effective Development: AfDB and NEPAD report to outline an agenda for the High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan
- Tunisia Symposium Declaration
- Can Aid be Effective without Civil Society? The Paris Declaration, the Accra Agenda for Action and Beyond
- The Accra Third High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness: A CCIC Participant Assessment of the Outcomes, by Brian Tomlinson from the Canadian Council for International Cooperation
- Civil Society and Aid Effectiveness: An Exploration of Experience and Good Practice, a reference document prepared by Jacqueline Wood for the Advisory Group on Civil Society and Aid Effectiveness
- This video has been prepared by UNITAS, the Bolivian NGO platform, and presented at the regional workshop for Latin America and the Caribbean early December 2009.
- Aid Effectiveness: Trends and Impacts of Shifting Financial Flows to Civil Society Organisations in Southern Africa: Report on Donor Roundtable Dialogue, published by Southern Africa Trust
- The Paris Agenda and Its Consequences For Civil Society in Kenya
Development Effectiveness Principles
- Governance Principles: Making development cooperation just: Governance Principles and pillars, a new discussion paper from the Better Aid Coordinating Group.
- Development effectiveness: towards new understandings, Canadian North-South Institute analyses four different approaches to defining development effectiveness
- Responding to NGO Development Effectiveness Initiatives
- Reality Check: Civil Society and Development Effectiveness: Another View
- De la Agenda de la Eficacia de la Ayuda a una Agenda Integrada e Inclusiva de Eficacia del Desarrollo by Juan López Dóriga (in Spanish)
- OECD Background Document on the Open Forum Istanbul Principles
- Capacity Development as a Core Driver of Development Effectiveness: presentation of Richard Ssewakiryanga of Uganda National NGO Forum at the launch of the Africa Platform for Development Effectiveness
Roles and added value
- Changing political spaces of Civil Society Organisations: a paper by ACT Alliance
- Growth of civil society in developing countries: implications for health here This article reflects upon the role in the health sector of civil society in general and NGOs in particular
- Partnership in Practice - A Kenyan Perspective on the Nature of Relationships with Irish NGOs: Dochas Report
Accountability
- Promoting Voice and Choice. Exploring Innovations in Australian NGO Accountability for Development Effectiveness, Australian Council for International Development
- Civil Society Legitimacy and Accountability: Issues and Challenges, by L. David Brown (Hauser Centre, Harvard Univsersity) and Jagadananda (CIVICUS and Centre for Youth and Social Development)
- Who monitors the monitors?, speech by Peter Phiri, CIVICUS
- 2008 Global Accountability Report, published by the independent London-based think-tank One World Trust.
- Transparencia y Rendición de Cuentas en las Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil en Bolivia, Fundación Jubileo y Catholic Relief Services USCC (in Spanish)
Enabling environment
- Political Space of Civil Society Organisations in Africa: Civil Society, Aid Effectiveness and Enabling Environment: collective paper on the Cases of Burkina Faso, Ghana and Zambia
- Position Paper on Enabling Environment towards HLF4 by European NGO Confederation CONCORD
- Supporting Inclusive and Democratic Ownership, A ’How To’ note for Donors
- Where to Now? Implications of Changing Relations between DFID, Recipient Governments and NGOs in Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda. This joint ActionAid-CARE report provides some valuable insights on the repercussions of certain aid trends on non-governmental organisations
- Closing the Door on Aid. This article offers a global view on the main restrictions on foreign funding, the international treaties such restrictions violate and proposes several avenues for action.
Ownership
- OECD Development Centre Studies: Financing Development 2008 - Whose Ownership?
- Fostering Democratic Ownership: Towards Greater Impact on Poverty: Alliance2015 Report
Self-regulation
- NGO Self-Regulation: a paper by Colombian NGO Confederation and ONG por la Transparencia (in Spanish)
- Models of NGO Self-Regulation: Theory and Evidence from Africa, Research paper by Mary Kay Gugerty, Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington
- The Role of NGO Self-Regulation in Increasing Stakeholder Accountability, research paper written by Robert Lloyd (One World Trust)
- NGO self-regulation: enforcing and balancing accountability
Partnership
Institutions
- Draft Practitioners’ guide for using country Public Financial Management (PFM) systems (with some interesting information on civil society and budget support), produced by the OECD Task Force on PFM: November 2010
- Evaluation of EC Aid Delivery through Civil Society Organisations
- Draft report on civil dialogue in the Constitutional Affairs Committee
Thematic Issues
Gender
- Conditionalities undermine the right to development: an analysis based on a women’s and human rights perspective, WIDE, Awid, Dawn and IGTN
Contributions to the dialogue
- Finding Frames: New ways to engage the UK public in global poverty: a report about the ways in which the UK public engage with global poverty issues, and about how development NGOs and other stakeholders might deepen and extend that engagement.
- What is the impact of NGDOs on development?: Article from Cercle de Coopération, Luxembourg NGO Platform
- NGOs: the new colonialists?, response to an article in "Foreign Policy" that accuses NGOs of being new colonialists.
- The Backlash against Civil Society in the Wake of the Long War on Terror This working paper describes the impact of the "war against terror" on civil society organisations. Its auhtors argue, inter alia, that official donors increasingly focus on the service delivery component of civil society (as opposed to its political and emancipatory role) and are also increasingly selective when choosing their interlocutors in civil society.
- The Myth of NGO Superiority This article argues that non-governmental organisations (NGOs) do not provide better targeted or more efficient aid than state-run development agencies. In their response to this article, VENRO, the German NGDO platforms, provides additional facts and gives a more comprehensive view of the situation.
- Response of the Global Facilitation Group to the INTRAC paper "Improving aid effectiveness: A review of recent initiatives for civil society"
- Have the NGOs sold their souls to the Minister of Development Cooperation? On 4 May 2009, representatives of the Belgian government and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) signed an agreement on aid effectiveness.
- Keeping a Low Profile: What Determines the Allocation of Aid by Non-Governmental Organizations
- Potentially Lethal: Increased Relationship Between Military And Aid
- Have NGOs ’Made a Difference?’ - From Manchester to Birmingham with an Elephant in the Room, by Michael Edwards form the Global Poverty Research Group
- Development Cooperation for the MDGs: Maximizing Results by the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations
- EU Responsibilities for a Just and Sustainable World (CONCORD, December 2010)

