GDN: Promoting Development Research

GDNet supports southern researchers to contribute and debate ideas in development thinking, policy and practice.

GDNet Special Features

Understanding Reforms

To complement the theme of the recent Global Development Network Fifth Annual Conference, New Delhi, 2004 on "Understanding Reform" and in light of the World Development Report, 2004 "Making services work for poor people", this GDNet Special Feature provides you with an overview of key issues in the reform debate while also providing a unique perspective on the reform experiences of a range of countries in the developing and transition world.

Access the selection of papers More »

Global Issues, Local Voices : Impact of health sector reforms in India
The collection is supplemented by an opinion piece by Delampady Narayana, from the Centre for Development Studies, India who gives his view on the impact of health sector reforms in India. Read the opinion piece. More »

Understanding Reforms: "Similar Paths, Varied Outcomes"

Background

In 2002 GDN launched an ambitious research project spanning nearly 30 countries to understand the successes and failures of various reforms through a cross country comparison of reform policies and experiences in different regions. The project sought to explore several questions such as:

Why were some countries able to undertake reform while others were not?
What factors enabled some countries to achieve success in implementing reform programs, while for others, these programs failed?
What were the characteristics of reform programs that helped them deliver outcomes?

This GDNet special feature provides you with an overview of key issues and perspectives ranging from issues of ownership of the reform experience, the social consequences of reform as well as a unique insight into the reform experiences of developing and transition countries from researchers based in these developing and transition countries.

Introduction

So why did different countries adopting more or less similar policy prescriptions result in the very different outcomes that the last ten years has revealed?
It became apparent that a focus on the standard economic analysis with its emphasis on macroeconomic imbalances and projected policy impacts on long-run growth was not sufficient in understanding the complexities of the reform process. The study adopted a multidisciplinary approach with a strong emphasis on political economy, to understand the behavior of various stakeholders – how they reacted to new policy regimes and institutional configurations.

The project evolved in three distinct phases: In the first phase, eight thematic papers dealt with issues central to the reform debate. This included national costs and timings of reform; political institutions and economic policy reforms; measuring market-oriented reforms; the state and public sector; philosophical and methodological underpinnings of reform and regulatory institutions and competitiveness. These ideas and findings formed the basis for the next stage of the project – a series of studies that examined the varied experiences of different countries towards providing a comprehensive analysis of the reasons for reform and the success and failure of their country’s attempts to undertake political and economic reforms in the 1980s and 1990s.


	Key Findings				Disseminating Research

While it is not possible to summarize all of the results in this short note, five findings stand out:

In many countries reformists concentrated on the possible rather than the optimal given the political economy configuration of their country; that is, a theoretically optimal sequence remained just that, theoretical
In most countries successful reform only occurred when the existing political economy and traditional stakeholder power blocks were broken down. There were various ways in which these broke down, of which the most common were a major crisis, direct external pressure, indirect external pressure due to the success of nearby or competing countries, external commitment to an international agreement (such as the EU), and very strong leadership (although the latter may be considered a cross-cutting factor)
In countries where the political economy was not radically changed, reforms were rarely successful or sustainable
For the reform impetus to be sustained, benefits must be widespread
Successful countries must take a long-term view, which means that the ability to make political transactions over time is critical for institution building and the success of the reforms.

As with most research supported by GDN, emphasis is placed on disseminating this policy relevant research. Four publications by Palgrave/Macmillan have resulted from this study:

Understanding Market Reforms Vol. I
Understanding Market Reforms Vol. II
Understanding Economic Reform in Africa: A Tale of Seven Nations and Understanding Market Reform in Latin America: Similar Reforms
Diverse Constituencies, Varied Results

The collection features a selection of papers by researchers in developing countries, giving their views on key issues relating to social sector reform. It has been organised to provide southern perspectives on the major areas of social sector reform.

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