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The Bank has increasingly turned to CBOs to promote local development, especially where the existing government lacks the capacity or incentive to deliver effective services. In 2000, the ECA region prepared a strategy that proposed scaling up CDD by integrating these operations into institutional reform and decentralization strategies. The Bank supports projects in which communities take responsibility for local investment or resource allocation decisions (e.g., water user associations, village banking).
Promising examples include those which have directly engaged local communities themselves. Many of these projects are relatively new and their sustainability needs to be monitored over time. However, there is evidence that a systematic approach to community participation has proven effective for several important sectors, including: water users' associations in irrigation (11 projects), community-based rural credit and collective guarantee mechanisms (7 projects), infrastructure reconstruction and community training through social investment funds (25 projects), and natural resource and forestry management (9 projects).
CDD can also be adopted within institutional reforms to improve accountability and efficiency at the local level. For example, experiments with innovative CDD approaches include the earlier mentioned People’s Voice Project in Ukraine that supports dialogue on reforms and community monitoring of policy implementation. In Albania, as part of the PRSP, communities are involved in monitoring the impact of health reforms, and regularly contribute to an assessment of the quality of basic services in the capital city. A Norwegian Trust Fund supports budget information disclosure to communities in Armenia, and involves communities in monitoring regional treasury activities in Serbia. CDD is also being articulated more clearly in the CAS. For example, the recent Tajikistan and Albania CAS-es make CDD a central element in structural reform and investment.
Effective scaling up also requires impact monitoring and evaluation so that lessons can be learned and disseminated. A CDD learning program in ECA was launched over a year ago, supported by a Norwegian Trust Fund that finances pilot projects in IDA countries, especially focusing on decentralization, HIV-AIDS, and anti-corruption. A series of training and learning events have also been organized in the Bank and in several countries. A separate learning group on Central Asia has been formed to exchange experience and design a strategy for scaling up CDD in Central Asia, while WBI has also launched a CDD training program for Central Asia.
The governance approach to CDD should be undertaken with caution and appropriate analytical support. The legacy of authoritarianism and centralized command economies present significant obstacles to scaling up CDD in the ECA region. Governments at the national, regional and local levels lack the experience of involving citizens in decision-making at any level. Moreover, it is essential to determine whether (or which) local institutions are socially inclusive.
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