At the heart of the development challenge is building effective states—states capable of delivering public services to their citizens. Leaders of the state and its institutions, the private sector, communities, and civil society are the entry point to a constructive engagement within and between these institutions, and to inspiring individuals and collectivities toward fundamental change. Governance plays a critical role in improving a country’s performance across all development dimensions, including growth. Leaders are at the center, determining opportunities for, or constraints to, development by how they exercise power and make policy choices. In this context, leaders are critical in both promoting institutional change and modeling public and private behavior that reinforces accountability, integrity, and institutional constraint on power.

The World Bank has supported leadership capacity development initiatives in a range of countries. These projects provide skills, experience, and technical information to support leaders in partner governments and civil society in mobilizing expertise, resources, and political will in service to critical national goals. A range of Bank instruments—including Post-Conflict Fund, the LICUS Implementation Trust Fund, IDA project funds and country program budgets—have funded these initiatives.

Leadership development is still a new focus within the World Bank. The Fragile and Conflict-Affected Countries Group, therefore, initiated a Global Leadership Review of all PCF- and LICUS TF-funded leadership development interventions. The review sought to maximize learning, identify lessons learned, and suggest strategic and operational implications for future Bank engagement in leadership capacity development in fragile and conflict-affected countries. The Fragile and Conflict-Affected Countries Group together with the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Network (PREM) and the World Bank Institute have prepared notes that briefly summarize the range of activities across countries, and draws upon these experiences to identify enabling factors and articulate critical choices for consideration when designing leadership interventions.