Comments

Thanks Kylie for sharing these insights with us. It was partly in response to hearing you raise these issues in February that I started thinking about 'cultural capacity building' (could probably do with a better name) - i.e. assisting incoming companies to negotiate (or in the case of BCL renegotiate) the environment they are joining - yes they don't want to get involved in 'politics' but the reality is that they are so perhaps what can assist is methodologies and pathways to navigate bearing in mind the need to avoid causing or (sometimes more likely?) exacerbating conflict. <a href="http://asiapacific.anu.edu.au/blogs/pacificinstitute/2013/03/02/is-the-resources-boom-good-for-melanesia-report/" rel="nofollow">Here is the link</a> to the item in which I raised this earlier in the year, would be interested to know your (and others') thoughts.

Kylie Congratulations. It's great to see important findings from your PhD research so clearly captured in this blog which I hope will have a wide readership, especially compared with the numbers who have the time and inclination to read PhD dissertations. I particularly appreciate the point you make about how negotiations between mining companies, governments and communities are usually strongly focused on financial payments -- companies also focus on these in their published 'responsibility and sustainability' reports. Yet arguably more important impacts of mining operations on conflict, violence and health usually get much less serious attention. I think this is partly because, as you say, there are no easy solutions to be found. Effectively addressing these areas requires all parties (mining companies, national and local governments, landowners and communities) to cooperate and maintain that cooperation for the lifetime of the mining operation. In Melanesia, this seems like a dream (despite the admirable initiatives of a few companies) but it's worth striving for if mining is to deliver stable and more prosperous communities. Perhaps we'll hear more about this at the forthcoming Mining for Development Conference in Sydney. Margaret

Hi Jeff, Of course human rights and child rights are the key concern -- I acknowledged that in my response and my post. I think we agree that children are best raised in families rather than orphanages. I can only speak to situations I am familiar with in Southeast Asia, unfortunately my knowledge on the Ukrainian situation is limited. In Cambodia this issue is not being pushed aside by organisations such as UNICEF etc -- it is a core concern in their work and they have very much advocated children staying within their families and within their communities as far as possible. The Cambodian government has laid this principle out in policy. But when individual actors start their own care facilities without registration or approval, around these fledgling government systems, this doesn't help. The rapid growth of the orphanage tourism industry in Cambodia has only exacerbated this. The government and donor community are working on this issue, but policy change, implementation and enforcement has been slower than the growth of tourism. I think in this case, the donor community is working towards policy which better supports child rights -- but while there is demand for orphanage tourism and the potential for profit, the number of unregistered and unauthorized orphanages is increasing. Multiple approaches are needed. Ashlee

Ashlee, I comment in the context of this blog on development policy rather than the specofic situation in Cambodia, but the situation with economic orphans and parents unable to support them was much the same. As my deceased colleague related however, having argued the same case for protecting child rights and collaboration between government, NGOs and business was to discover these would be partners became a considerable obstacle. "Opening up the reality of that situation resulted in threats against me and anyone else interfering with that system. I came under direct assault by tax police, government's primary enforcement arm if anyone steps out of line. This is not a research activity where many, if any, other people dared to participate. UNICEF was willfully blind to the matter because it was just too dangerous to bother to intercede. Powerful interests remained entrenched with enforcers to make it dangerous. Jurists were correct, in my view. It was more a mafia operation than anything else, aimed at misappropriation and laundering of large money. That was perfectly congruent with how Ukraine operated before the revolution. USAID wanted nothing to do with it, nor would they fund any organizations or activists who might try. Some things could be done and some things could not be done. Helping these children was something that could not be done. So, I exposed it and made it the central focus and metric of Ukraine's microeconomic development blueprint. In that context, it was far more difficult to ignore, dismiss, or argue about." If both your government and mine are investing resources in international development, should we not be concerned when such human rights issues are pointedly brushed aside?

Hi Jeff, Thanks for sharing your views. I think it is important to always consider institutionalised care (whether family homes or other) as a last resort. Children should always be given the opportunity to stay within their extended family and community (as long as that is safe) wherever possible. In Cambodia, and in many other places, the potential to profit out of orphanage tourism means that many children in these institutions are not genuine orphans - they often have one parent alive at least, however parents send them to orphanages due to their poverty and the promises of the costs of education/food/etc for the child being covered. It is also important that any institutional care -- whether private sector funded family homes, charity run orphanages or state care -- meets standards that ensure children are being protected, cared for and educated. Operating outside of the state system doesn't mean that frameworks in place for child protection can be ignored, yet many individuals and organisations that set up orphanages illegally or outside of the government's frameworks are not meeting any kind of minimum standard, nor being monitored. Just because a country is developing and the enforcement of policies may still be weak doesn't mean that outsiders should come in and ignore those frameworks, no matter how good their intentions may be. There is a lot of scope to work together with business and the charity sectors to improve care and educational outcomes for children, but child rights must be at the centre and these initiatives must work in harmony with government frameworks at all levels. Ashlee

If it's obvious that children are being used for profit then there's an obvious question to ask. Why do charities help sustain the orphanage culture when there are so many indicators to suggest that a loving family home is a better outcome. Instead of helping the unscrupulous who exploit children, why not <a href="http://www.managementexchange.com/hack/every-child-deserves-loving-family" rel="nofollow">use business</a> to fund the placement of all children in family homes. That at least was what was suggested 6 years ago, but we were treading where nobody wanted to go.

It's also important to ask who gets the money from these tours? I was on a similar tour and paid around 20 dollars per person. Our guide told us a rich businessman owned the tour boats and the community didn't really benefit from these tour fees.

Excellent piece highlighting a number of concerns regarding the charity tourism industry. Voluntourism is an increasing problem, and most people are unaware of the negative impacts. I've seen some youth-focused sites discussing the issue - I particularly like <a href="http://matadornetwork.com/change/why-you-shouldnt-participate-in-voluntourism/" rel="nofollow">this series</a>. Perhaps a good message is that charity is for life, not just a holiday. Like all commitments, it needs to be done consciously and over the long term if it is to have an impact - not just a stop-off on an organised tour.

Thanks for posting this. <a href="http://orphanages.no/" rel="nofollow">Orphanages.no</a> has a lot of material about this issue, should anyone want to learn more about the problem of orphanage tourism in Cambodia (and many other parts of the world as well, unfortunately!).

The devpolicy blog should have more articles like this. I think it is good to have a blog arguing about 'big picture development', but there are 100s of other blogs doing that. In contrast, there are very few which look into the METHODS of development. More posts on survey techniques, consultation methods, public communications strategies would be really useful contribution to the development blogosphere. And easy way to start would be to create a new tag called 'methods'.

Robin and Margaret - this is an excellent summary of a complex debate. I look forward to the reading the outcome of some of this research. I would like to add something small to the debate. I think (and it is just a guess) that for the least developed of states, especially those which have either come out of conflict or have very small undeveloped private sectors then the PPP approach can work. This is because it is sometimes hard to get more established firms to invest in these countries (I do not include the resource industries here). As a result getting a bit of leverage via a donor like IFC or whoever has two important effects. The first is in terms of getting free access to the donors investment analysis arm. Often countries do not have the human resources to properly undertake a full analysis of highly complex programs, especially in the area of infrastructure. This can be a useful tool for Government officials to deal with some of the less desirable elements of the private sector who attempt to score the "big deal'. Secondly, it can reduce the risk of investing in these countries and attract better quality investors that way. Having said that, in reality, the problem is that these donors often have tighter fiduciary rules than most commercial banks (which some would argue is a good thing given the current global fiasco). However, it means that the donors internal processes can be so cumbersome ironically they act to deter genuine investors and we again end up with sycophantic companies winning who have close ties to the donor Governments. The application of PPP's has been so mixed that it is often a difficult policy tool to sell these days - but that may be due to poor application rather than poor theory.

Hi Tess, thanks for reading both blogs and providing your thoughtful and well-informed feedback. You are correct... an ISDA is an activity that seeks, through a subtle and long-term approach, to alter the political dynamic, as all successful anti-poverty interventions do. It does this firstly through the direct and equitable provision of public goods like health and education, thus empowering people to seek and find a wider horizon (and undermining the power of existing elites). But also, if configured accordingly, a scaled-up ISDA alters the political economy marketplace that underlies the state, and the state monopoly over public goods and resources that exists in some countries, underwritten by donors. The latter would only occur if an ISDA scaled-up enough over many years to make a difference. Otherwise it would just be another service delivery modality, which is fine by itself. I think the assumption underlying the idea of an ISDA is that state capacity and human development are primarily socio-political processes and not, at the first instance, technical processes. If the political processes are open access and pro-poor, then public resources are being centralised and equitably distributed, and there is no need for an ISDA. Where HDI gains are solid and on a long-term intergenerational upward trajectory, then an ISDA serves little purpose. Direct budget support (support for the political status quo) would be appropriate in such circumstances. Of course, a country with such circumstances would find itself after some years no longer in need of the bulk of foreign aid anyway. Critics contend that donor agencies as they are currently set-up are ill-equipped to make pro-poor open access political judgements in developing countries, and there’s a lot of evidence to support this. Some good papers that discuss this issue are “The Anti-Politics of Development: donor agencies and the political economy of governance”, found <a href="http://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/63444/1/558978355.pdf" rel="nofollow">here</a> [pdf] and “Can new aid modalities handle politics?” found <a href="http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/34761/metis_176305.pdf" rel="nofollow">here</a> [pdf]. I don’t feel too comfortable about explaining Collier’s ideas around an ISDA, because he does a far better job himself. I have sought to apply his idea to a Solomons context. But I quote from the Haan & Everest-Phillips paper above, “To begin to answer these questions, apart from understanding the politics of development in recipient countries, it is essential to see donors as political agents.” In summary, I think it's best to consider an ISDA firstly as a service-delivery modality, otherwise we may confuse people and scare the horses. But all aid is inherently political. I’m really glad you found the blogs useful. I value your comments on devpolicy.