Policy-Making and Legislating for Reform in Melanesia: why is it so difficult? Cases from Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu

Abstract

All Pacific Island countries have embraced policy and management reform - both in rhetoric and practice – as the central strategy for enhancing economic development and effective governance. Donor support and encouragement for this strategy over the past decade has been substantial. Yet reforms have proven difficult to implement in most countries and only partial success can be claimed. Why is reform so elusive? In the course of two recent consultancies undertaken for the FAO in Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu, Dr Jim Fingleton observed a wide range of obstacles and difficulties, structural and behavioural, that have inhibited the progress of reform. Impediments encountered o absence of a political mandate for change and reform o political and bureaucratic inertia, obstruction and “interference” o lack of coordination and continuity in bureaucratic processes o disconnections between the public and private sectors o unrealistic expectations of consultants and donor interventions, and o inappropriate donor programs and timeframes. While many of these obstacles are common throughout the Pacific region (indeed throughout the developing world), others are specific to individual countries. Dr Fingleton’s identification of these constraints within their national contexts assists our understanding of the inherent difficulties of the reform process. In addition, his close analysis of experience on these projects demonstrates some pointed lessons for domestic reformers, donors and consultants alike. One such lesson, he argues, is that aid projects and consultants cannot be used as a substitute for government policymaking - if reforms are to endure and responsible government is to have any meaning. A second is that, in the absence of functioning political parties and other mechanisms linking the populace to policy, the legitimacy of reform policy can be enhanced best by a wide consultative process. But even that is no guarantee of successful policy implementation: powerful vested interests may still override popularly-endorsed programs.