Q&A: The World Bank's strategy for fragile states

WASHINGTON — The World Bank Group is developing a new strategy for fragile and conflict-affected states that the institution’s leaders hope can “systematize” the bank’s approach to engaging in complex situations that demand an increasing share of its resources. The strategy will aim “to position the World Bank Group’s development support within the broader strategic context of our international partners’ efforts in fragility, conflict, and violence — FCV — with a huge push and a huge focus on prevention,” said Franck Bousquet, senior director of the bank’s fragility, conflict, and violence group. That will mean examining the different types of fragile contexts where the bank might engage to understand what approach it should take under different conditions. It will also involve reviewing staffing and personnel, the bank’s approach to partnerships, as well as internal policies that govern implementation. Devex spoke to Bousquet about why the bank needs an FCV strategy and how it might change the institution’s approach. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. “We want to make sure that we are recognizing that each FCV situation requires a tailored approach.” --— Franck Bousquet, senior director, World Bank fragility, conflict, and violence group Is this the first fragility, conflict, and violence strategy for the World Bank Group, and what function does a strategy like this serve? This is a top priority for our twin goals. If you look at the numbers, by 2030 at least half of the world’s poor will live in fragile and conflict-affected situations. So it’s very clear if we are to achieve our World Bank Group mission of ending poverty by 2030, we must focus our efforts on countries that are impacted by fragility, conflict, and violence. This is a top priority for our institution. The strategy aims to build on progress that has been made over the last few years and systematize it. Through [the International Development Association], for example, our fund for the poorest countries, we have doubled our resources in low-income and FCV countries from $7 to $14 billion … We are ready to start to change our approach by focusing more on conflict-prevention, but also by, for instance, now playing a role on the whole refugee agenda, because we know it’s not only a humanitarian crisis, but it’s actually humanitarian and development, and we have to work with our humanitarian partners — focusing much more on de-risking private sector investment to ease investment in those countries to create jobs. This strategy will be an opportunity for the World Bank Group to form part of a global effort with other partners to collectively address the challenge of FCV. In the end, the strategy is about addressing the drivers of fragility, conflict, and violence, but it’s also towards promoting peace and prosperity. This is the first strategy ever for the World Bank Group in FCV. Do you expect that the strategy will bring about any operational or policy changes in terms of the bank’s engagement in FCV countries, or is it more about describing and codifying the work you’re already doing? We want to make sure that we are recognizing that each FCV situation requires a tailored approach — again, significant progress has been made as you can see in all the work done, whether it’s Niger, Somalia, and others — and here will be a way to articulate in a strategy about what type of FCV situation requires what type of approach. The second is about personnel and staff. Over the past two years, we have increased our presence in the most fragile settings by an additional about 120 staff, which is very important especially in these environments where you have low capacity and there is a need for a lot of handholding. At the same time, we are going to focus on partnership and process. By partnership, that’s the recognition that no single organization can work effectively in FCV settings. You need to work with security actors, with humanitarian actors, while at the same time remaining on your competitive advantage. We are a development actor, and therefore the strategy will articulate, in a more systematic manner, what type of partnership can be leveraged depending on the situation — whether you are in crisis, whether you are focusing on prevention. We have seen, especially under IDA, a number of good examples of partnerships, and it’s the right time to institutionalize that and make sure this is really systemic across countries. We want to make sure the strategy will help strengthen the effectiveness of our programs, and that would mean looking at our process, our procedures, and adapting, if needed, to ensure that they are fit for purpose. That’s basically the work of the strategy over the next two, three, four months — there will be very significant consultation outside the bank. We have decided not to consult [not only] on the draft strategy paper, but [in addition] to consult on the concept note … We want to be in listening mode on a topic as important as fragility, conflict, violence, and collect views from civil society, the private sector, bilaterals, other [multilateral development banks], humanitarian actors, and others. “How can we ensure that we work hand in hand with U.N. organizations — so that we can gain from their perspectives — but at the same time we can provide financing incentives to the countries hosting refugees.” --— Since the bank was created to work through country governments, how big of a shift is required in places where there might not be a legitimate government to partner with? Does the bank already have those structures for working with nonstate actors or security actors, for example, or is that something you are having to create now that the bank is emphasizing fragile states? It’s very important to work with security and peacebuilding actors because without them there would be simply no possibility for development … Whether it’s in Mali or the Central African Republic … we are hand in hand strengthening, helping the government to deliver services in areas of high level of insecurity — and that can only be done with a concrete partnership. This will be clearly emphasized in the strategy — the importance of working with humanitarian actors. Why? This is not to change our DNA. We are World Bank Group focusing on our core competitive advantage, which is development, but we know also that many crises are protracted crises. When you look at the refugee crisis, for instance, today we have about 68 to 70 million forcibly displaced people in the world, the biggest crisis since World War II. In many cases, those crises are humanitarian, but also development. How can we ensure that we work hand in hand with U.N. organizations — so that we can gain from their perspectives — but at the same time we can provide financing incentives to the countries hosting refugees … Humanitarian actors, for instance, have the presence on the ground in very difficult settings where we are not there, and also have the experience of being associated very closely with the most vulnerable populations. Yemen is a very good example of partnership with U.N. agencies — UNDP, WFP, WHO. Why are we partnering with those organizations? Because they allow us — when we don’t have any staff on the ground — to support the implementation of about $1.5 to $1.6 billion of development assistance at a critical time. We know more and more that even during a crisis it’s important to remain engaged and provide complementary support to humanitarian assistance. Considering how politically charged some of the situations you just described are, does the bank have set guidelines about who you will and will not partner with? The partnership is very important, and that’s going to depend on the country, on the situation … The type of partners that I mentioned remain relevant in many situations. Today we are working in … 23 [FCV countries] with the U.N. agencies. This is going to, of course, be different, whether we are talking about drought, whether we are talking about famine, whether we are talking about refugee crisis, whether we are talking about focusing in the center of Mali, or strengthening the capacity of the state in the Central African Republic in the territory, which is not under control by the government. You are going to see a huge number of partners with whom we are associating ourselves … and I think the strategy will be exactly the opportunity to take stock of all the different types of partnership and systematize it to be even more effective in all the different types of FCV situations. Are there any situations in which the World Bank would partner — or is partnering — with a national government’s military? Not right now to my knowledge … When you look at the security sector, what we have done more and more is financing what we call “public expenditure review” of the security sector, which has been quite important. But obviously, our mandate prohibits us from a number of programs which are directly related to military assistance. This is completely outside of our mandate, obviously. The bank has been financing a number of public expenditure reviews in security sectors that allow the government to make the expenditure more efficient and then to unlock significant sources of funding for other development areas. This is a way we’ve been involved while obviously remaining fully in our mandate. One of the challenging things about implementing programs in fragile and conflict-affected states is risk, and the compliance requirements that come with riskier environments. Is that something you’ll be looking at in this strategy? We are, of course, whether it’s in FCV situations or nonFCV situations always paying a lot of attention to managing risk and making sure that all our programs are fully compliant with all our procedures … Whether you’re going to partner with an INGO, or whether you’re going to simply work directly with the government — which is the majority of cases — the focus on supervision … needs to remain the same ... We have adapted ourselves to ensure that we can use not only third-party monitoring but also ICT, so that we can really know how programs are being delivered, who are the beneficiaries, are the teachers in schools, are the doctors in the hospitals. Update, Apr. 25: This story was updated to clarify that the World Bank will consult on both the concept note and the draft strategy paper.