Ideals of Public Procurement Reform and Governance

Challenges in Africa: A Survey of Legislations and Practices

S.N. Nyeck, PhD

Assistant Professor of Political Science

Clarkson University, New York

sngonyec@clarkson.edu

sngonye1@ucla.edu

Do new public procurement regulations influence public women friendly-policies in Africa?

Can women-friendly acquisitions be strategically and positively commodified within market-based solutions for financing development?

Questions

What is the future of the “public”/the political in public procurement schemes in Africa?

Perspectives on Development

Realism: Focuses on who gains more even if all gain some. Development is not just about growth but also about the control of resources.

Liberalism: specialization, competition, and the markets. Development foster interdependence, which in turn fosters cooperation and the building of international regulations and institutions, from which all can gain.

Identity/Critical: political and social objectives (sustainable growth, conservation of resources). Does development cultivate NGOs, Human rights (especially for women), and democracy? Does it contribute to human not just economic development, better health, education, protection of life and property for the least advantaged?

What Causes Development?

The Government or the Market?

Neo-classical view: Markets take center-stage in economic life and government plays a minor role.

• Governments do best if they work with, rather than try to override, the forces of the marketplace.

Revisionist view: “ worries about the redistribution of gains from development and doubt that governments pursue policies that spread wealth unless they are confident that the growth in wealth serves their existing interests and allies. Market forces may enrich others, but they inevitably serve the objectives of those who already possess wealth. Thus governments that start behind internationally or challenge entrenched interests domestically have to override markets to ensure development...Stresses government intervention to protect against or correct market forces. Examples? Domestic subsidies, foreign aid, import substitution…etc.

New Global Governance (Finance)

The State is changing:

“The reengineering of public finance in response to the rebalancing of market and states is well established worldwide, a process that has been researched and documented. Contracting out, private solutions to externalities, private financing of public sector projects, among others, are making their way into public finance textbooks” (Kaul & Conceicao, 2013: 3).

New Actors:

“Contrary to what might still be a widely held view, government no longer merely act as aggregators of national policy preferences and national public policy is nested in global policy framework…Thinking about public finance is reaching into the realm of foreign policy…And it is transforming international cooperation from an essentially intergovernmental process into a multiactor process” Kaul & Conceicao 2013: 4).

I nstitutional Environment

Governance

I ndividual

Shift Parameters

Strategic

Behavioral Attributes

Endogenous Preferences

Mechanisms of governance (Williamson 1996, main effect are in solid arrows and feedback in broken arrows)

Mechanisms of Governance 1

What is public procurement?

Government:

Public servants produce and deliver public works, goods, and services.

The Private sector:

Produces works, goods, and services that the government needs.

Partnership, contract (formal/informal), expenditures

BOT (build, operate, transfer), privatization, concessions (long-term)

The outsourcing of U.S. government activities is far greater than most people realize, has been very poorly managed, and has inadvertently militarized American foreign policy.

“ common proposition that the twin forces of internationalization and globalization are eroding state sovereignty is a clumsy conceptual approach to the topic” (p.205-6)

Sovereignty/Hierarchy: hybrid, incomplete, intermediary

“The ubiquity of governance-by-private-contractors strikingly outstrips our legal and political capabilities of oversight meant to ensure that the contractor’s execution of these governmental functions complies with democratic norms” (p.2)

Important trade-offs. A public law critique the current state of affairs

SOME EXAMPLES OF PUBLIC PROCUREMENT PROJECTS

Public Procurement and State Formation/Organization

Leonardo da Vinci’s Profilo di capitano antico, known as Condottiero 1480

Simon Mann, (Left) led a group of mercenaries in a failed coup attempt in equatorial guinea in 2004

Provision of stability and instability!!!!!!

Value of gifts expected to secure a government contract (% of contract value) in Sub-Saharan Africa - Highest Group. Source: World Bank Enterprise Survey.

Public Procurement & Scholarship on Africa

• Public Procurement and Regulations in Africa (Quinot & Arrowsmith, 2013)

• Public Procurement Reforms in Africa: Challenges in Institutions and Governance ( De Mariz , Menard, and Abeille, 2014)

• Public Procurement and Mechanisms of Governance in Africa: An Exploration of the Law-Politics-Business-Matrix (Nyeck, 2016 upcoming)

• Civil servants, civil society, policymakers, scholars.

• Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda, Ethiopia, interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary.

I nstitutional Environment

Governance

I ndividual

Shift Parameters

Strategic

Behavioral Attributes

Endogenous Preferences

Mechanisms of governance (Williamson 1996, main effect are in solid arrows and feedback in broken arrows)

Mechanisms of Governance 2

Women and the States What accounts for the worldwide emergence of state behavior that expressly target women?

Norms: Homogenize states: “ victory of the state as

the predominant polity, but also the individualization of humanity” (p.5)

Heterogenize states (raking sets up relations of hierarchy): “states practices towards women have been and continue to be important standards of rank across the world” (p.9)

Women’s suffrage / Waves National machinery (formalized

public policy & implementation)/ Swift; random geographical distribution

Sex quotas (in legislatures)/ out of Latin America then elsewhere

Questions Revised

Do new public procurement regulations influence public women friendly-policies in Africa? What are African states bidding for/against?

Can women-friendly acquisitions be strategically and positively commodified within market-based solutions for financing development? What is the role of transnational economic institutions in this process?

Public Procurement in Africa: General Trends

N= 23,000 Data source: African Development Bank

Public Procurement in Africa: General Trends (continued)

N= 23,000 Data source: African Development Bank

Public Procurement in Africa: General Trends (continued)

N= 23,000 Data source: African Development Bank

Source: OECD, 2003

Country WBCAR Status of Women

New PP Law Status of Women (preferential?)

Nigeria 2000 NO 2007 NO

Uganda 2004 NO 2003 (supp. 2006), Local Govt. Act (2001) : At least one tender board member ought to be a woman/ person with disability.

Kenya 2005 NO PPDA (2007)(2014 amendment)

Section 39 (4): Preferences and reservations apply to, candidates such as disadvantage groups, micro, small, and medium enterprises”

subsidiary legislation (No. 114, 2013) Amendment

32 “enterprise owned by youth (10%), women or persons with disability”

Sierra Leone 1997 NO 2009-013 NONE

Cameroon 2005 NO 2004 NONE

South Africa 2003 NO Cons. 217 (2)

1996-1997

Inclusion of SMMEs owned by historically disadvantaged individuals (blacks, women, youth, disabled people and rural dwellers)

Source: CNRS(2001)

Thank you