| Description |
1 online resource (x, 275 pages) : illustration |
| Summary |
Jacqueline Best argues that the changes in International Monetary Fund, World Bank and donor policies in the 1990s, towards what some have called the 'Post-Washington Consensus, ' were driven by an erosion of expert authority and an increasing preoccupation with policy failure. Failures such as the Asian financial crisis and the decades of despair in sub-Saharan Africa led these institutions to develop governance strategies designed to avoid failure: fostering country ownership, developing global standards, managing risk and vulnerability and measuring results. In contrast to the structural adjustment era when policymakers were confident that they had all the answers, the author argues that we are now in an era of provisional governance, in which key actors are aware of the possibility of failure even as they seek to inoculate themselves against it. This book considers the implications of this shift, asking if it is a positive change and whether it is sustainable. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Note |
Print version record. |
| Contents |
Part I Understanding how global governance works; 1 Introduction; How and why the shift occurred; How the new practices work; Implications; Empirical contributions; Methodological innovations; Theoretical insights; The importance of practice: between materiality and ideas; Understanding change; Expertise and failure; Provisional governance beyond risk; The plan of the book; 2 A meso-level analysis; Understanding governance as practice; Focusing on governance strategies; Examining factors of governance. |
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ActorsTechniques; Knowledge and ideas; Authority; Power; Recognizing governance styles; Understanding change; Part II History; 3 What came before; What came before; Before standardization; Before ownership; Before risk and vulnerability; Before results-based measurement; A confident style of governing; Tensions emerge; 4 Transformations; Some traditional accounts; An alternative account; The fragility of expert authority; The politics of failure; The problematization of structural adjustment practices; The problems (and possibilities) of politics; The limits of technical universals. |
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Debating success and failureThe problem of contingency; Conclusions; Part III New governance strategies; 5 Fostering ownership; The evolution of ownership; Redesigning conditionality; Streamlining at the IMF; A more gradual change at the World Bank; More radical shifts in some donor states; Analysing conditionality reform; Small ""i"" ideas; Symbolic and informal techniques; Informalizing power; Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs); The push for the PRSP; Analysing the PRSP; Engaging new actors; New techniques; New forms of authority and power; A more provisional style of governance. |
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6 Developing global standardsGood governance; The evolution of a governance agenda; The World Bank; International Monetary Fund; Analysing good governance; A new kind of universal; New actors and sites of authority; New techniques: governing through universals; New forms of power and authority; Standards and codes; Developing the initiative; An analysis of standards and codes; A new kind of universal; More performative techniques; New actors and sites of authority; More indirect power; A more provisional kind of governance; 7 Managing risk and vulnerability. |
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Assessing poor countries' vulnerability to shocksUnderstanding the shift; Three new policies; Changing governance factors; Small ""i"" ideas; Actors; Techniques; Power and authority; Redefining poverty as social risk and vulnerability; Understanding the shift; The social risk and vulnerability framework; Changing governance factors; Small ""i"" ideas; Techniques; Actors; Power and authority; A more provisional kind of governance; 8 Measuring results; Where it came from; The ""failure"" of government and new public management; Results in development agencies. |
| Summary |
Traces an important shift in international development policy as global institutions have become preoccupied with policy failure. |
| Note |
This work is licensed by Knowledge Unlatched under a Creative Commons license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0 |
| Local Note |
Cambridge University Press Cambridge Open Access Books |
| Subject |
Economic development -- Finance.
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Economic assistance.
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Development banks.
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Non-governmental organizations.
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Corporate governance.
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Economics, finance, business and management.
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Economics.
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Political economy.
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BUSINESS & ECONOMICS -- Finance.
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Corporate governance. (OCoLC)fst00879649
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Development banks. (OCoLC)fst00891746
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Economic assistance. (OCoLC)fst00901592
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Economic development -- Finance. (OCoLC)fst00901824
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Non-governmental organizations. (OCoLC)fst01038524
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| Genre/Form |
Electronic books.
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| Other Form: |
Print version: Best, Jacqueline, 1970- Governing failure. New York : Cambridge University Press, 2014 9781107035041 (DLC) 2013028563 (OCoLC)847833629 |
| ISBN |
9781139542739 (electronic book) |
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1139542737 (electronic book) |
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9781107732001 (electronic book) |
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110773200X (electronic book) |
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9781107728493 (electronic book) |
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1107728495 (electronic book) |
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9781306376372 (electronic book) |
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1306376378 (electronic book) |
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9781107035041 (hardback) |
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110703504X (hardback) |
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9781107723887 |
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1107723884 |
