OECD (2004) Lessons learned on donor support to decentralisation and local governance.

This study examines aid programmes geared towards decentralisation and local governance support. Based on experience of both bilateral and multilateral programmes, it presents lessons learned as well as guidance to donor and partner countries to improve their programmes.

Main findings of the study include:

• successful decentralisation may take more than a decade in a context of financial and political instability, and therefore needs long-term donor support
• successful implementation of decentralisation support calls for commitment on behalf of the central government of the partner country
• donors coordinate their support with partner governments to a limited degree
• although evaluated programmes tend to focus more on gender issues than poverty issues there is still a need to ensure that programmes contribute to the empowerment of women in local decision-making
• donor support to fiscal decentralisation is an area in need of attention, considering its importance to the overall process and success of decentralisation efforts and poverty reduction.

Recommendations provided include:

• improve co-ordination between donors and partner governments by integrating programmes more effectively with partner governments, support partner governments in preparing implementation plans
• enhance co-ordination between donors through joined fora and basket funding
• build short-term and long-term sustainability concerns into donor programmes
• strengthen the poverty focus of programmes by making sure the poor are targeted as well as by stimulating bottom-up, grassroots-based governance
• strengthen local government capacity to enhance financial development and sustainability of local governments

This summary has been adapted from http://www.eldis.org/assets/Docs/18415.html