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So how do your environmental (ENV) programs contribute to democracy building and governance reform? Increasingly, ENV managers are being asked to justify their program choices and their budgets as donor agencies shift priorities in democracy-governance (DG) directions and host country governments undergo unexpected democratic transitions. For many ENV managers, this justification process is quite difficult. While they know that their ENV programs have been reforming governance and building democracy, they cannot always effectively articulate these contributions to a broader audience. ENV specialists tend to talk in terms of stakeholders, participation and site-based accomplishments (land management practices, plans and maps). DG managers are listening for, but not usually hearing about results related the capacity of civil society, the checks and balances associated with democratic governance, changes related to the rule of law, protective measures for upholding human rights and measures to combat corruption.
How would you justify your budget for ENV programs if larger funding priorities shifted to democracy-governance and other activities? There are many rich lessons to be gleaned from USAID's experiences with the Indonesia-based Natural Resource Management Program - Phase 2 (NRM2) during the 1996-2000 period. From 1996-1998, NRM2 undertook a set of strengthening activities for civil society organizations that aimed to re-balance power between government and civil society for the governance of natural resources. When President Suharto resigned in the spring of 1998, NRM2 was showing promising early results despite operating under an authoritarian regime. Nonetheless, NRM2 became vulnerable to budget cuts when USAID leadership decided to immediately reposition their programs to adapt to new opportunities for democratic and economic reform (reformasi).
This case study tells two stories:
The Checks - The first story explains how the NRM2 team 1 shaped their strategies and arguments to convince USAID leadership to keep "checks" flowing to ENV programs during a democratic and decentralization transition. They were able to leverage support from both internal and external allies, in Indonesia and in Washington. They were able to show how their ENV activities contributed to Indonesia's democratic transition and would help the mission reach its other objectives. Using results from NRM2, the NRM2 team clarified the conceptual and practical ENV-DG linkages to different audiences. They bolstered these arguments with specific results related to their capacity building work with leading civil society organizations and networks. These groups had already been advocating for more democratic and sustainable environmental governance. When new opportunities opened up with reformasi, including decentralization, NRM2's civil society partners were particularly well positioned and well prepared.
The Balances - The second story helps the reader to understand two types of balancing: 1) how power was re-balanced between Indonesian civil society organizations and government as a result of NRM2 support, and 2) how civil society activities were structured under NRM2 to take advantage of political transitions. These capacity building efforts have proven to be a good investment for promoting sustainable NRM and DG objectives under both the repressive Suharto regime and in the new reformasi era.
The expression, "checks and balances" is loosely used an organizing metaphor for these two stories. I recognize that, for political scientists, the term, "checks and balances" refers to the mechanisms used to balance power for governance and check the power of government and any single government institution. The stories help the reader to understand the importance of funding ENV sectoral projects that help civil society organizations and networks to re-think and re-balance environmental governance and develop checks on the powers of government institutions. It is clear that these types of activities can help partners in authoritarian regimes to prepare for democratic transitions and reforms.
This case study was requested by the Biodiversity Support Program. The Biodiversity Support Program (BSP), funded by the Global Environment Center of USAID, is a consortium of World Wildlife Fund, The Nature Conservancy, and World Resources Institute. BSP works to conserve biodiversity in developing countries by supporting innovative, on-the-ground projects that integrate conservation with social and economic development; research and analysis of conservation and development techniques; and information exchange and outreach. USAID field missions and bureaus can "buy in" to BSP for short- and medium-term programs related to biodiversity conservation. BSP began in 1988 and will close down in December 2001.
From 1999-2001, BSP supported a global initiative on ENV-DG linkages (EDGE- Environment-Democracy/Governance Exchange). The EDGE initiative used reports, presentations, workshops and roundtables to:
improve natural resource management and biodiversity conservation in countries undergoing political and governance reform, including decentralization,
help civil society organizations (CSOs) with environmental objectives to work more efficiently and effectively,
encourage greater collaboration among ENV and DG sectors in USAID and other donor programs so that environmental programs lead to systemic DG reforms in governance and DG programs support ENV objectives, including support for the environmental activities of indigenous peoples.
This case study complements other BSP analyses and outreach on the linkages between environment and democracy-governance, including Shifting the Power: Decentralization and Biodiversity Conservation, and Greening Democracy and Governing the Environment: USAID Experiences from the Field. This case study focuses on the USAID/Indonesia NRM2 Program.
From 1996-2001, BSP supported KEMALA in Indonesia under USAID/Indonesia's NRM2 program. The KEMALA approach evolved as NGOs interacted with BSP and USAID staff in Indonesia. They were seeking ways to collaborate in a partnership for improving natural resource management. With funding from USAID, BSP set up the BSP-KEMALA field office in 1996 to administer an NGO grants program that was directed by the grantees themselves. The KEMALA approach mobilizes six parties: the donor, government, local NGOs and NGO networks that receive funding (the KEMALA partners), communities the partners serve, the project team (in this case, BSP-KEMALA), and a group of representatives from grantee partners that provides strategic guidance for the donor's annual investment (the KEMALA forum). Additional information on the KEMALA approach can be found in Stories at the Forest Edge: The KEMALA Approach to Improved Governance and Sustainable Livelihoods (Read and Cortesi, 2001), and in Indigenous Social Movements and Ecological Resilience: Lessons from the Dayak of Indonesia (Alcorn and Royo, 2000).
The objectives of this case study are to:
provide ideas to ENV donor staff and partners about how to re-frame their strategies and build on their relationships to protect ENV programs in DG-driven situations,
help other natural resource management (NRM) and biodiversity conservation colleagues to recognize the advantages and opportunities associated with democratic transitions & decentralization,
help DG colleagues to better understand how NRM/BD programs can contribute to DG objectives.
This case study draws from key informant interviews and a review of project and background documents. Key informants are listed in Appendix A. They included 14 current and former USAID staff; staff and 28 consultants and partners from the EPIQ, CRMP and BSP projects. In addition, the report includes input from eight representatives of other donor agencies and nine representatives from ENV NGOs not receiving NRM2 support. In addition, three Ministry of Environment (BAPEDAL) staff were interviewed. The consultant conducted face-to-face, telephone and e-mail interviews in Washington, DC, Jakarta, Bogor, Samarinda and Balikpapan, Indonesia. The consultant also drew on interview notes with BSP staff and partners from a prior, related assignment in Indonesia which resulted in a separate publication.2
The case study begins by describing the threat to the NRM2 program from the shift in mission priorities and the Indonesian and USAID context for that threat, in Section 2 (Changing Currency).
Section 3 (The Checks: Adaptive NRM2 Strategies) focuses on the strategies and actions taken by the NRM team to justify and evolve their program from 1998-2000.
Section 4 (The Balances: Civil Society Strategies) reviews the results of NRM2's civil society strengthening activities from 1996-2000 and analyzes lessons learned about designing and operating these types of projects. This section includes lessons learned from BSP-KEMALA'S work with NGOs and NGO networks.
The fifth and final section (Checks and Balances: Lessons Learned) summarizes the lessons learned about how to maintain NRM budget support in DG-driven environments and how to re-balance environmental governance through civil society support in the NRM sector.