Strengthen the Bank Group'spoverty diagnostic work to ensure that it incorporates relevant social and political dimensions of poverty analysis.
The Bank's analytical work on poverty often does not adequately address the important social and political factors that contribute to poverty and impede efforts to reduce it. Robust and independent poverty diagnostics that identify social and political parameters as well as distributional issues, institutional capacity, and excluded communities provide more relevant and actionable policy recommendations.
WB: Agrees. A sizeable number of poverty Advisory and Analytical Activities (AAA), in the past but especially in more recent times, has examined the economic, social and political drivers of poverty reduction and shared prosperity. They have also articulated policy actions that would lead to achieving the goals. Poverty analytic work is an important input into the SCD process. Strengthening the social and political aspects of poverty diagnostics is also an intent of the Poverty and Social Impact Analysis (PSIA) work which focuses on the implications of policy reforms. This is now also being addressed by the Poverty Global Practice through its Global Solutions Areas - particularly the Fiscal and Social Policies and Markets and Institutions for Poverty Reduction and Shared Prosperity.
Action 4: Guidance and supporting resources developed to incorporate social and institutional analysis to identify the drivers of poverty and shared prosperity in SCDs.
Indicators: Percent of countries with social and institutional analysis of drivers of poverty reduction and inclusion in SCDs (or similar country reports focused on twin goals).
Baseline: t.b.d. (FY16)
Target: 100%of SCDs for which concept notes were approved in FY17-FY19.
Timeline: FY19
IEG acknowledges that a number of quality tools have been developed to incorporate social and institutional analysis in SCDs in order to identify the drivers of poverty and shared prosperity. This is an essential first step to ensure that a rigorous analysis is conducted in SCDs. IEG also acknowledges that the preparation of these tools represents a substantial and time-consuming effort in the process of implementing this action, which justify a rating of "Substantial". A key step in the implementation of the action plan will be to identify a mechanism to track SCDs that include a social and institutional analysis of drivers of poverty reduction and inclusion - whether through periodic stocktaking exercises (how frequent?) or ongoing monitoring as SCDs are approved. The preparation of quality tools is a necessary but not sufficient condition to achieve this goal. Therefore, in the following updates it would be great if management could specify how the tools will be disseminated how their use by SCD teams will be monitored and to what extent SCDs integrate the social and institutional analysis as required.
Since the update provided by management in FY16, the role of social and institutional analysis in SCD has been articulated in more detail in the full SCD Guidance Note that was issued in December 2016 (attached), which replaced the Interim Guidelines. Both the Guidance Note and a more detailed technical document, titled "Analytical approaches for a Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD)", are available at the SCD Resource Center, WBG's internal website for SCDs, which has high visibility and use among WBG staff. These are complemented by a resource guide on social analysis titled "Incorporating Social Inclusion Analysis into Systematic Country Diagnostics", and a paper titled "Social Inclusion in macro-level diagnostics: reflecting on the World Bank Group's early systematic country diagnostics" that was published as a WB Working Paper in FY16 and disseminated at a Bankwide seminar in FY17. These two documents were attached with the last management update. An updated resource guide on Gender analysis, and important dimension of social analysis, has been completed in FY17 and added to SCD Resource Center (attached). A detailed resource guide on governance and institutional analysis in SCDs is being developed by Governance GP, as a part of the operationalization of the WDR on governance, and will be added to the internal website in Q1 of FY18. The SCD Guidance and thematic resource guides are supported by an inventory of relevant analytical tools, methods and data sources on all key topics at the SCD Resource Center. Resources relevant for social and institutional analysis are found primarily under the categories "data tools and databases", "Social Development", and "Governance & Civic Engagement".
Baseline for the indicator specified here has not been fully developed yet, beyond the above-mentioned review of social analysis in first 17 SCDs. In addition, a stocktaking exercise for 30 early SCDs (PPT draft with preliminary results attached) takes stock of priority areas, and knowledge and data gaps identified by SCDs, including the frequency with which governance is identified as a priority area and political economy analysis is identified as a knowledge gap. While these results do not map to the indicator associated with this action precisely, they provide relevant information on the coverage of these topics in the first 30 SCDs. More complete stocktaking of both social and institutional analysis in SCDs will be done in FY18 to monitor the required indicator. To summarize, substantial progress has been achieved in FY16 and FY17 in providing guidance and supporting resources to incorporate social and institutional analysis in SCDs, the highlights of which are incorporating more high level guidance on these issues in the full SCD Guidance, developing a new Gender resource guide, and taking stock of these issues in the context of prioritization and knowledge gaps in SCDs. These merit a rating of "substantial" (at more than 50% of the action plan). Key elements of the action plan that remain to be completed include developing more technical resources on governance and institutional analysis, and measuring the indicator associated with the action plan more precisely.
After reviewing the management response and the supporting material, IEG agrees with management that a number of quality resources have been produced to support the social and institutional analysis of drivers of poverty reduction and inclusion in SCDs. There appears to be richer material referring to social inclusion than poverty reduction analysis, though. As management recognizes, it is still not possible to provide a baseline of the indicator. With respect to social inclusion, Das' analysis of 17 SCDs (carried out in 2016) reveals that, while all 17 SCDs identify exclusion along at least one identity group and the domains in which exclusion occurs, few SCDs address the practices through which exclusion occurs and very few drill down to why some groups fare worse than others (drivers of exclusion) (Das, p. 14 and p. 23).
Reference:
Das, M. B (2016), Social Inclusion in Macro-Level Diagnostics: Reflecting on the World Bank Groupâs Early Systematic Country Diagnostics, Policy Research Working Paper 7713
**see full update attached**
The role of social and institutional analysis to identify the drivers of poverty and shared prosperity in SCD is articulated in the Interim Guidelines for SCD as a part of overall guidance. More details on how such analysis fits into an SCD's analytical framework are provided in the main technical resource document, titled "Analytical approaches for a Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD)". These are prominently available at the SCD Resource Center, WBG's internal website for SCDs, which has high visibility and use among WBG staff particularly SCD teams and CMUs. Numerous presentations and training sessions (online and in-person) have been conducted for many different audiences in the Bank and IFC using these materials. The main presentation on the website summarizes these materials
A more detailed technical note on social analysis, a resource guide for staff titled "Incorporating Social Inclusion Analysis into Systematic Country Diagnostics", is available at the SCD Resource Center. An additional resource, a review of social analysis in the first batch of 17 SCDs, titled "Social Inclusion in macro-level diagnostics : reflecting on the World Bank Group's early systematic country diagnostics", has been published as a WB Working Paper. These materials have been used at a number of training sessions and other events for WBG staff. The two documents are attached.
Similar technical note or resource guide on governance and institutional analysis in SCDs is not available yet and is expected to be developed in FY17.
The Interim Guidelines and thematic notes are supported by an inventory of relevant analytical tools, methods and data sources on all key topics. Resources relevant for social and institutional analysis are found primarily under the categories "data tools and databases", "Social Development", and "Governance & Civic Engagement". The inventory is regularly updated. More resources on institutional analysis will be added as the thematic note on governance and institutional analysis is prepared. The inventory is a part of SCD Resource Center.
A full Guidance Note for SCDs is being prepared, revising the Interim Guidelines that has been in place since February, 2014, which will be replaced by the Guidance Note. The revised Guidance will include more substantive high-level guidance on social and institutional analysis than the Interim Guidelines currently does, which should further strengthen the role of social and institutional analysis in SCDs. The Guidance is expected to be issued in Q2 of FY17.
Baseline for the indicator specified here has not been developed yet, although some progress has been made through the above-mentioned review of social analysis in first 17 SCDs. More complete stocktaking of both social and institutional analysis in SCDs will be done in FY17 to monitor the required indicator.
In FY17, web statistics and feedback from SCD team leaders (collected through an online survey) will be used to monitor the use and relevance of all the resources provided at the SCD Resource Center, including the thematic notes on social and institutional analysis and the inventory of resources. This will provide additional information on the use of these resources among SCD teams as reference materials, which will be taken into account to create additional resources or update/revise existing ones.
To summarize, considerable progress has already been achieved in providing guidance and supporting resources to incorporate social and institutional analysis to identify the drivers of poverty and shared prosperity in SCDs. However progress is rated as moderate (at less than 50% of the action plan), since: (i) more resources, in the form of detailed technical notes and tools and databases, **see full update attached**