How to narrow the gap between policy objectives and eventual results

What you need to know:

  • Throughout the world, policy implementation is perhaps one of the most difficult aspects of translating policy pronouncements into action.
  • Although developing countries could learn from the experiences of advanced countries, they lack the motivation to find their own ways of responding to policy implementation deficits. Other factors like selfish interests made it impossible to review how policy was implemented.
  • Last week, I participated in a discussion at Windsor Hotel organised by the African Institute for Development Policy to chart the way forward in leveraging data, research and other types of evidence to improve policy implementation.
  • In retrospect, policy implementation in Kenya gave me invaluable knowledge. I learnt the hard way that the bottom-up approach was more like purposively attempting to hurt yourself because no matter what you did or said, you were still bound to be criticised, with some participants shouting abusive language.
  • developing countries must up their game with respect to policy implementation by leapfrogging into evidence-based policy implementation.

Throughout the world, policy implementation is perhaps one of the most difficult aspects of translating policy pronouncements into action.

Academics (see, for example, the 2004 works of Theodoulou & Kofinis) define this exercise as the stage where government executes an adopted policy as specified by the legislation or policy action.

Some policy statements have no legislative direction to follow, especially in this day and age when new solutions emerge out of new technologies.

Common across many countries is that policy implementation fails for lack of fit between the implementers and developers of policy.

In the 1960s US, for example, there were difficulties in translating public policies into stated objectives.

Research into this problem, which was popularly referred to as the “implementation deficit”, started to find better solutions.

By the 1970s, the study of the implementation of policy emerged as an autonomous field within the broader discipline of public policy, leading to better policy implantation in the West. The problem, however, persisted in developing countries.

Many of those who studied public policy at the time argued that policy implementation was a science involving analytics and providing prescriptive solutions.

As a result, they embraced research and analytics before policy implantation that largely adopted a top-down approach on how best to implement policy.

This implementation that was pushed down to policy recipients did not live long before new research made alternative approaches.

LESSONS FOR THE DEVELOPING WORLD

In the 1980s, however, realisation came that the approach was undemocratic, leading to the adoption of a bottom-up approach where policy recipients were active participants in directing the implementation towards stated policy objectives.

By the 1990s, it had become necessary to review past information in addition to research.

The advent of the 21st century saw data playing an important role, so much that policy decisions were informed by rigorously established objective evidence.

In the US, for example, a commission was created to establish ways of accessing the necessary data required for policymaking and implementation.

In 2017, the U.S. Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking issued a bipartisan strategy for ensuring that rigorous evidence is created efficiently and as a routine part of government operations that can, in turn, be used to construct effective public policy. The Commission unanimously approved 22 recommendations to improve data access, strengthen privacy protections, and enhance government’s capacity for evidence building.

These research-based iterations meant that the US responded to policy implementation challenges from the ground.

Although developing countries could learn from such experiences, they lacked the motivation to find their own ways of responding to policy implementation deficits. Other factors like selfish interests made it impossible to review how policy was implemented.

Many policymakers in Kenya, for example, still prefer the top-down approach, even though the Constitution requires a participatory approach to policymaking and implementation. Africa now needs to leapfrog in order to effectively implement its policies.

The good news is that the discourse around policy implementation in Africa has started and with that, hopefully, we can narrow the gap between policy pronouncements and implementation.

INVALUABLE KNOWLEDGE

Last week, I participated in one such discourse at Windsor Hotel organised by the African Institute for Development Policy to chart the way forward in leveraging data, research and other types of evidence to improve policy implementation.

The workshop, which attracted senior policymakers from around the world (including Kenya, Chile, Ghana, Malawi, Mexico, Nigeria, Rwanda, and South Africa), shared practical experiences, technical solutions and strategies in addressing the challenges governments face in taking an evidence-informed approach to policy implementation.

My keynote address centred on my own experience during the implementation of Vision 2030 Information and Communication Technology (ICT) projects in Kenya.

In retrospect, policy implementation in Kenya gave me invaluable knowledge. I learnt the hard way that the bottom-up approach was more like purposively attempting to hurt yourself because no matter what you did or said, you were still bound to be criticised, with some participants shouting abusive language.

First, you had to develop a thick skin and, second, you had to conduct your own studies and analytics such that you always had more points to convince everybody.
I studied India’s ICT miracle more than any of my previous studies. I read Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat, to shore up my understanding of the undersea cables.

With the help of the US Embassy, I met Friedman at a time when very few people understood my obsession with linking Kenya to the rest of the world. The news media were against me, and so were all investigative agencies.

SIMPLE DIGESTIBLE PORTIONS

Desperate, I broke down the project implementation to simple digestible portions – feasibility, undersea survey, cable manufacturing, obtaining guarantee, cable laying, landing station – that as post-election violence was underway, I was negotiating with Citibank to guarantee $40 million for laying the cable.

At no time did I feel that the public hostility at the time was misplaced. They could have been right, considering that many projects had failed. From that perspective, it was easier to predict the failure.

At some point in the past there were many abandoned projects referred to as “white elephants.” The thought of this emboldened my resolve.

The decision to remove Kenya from a regional fibre-optic cable initiative and go alone did not sit well with many stakeholders.

Still, I subjected it to debate both online and in special conferences to deliberate on Kenya’s journey towards affordable broadband.

The policy development and implementation process was painful but had a very happy ending.

Today, Kenya leads Africa in internet penetration and broadband speed, with broadband fairly affordable and accessible. The per-minute price on voice plummeted from a high of Sh30 to less than Sh3.

The secret of success comes from the ability to take responsibility, for better or worse.

It is a risky affair, because there are multiples of people involved in the implementation process.

The principal implementer must carry the vision and fully understand everything.

Most policymakers fail when they rely on their staff to write speeches for them even on critical implementation matters, without realising that speech writing forces them to engage with the issues and brings them closer to the process.

INITIAL OBJECTIVES VERSUS RESULTS

Any policy must be broken down to multiple objectives, such that there is always progress any time the policy is evaluated, meaning that the gap between initial objectives and eventual results keeps on narrowing.

President Kenyatta made serious policy pronouncements that will define his legacy. Food security, for example, touches everyone, meaning that it will be more accessible and affordable.

With huge resources directed at this cause, we should at least see some of the immediate policy interventions. Implementation should be broken down to what the citizens can relate to.

For example, the food security of people in northern Kenya is tied to livestock and some of the implementation initiatives should have started during the recent rains. Grass has been everywhere but it is beginning to dry.

We should have baled it and buried it so that when drought comes, we will have sufficient food for the animals to produce milk and reduce the losses that drought brings. It is perhaps the cheapest way of ensuring food to northern Kenya.

With such missed opportunities, research reveals that no matter what approach is used to ensure that objectives are achieved, the ease with which problems can be solved, the policy’s ability to structure its own implementation, as well as external issues such as consensus and socio-economic conditions are difficult to realise.

In reality, these preconditions are rarely present and therefore there are always a number of challenges in implementing public policy.

Either way, developing countries must up their game with respect to policy implementation by leapfrogging into evidence-based policy implementation.

The writer is an associate professor at the University of Nairobi’s School of Business. Twitter: @bantigito