In late 2001, after many decades of war and political instability in Afghanistan, the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), under the leadership of the US government, intervened and brought a new government into Afghanistan. In 2003, Afghan elders from across the country convened a traditional Loya Jirga 1 in Kabul; a new constitution was drafted under which a presidential form of government and free market economy are chosen. Many educated Afghans living outside of Afghanistan used the opportunity to come back to Afghanistan to manage and run the new government; the international community encouraged and facilitated in this regard. Gender, human rights, freedom of speech and a free market were the political slogans. The majority of the government offices were equipped with computers flown in from Dubai and funded by external aid. Modernization and quick transfer of the country into a developed nation were bywords while the past and its influences were considered non-existent.
The first task of the new government of Afghanistan was to make a functioning government, including improving institutions and the public finance system. Decades-old, paper-based recording systems were replaced by an upgraded computerized system and new procedures. The international community (donors) assisted financially and technically in this work. Not everyone working in ministries was familiar with advanced modern planning, accounting and reporting mechanisms.
In late 2006, the government and its advisors initiated new budgetary reforms for making the budget process gender-sensitive and participatory. These two reforms aimed to reduce the gender gap and empower citizens. Gender and public participation are two closely related issues in budgeting in modern governance. Gender-sensitive budgeting is not possible without making the budget process participatory and allowing citizens to participate in the process of budget drafting, implementation and oversight to make sure their needs are addressed and funds are spent properly. Participatory budgeting, however, does not necessarily ensure gender responsiveness of the budget, because participatory approaches can also be biased. Thus, it is important to ensure that marginalized people and women get equitable attention in participatory approaches for making gender-sensitive participatory budgeting.
Although womenâs participation in budgeting and planning in Afghan institutions is relatively weak as compared with menâs, the Afghan government is supposed to be taking into account womenâs rights and gender equality in all development programs; this is one of the conditions imposed by the international donors providing financial and technical support to the government. Thus, even if womenâs participation is less visible, the government claims that it is going to great lengths to make budgeting and planning more gender-sensitive. To better understand these issues, the topics of gender and participation are briefly discussed below.
Participation
Fiscal policy and monetary policy are two tools every country has in hand through which they manage their economy, serve citizens, and implement their development plans. Fiscal policy refers to government revenues and expenditure budgeting. In order to have good governance and a strong relationship between the government and the public, government policies and strategies should be based on the needs and priorities of the people. Citizens should be allowed to have a say in the decision-making process, especially in making economic decisions, as they directly affect the living conditions of citizens. The terms âparticipationâ, âengagementâ and âconsultationsâ may have minor differences in terms of language but, in this book, are used interchangeably because in public finance they refer to essentially the same thing.
How can public participation in fiscal policy be ensured? For this purpose, the Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency (GIFT) has identified 10 principles:
- 1.
Openness: Provide full information about, and be responsive with respect to, the purpose, scope, constraints, intended outcomes, process and timelines as well as the expected and actual results of public participation.- 2.
Inclusiveness: Proactively use multiple mechanisms to reach out to engage citizens and non-state actors, including traditionally excluded and vulnerable groups and individuals, and voices that are seldom heard, without discrimination on any basis, including nationality, race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability, age or caste, and consider public inputs on an objective basis irrespective of their source.- 3.
Respect for self-expression: Allow and support individuals and communities, including those directly affected, to articulate their interests in their own ways and to choose the means of engagement that they prefer, while recognizing that there may be groups that have permission to speak on behalf of others.- 4.
Timeliness: Allow sufficient time in the budget and policy cycles for the public to provide inputs in each phase; engage early while a range of options is still open; and, where desirable, allow for more than one round of engagement.- 5.
Accessibility: Facilitate public participation in general by disseminating complete fiscal information and all other relevant data, in formats and using mechanisms that are easy for all to access and understand and to use, re-use and transform, namely in open data formats.- 6.
Transparency: Support each public engagement by providing all relevant information, highlighting and informing key policy objectives, options, choices and trade-offs, identifying potential social, economic and environmental impacts, and incorporating a diversity of perspectives and provide timely and specific feedback on public inputs and how they have been incorporated or not in official policy or advice.- 7.
Proportionality: Use a mix of engagement mechanisms proportionate to the scale and impact of the issue or policy concerned.- 8.
Sustainability: All state and non-state entities conduct ongoing and regular engagement to increase knowledge-sharing and mutual trust over time; institutionalize public participation where appropriate and effective, ensuring that the feedback provided leads to revision of fiscal policy decisions; and regularly review and evaluate experience to improve future engagement.- 9.
Complementarity: Ensure that mechanisms for public participation and citizen engagement complement and increase the effectiveness of existing governance and accountability systems.- 10.
Reciprocity: All state and non-state entities taking part in public engagement activities should be open about their mission, the interests they seek to advance, and whom they represent; should commit to and observe all agreed rules for engagement; and should cooperate to achieve the objectives of the engagement. (Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency, retrieved 11 May 2016, http://âwww.âfiscaltransparenâcy.ânet/âpp_âprinciples/â)
The 10 principles above are necessary for ensuring meaningful public participation; the first principle is openness, meaning that budgetary and decision-making information should be made available to the public. In Afghanistan, only a few years ago, the national budgeting and planning process was considered top secret; the public was not allowed to participate or share their thoughts with the government. Even the budget decree was not available to the public. The situation has improved during the last few years; now at least ministries are working on improving budget openness, and a few are trying to make the budget process participatory, although more still needs to be done.
In Afghanistan, the majority of citizens are not very aware about development programs the government is implementing in their villages and provinces. This has resulted in a widened gap of trust between citizens and the government and sometimes adds to insecurity and insurgency.
In order to narrow this gap between citizens and the government and make sure that citizensâ priorities are reflected in the national budget, the Afghan government has initiated a process of three main budgetary reforms: gender budgeting, provincial budgeting, and program budgeting. These reforms are managed by the budget policy and reform directorate of the Directorate General of Budget of the Afghan Ministry of Finance. Depending on how well reforms are actually implemented, public participation, integrating gender into the budget process, and the delivery of public services could also improve.
It is also important to acknowledge that public engagement in the budget process is a two-way street. The government needs to provide opportunities for public engagement in the process of budgeting and planning and at the same time citizens and civil society organizations (CSOs) need to do their homework and prepare themselves for active and constructive dialogue with the executive institutions and the legislature. By raising public awareness, CSOs and the media can play an important role in the enhancement of public engagement and enable the public to better understand the nature of public programs and their impacts. This can be done by analyzing the policies that affect the development programs and initiatives in which the people want to have a say.
Benefits of Public Participation
Public participation in the planning and budgeting process at the local, regional and national levels has many benefits, as discussed below. Some of these may also be considered benefits of gender-responsive budgeting (GRB) because public participation in budgeting is an essential part of GRB:It is a fact that the government cannot fulfill all the needs and wants of its citizens in a short span of time; it is important that citizens understand this. Resources in the hands of governments to finance national needs are usually limited and in real terms come from the contribution made by the people in terms of taxation, special collections, and donations to specific projects. In countries like Afghanistan, most of the resources are from international ...
- It promotes democracy and good governance.
- It secures equitable/balanced distribution of resources for the benefit of different parts of the country.
- It helps in hearing the voices of and to address the needs of marginalized groups such as women, the elderly and disabled people who would usually be unable to share their concerns with authorities.
- It builds trust between the government and citizens.
- It brings efficiency to the governmentâs programs and actions and helps improve service delivery to the public.
- It helps reduce corruption. Citizens get ownership if they see corruption or misuse of resources and try to prevent it.
- It helps in the maintenance of public property when citizens assume an âownership roleâ of public infrastructures in their areas.
- It helps re-elections of governments and legislatures to be more democratic.