 Good morning everybody, or good afternoon, good evening wherever you're joining us from. We're going to give everyone a few minutes or a minute to sort of join in before we kick off so don't don't be alarmed if we're sitting here in silence when first join. Right, it seems like the participant numbers have sort of reached a bit of a plateau at the moment so I think we'll take that as a good signal to get started. So good morning. Good afternoon and good evening everybody. My name is Graham Ramshaw. I'm Westminster foundation for democracies director of research and evaluation. And it's my pleasure to welcome you to this event on doing development democratically. This, this online discussion is one of over 40 events webinars online sessions being held today as part of the global democracy coalition forum. The global 24 hour event convened on the eve of the summit for democracy, which is scheduled for later this week on the 9th and 10th of December. And that includes another WFD hosted event today on why women's political leadership is essential for democracy, which is happening at 1pm UK time so three hours from now, so please do check that out. And the main messages from our speakers at our event today, and all the other webinars that are happening will be communicated to the organizers organizers of the summit to try and feed into that global discussion about democracy. So with that in mind, you'll see that the event is being recorded today to facilitate the coalition of those messages. Add a quick thank you here at the beginning to my colleague Beth, who's co hosting the event and hopefully seen off any technical glitches before they emerge. After our session today. We would encourage you to visit the global democracy coalition website, which is www dot global democracy coalition.org and attend some of the other events that are being held today and I see my colleague has put the link there in the, in the chat. So our event today is going to be a conversation. I think we're all a bit tired of sort of webinars and presentations and things so I wanted this to be a sort of a visual podcast, if you will. So the panelists and I will go back and forth on a number of questions over the course of the first sort of 4550 minutes or so. And then I'll pull some questions and comments from you, the audience to discuss with the panel before we close at 1115. So please use the Q&A function that you should see at the bottom of your screen to register those comments and questions throughout the event. And also don't forget to use the hashtag hashtag global democracy coalition to tweet about this, this webinar during the course of the day. So, onto our topic. So I'm going to comment democratically. What is it. Is it possible. Is it preferable. We're two days ahead of a global summit for democracy that convened in response to concerns of advancing authoritarianism and liberalism. A trend enabled by China and Russia exacerbated by COVID. But this declining trajectory for democracy is not a new story. In a variety of democracy project be them. Their data suggests that 2006 was actually the inflection point at which the supply of democracy globally began to decline. And in describing this phenomenon the academic Larry Diamond made very apt use of a quotation from Hemingways the sun also rises, where a character is asked how did you go bankrupt and he replies two ways, gradually, then suddenly. So it has felt, I think with respect to democracy globally. Nevertheless, having waited this long to respond. We now face the combined challenges of repelling the sort of growing appeal of authoritarianism, while also rebuilding our economies in the shadow of a persistent pandemic. Meeting all these challenges at once will necessarily mean tensions and trade offs. All policy decisions do. This debate is also not a new one foreign affairs devoted an entire issue to the subject back in 2005, when democracy was still in ascendancy we're all still sort of in the flesh of that sort of wave of democratization. And yet it still remains unresolved. For every proponent of development is freedom. There's one who sees democracy as optional for every advocate of developmental autocracy there's one for whom democracy is fundamental for open societies and open economies. And this is more than just an academic debate. It has resolved this sort of tension these trade offs is becoming increasingly important for policymakers, who in many cases, dispersing smaller amounts of aid, following the recessions. We faced over the last year or so, under greater scrutiny over both effectiveness of that aid and the values of that aid. We're being exhorted to build back democratically, but it's not clear what that really means, whether we as an international community or structurally capable of doing it, or what success looks like. So joining me today to discuss all this, maybe come up with some answers but hopefully at least coming up with some better questions are Susan Doddsworth from the University of Queensland in Australia. And Indra Adhikari from International Idea in Nepal. Tom Wingfield, formerly of DFID now with Act Associates and Elizabeth Piddles guard from the Danish Institute for parties and democracy who are co host today for this event. Thank you all for being here. Susan, if I could start with you. There's a good article published in the Journal of Democracy in January, where we argue that the trade off between democracy and development is more purported than real. In your opinion, why are democracy and development so often seem to be perceived to be a tension with each other. And I want to say to the audience that, you know, to give a little bit of background about the article Graham and I wrote it was that the product of years of frustration, essentially as sort of trying to get off my chest something I'd noticed ever since I was a PhD student that among the development community they really seem to be this very deeply entrenched belief that there's this inescapable trade off between democracy and development. And ultimately, you know, you've got to sacrifice democracy to achieve developmental goals. But as Graham's flag, there are a number of reasons I think that, you know, this sort of perception has lasted as long as it has. One of those is that, you know, simply first impressions count the narrative that, you know, there's this tension that there's this inescapable trade off. That was the story that got out there first. And at the time it appeared to be the story that was supported by empirical evidence. But as we've gotten more and better data about both democracy and development, a lot of the more recent research has challenged that and shown if not that democracy is necessarily always good for development, certainly that the idea of this inescapable trade off, you know, is not supported. There's either kind of no relationship there or probably more likely a kind of weak positive one. But that hasn't really shifted the underlying perception. And I've been reflecting on that a bit in events of this event and I wonder if perhaps academics are part of the problem. If we're maybe not getting out there and kind of making our research sufficiently accessible to kind of allow practitioners to update their thinking on this issue. So I'm glad to still see events like this taking place where we get a chance to kind of open up some of these questions and rethink what's often taken for granted. Thanks, Susan. No, I mean just over to you, Elizabeth. I mean, earlier this year, Denmark launched a new strategy for development corporate corporation. And one of the tenants and I'll quote this to make sure I get it right, is that the foundation of Denmark's development cooperation is anchored in democratic values and human rights. Now this was I think in June that this got signed off so it's still quite early obviously into but do you think this is a shift in how the Danish Ministry for Foreign Affairs is going to is sort of perceiving these potential trade offs between democracy and development or is it really just a sort of continuation of previous policy in terms of working with democracy and development. Thanks Graham and good to see all of you here. Well I think there are several aspects in in the question and maybe there's an issue to be discussed about the trade off because that in itself when you frame it like that it has quite strong connotations. I'm not representing the Danish Foreign Ministry or development agency, so I can only give you my take on on how it seemed. And certainly there is a without current government and interest in a value based policy on on development date. There's also a great interest in having the fundamentals of democracy anchored into the work of development date. I don't necessarily see it as a huge change, but I see it as a positive development that there is a increasing understanding and acceptance that democracy plays an important role in terms of developing the world and providing stability and better conditions for humans all around. I wouldn't say much more but you interrupt me in your podcast how how you want it great. Well yeah we can come in and maybe a bit on some of these other ones I mean I wanted to turn to Penindra now actually and so you've been working at the, the nexus of democracy and development in Nepal for a number of years, with a variety of organizations and funded by lots of different international partners. So in your experience, how does this, you know whether it's a real trade off or a perceived trade off between democracy and development, affect the design of aid programs in practice and what impact does it have on on their effectiveness. You're still on mute, Penindra. Thank you very much. Hello panelists and hello everyone. Well, I will, I have worked in Nepal for a long time but I have also worked in Rwanda briefly, both offer contrast you know, well Nepal has been going through the conflict and peace process and then the democratic process. We have a new constitution in 2015 then the federalization process is currently ongoing we have three spares of government, which is the federal provincial and local government. And I was in Rwanda where you know genocide took place unfortunately 1994 and people were really, really, you know got affected badly affected and people, you know what is, what is important is it democracy or is it immediate development that is key I mean what I will give you nuances that some of the politicians from Nepal that landed in Rwanda, the first day and they were super impressed by the physical development I think when you talk about development people look at infrastructure as development and they see it, and they can they can feel it and they can they can use it. So they saw such a clean city with the clean system in place and they thought, Okay, this is what is, what about development, perhaps, while in Nepal we have democracy, but we have not, you know, experience that kind of development that we are intending to. And then in Nepal corridor and context my friends and relatives and all talk about what has democracy paid. We have not got any development. Look at, look at, they don't compare about China, they may compare about Cambodia, I've also been in Cambodia, so they compare Rwanda, Vietnam, so probably the good development is more important when you say, but my experience of living in Rwanda for three years, when I came to know the subtlety of the challenges that there is no democracy is autocratically led government and when you are an investor and then if you make a minor mistake, then, you know, you are not allowed to continue suddenly, your whole investment goes away and you are frustrated, while if you had a democratic institution, it will follow the rules, rules and system, and then it will not affect the people as such. So that's, that's what I see. And if I go back to some of the program in Nepal back in 2010 when I was heading the enabling state program, which is, which is about promoting democracy through by working with civil society and government, very much around that peace process when the Constitution was happening. We could do all work around free press, we could work with the media, we could work with the human rights organization, we could work, we could have a long discussion on inclusion and exclusion, we could have research. I think that democratic, the open environment allowed that. But if you, if you go to Rwanda, if you go to Cambodia, I'm already taking example of, you know, free press, how Hong Kong got so affected, how Cambodia human rights, you can't talk about human rights in Cambodia, how you can talk about exclusion in Rwanda because they're all Rwandans. So it limits, it limits the research, it limits the policy aspects. And it's, it's basically development happens, but for what purpose. I think it's very much around solution centered or, you know, supply driven development, which may not make a lot of sense. So that's where I will say, you know, who makes the decision and how the decisions are made is very important and that's democratic environment provides that and once the right decision happens, then development process can really take a safe sustainable approach I think that's what I've been learning recently more while implementing Coherence program, I think we'll come back to that. But, but I think democracy and development needs to go hand in hand for a sustainable development, because I think for me, it's much more perceived. If you see development tangibly, it's infrastructure, but has it affected the growth in humans? Have we have had human development in a way, which in a non democratic environment, non democratic environment is less likely. So if you're looking at human development from that perspective, not just the infrastructure or the physical development so that's what I see. I think it needs to go together. If it is separated I think it's much more perceived. And then, if the democracy doesn't deliver then people will be frustrated I think that's probably a frustration in Nepal that's going on at the moment. I've talked a lot so I might stop and then you can ask me more questions later on. Thanks Fenindra. Yeah, Susan, Rwanda is one of the countries that sort of features in some of your research around this sort of perceived trade off. Yeah, I was really struck by the fact that Fenindra brought this up as an example because it is one of those cases that's been a big part of the reason why this idea that democracy and development or intention has proved so hard to change because you do have this small space is like Rwanda, where authoritarian regimes appear to have been incredibly successful in their developmental programs I mean, I had a similar, you know, experience. What Fenindra described I was traveling in Uganda and I went across the border into Rwanda, and, you know, immediately you can see that the car, you know the country has just achieved far more in terms of development. But there are a couple of reasons why we have to be really cautious about that example. One is that it's a little bit data from authoritarian regimes like Rwanda isn't been quite a few controversies around some of the data on poverty reduction that have come out of Rwanda. But perhaps more importantly is the fact that, you know, these authoritarian success stories, you know, as visible as they are, you know, are probably entirely unlikely that they're replicable, replicable like not everyone can be Rwanda. Because as Fenindra has pointed out, you know, the development that occurred there occurred in, you know, pretty unique circumstances following this massive crisis that really put Rwanda at the top of the international communities agenda. And the reality is that most other developing countries aren't going to be in that situation. And so relying on those kinds of authoritarian success stories I think it's quite misleading and really quite dangerous if we let that sort of guide our decisions about whether or not that trade off between, you know, democracy and development really exists and is actually worth it. Thanks, Susan. I want to bring Tom in now so Tom you spent a long time with with DFID now now FCDO as a governance advisor in a variety of countries, including Nepal. And what were some of the sort of internal debates around how issues of sort of democratic governments were programmed within DFID when you were there and and and does does the calculus around any potential trade off feel different with sort of democracy in decline versus sort of maybe a period before where where democracy felt maybe inevitable or certainly sort of much more likely than it does at the moment. Thanks, Graham. I mean, I think probably want to dodge the question about internal debates, but I think overall if we look at the kind of engagement of donor agencies and external actors in this space. I think the real challenge is that there isn't enough of a debate and these big issues these big kind of philosophical questions about the role of aid and how development actually takes place in countries that debate is really supplemented. And so just about every development agency will have a policy commitment to supporting more open politics and human rights and democratic change. But the reality and this is the critical critical point. The reality is that if you look at the way programs are designed and the conventional orthodox development approach. If you look at the cumulative impact in a country. It's profoundly anti democratic. And so and I think some of this has been discussed, you know, quite a lot but you know that the general working assumption of conventional aid is that development is a technical administrative process, which ignores the fact that actually is about politics and power. And these are deeply political processes. And the way conventional aids is designed is it sees politics and the political process as a problem. It basically doesn't trust that process. Most designs, if you look at the detail are designed in a way to work around the political process and to put in place mechanisms to insulate the development programming from political influence. And that's really deeply problematic because I think cumulatively you know if you look at the sheer number of projects operating in a country or within a within a jurisdiction. It does unintentionally influence the rules of the game and it does privilege certain types of institutions. And so I think in kind of authoritarian contexts. This technocratic administrative approach can actually unintentionally underwrite and provide legitimacy to quite illegitimate regimes, but also much more, I think, importantly in more open political systems. The way projects are designed where funding is earmarked, which removes the discretion provided to locally elected leaders, or projects are designed with parallel kind of implementation units to implement particular project activities that actually can unintentionally undermine more open and more democratic politics in these contexts. So there's some really fundamental challenges with the kind of rhetoric and the policy ambitions, and then how programs are actually designed. I think there are ways around this, and there are ways to kind of solve this, or begin to solve this wicked problem, but we have to start with, with really opening up that debate. Elizabeth so one of the reasons why we convene this this panel was that we at WFD have been arguing something sort of essentially similar to what what Tom has outlined there that that actually we should be pursuing what we're calling sort of doing development democratically approach where programs are designed and delivered in ways that sort of facilitate good democratic practice. For instance, engaging more with with sort of political institutions like parliaments political parties, and not just with sort of executive agencies ministries, etc. And this idea that you can sort of model how democratic practice can yield positive outcomes. What's what's DIP these experience recently in terms of of how development agencies that you interact with are sort of looking to integrate democracy, more robustly with sectoral programming like sort of economic development or sort of security sector reform etc. Is there any sort of trend in that direction or is democracy still sort of sort of carved out as a as a separate silo of work that's done independently of this other development work that that Tom described. Quite complex question Graham. Thanks. I want to go a little bit back to what Tom style of which I think is is very, very important and thanks for training the problem. So clearly. It reminds me very much I mean I have a past in the humanitarian sector and we have in that sector been endlessly discussing the humanitarian development nexus and now humanitarian development security nexus. There's something about the whole way of and it, it, it, it just rings a lot of pills of what what Tom was saying about this thing of how we organize our work and how development date is structured and and siloed. And we seem to be. Yeah, moving around some of the same challenges. This is political as you said Tom but it's also structurally how you organize it. And I agree the programming, which is done by many of the northern from the northern hemisphere is not particularly creative or, or have challenged have challenged itself in the way that they are doing it. And I think we, we have been having these discussions, perhaps in may more closed for us about that we need to do things differently. And, and now we put in, I mean doing democracy development differently is something that is a focus of the Danish development aid and, and, and probably many others. It would be interesting if we kind of integrated and not having democracy as something totally external or different or in in a contradiction. I don't see in principle the contradiction I see structural and programmatic that we need to to work differently. And the end result is that we are trying to support and induce and develop democratic societies, all pillars and fundaments of supporting that is needed. And they're not necessarily contradicting itself, but the way that we've structured that the finance the fundraising the finance financing of it is certainly a challenge. We, we did try agreement and I when we talked about this event that we, we really tried to get the sweets to join us because they, I think they are trying, Sweden is trying with the drive for democracy to integrate a democratic approach in all their work and decisions and policies as well. And I think, as many other examples, we should look to Sweden and see how they're doing I think it's still a challenging work for them but at least politically they made a decision that they want to try and integrate the approach of democracy into all aspects of world. So, I'm not sure I answered your question Graham, but that perhaps I made it just to say that it is, I think it is complex but it's, it shouldn't be and we probably in in the sector of doing democracy support should also be sort of not closing ourselves into a little ghetto of do goodness of that we are the only one who can do democracy support. I mean that that is certainly also something we need to work on, and we should be better in reaching out and working with all the different agencies, institutions, political parties and so on in the different countries. Yeah, I mean Susan your your research has yielded some some interesting examples where democratic practice and development outcomes overlap. What were some lessons we could draw from that with respect to sort of doing development I think there are a couple of useful lessons probably two in particular that stand out. I think probably the most important is that often when you do find these synergies between democracy and development. They're real they're easy to miss because they're kind of less sexy, less exciting gates of democracy right like it's, it's generally not elections that we see driving this kind of thing which is, you know, where a lot of the attention tends to be. You know, it's things like your parliamentary committees, or post legislative scrutiny that is done by legislatures. You know, there's a relatively small group of people who are really into that kind of thing. But that's actually where we tend to see some you know really useful success stories coming out, including for example, you know, to give one example the in Malawi where I did some research with WFD. We found that the parliamentary committees played a really important role in helping to kind of transform the HIV and AIDS management bill that had been initially put forward in a fairly kind of regressive way. And a way that was sort of seen as being potentially quite counterproductive in terms of the country's fight against HIV and AIDS. But thanks to international donors, and in that case you and AIDS, really making an effort to work with the parliament and engage with the parliamentary committees. It ultimately produced a bill or an act at the end that was far more respectful of the rights of people with HIV, and also a piece of legislation that did a lot more to engage with women and to look at the kind of gender aspects of HIV and AIDS in Malawi. But if you're looking at kind of, you know, for mass elections or democratic revolutions and sort of how those contribute to development, you miss those kinds of positive success stories that are happening in a much kind of nuanced and fine grained way. The second important lesson I would say is that what we also really need to do is to think critically about the kind of development that we're aiming to promote right like it's not obvious what development is or what it should be. And, you know, this actually links back a little bit to what Fenindra said in his opening comment, which was, you know, it's also about sustainable development. And I should all I would argue as well about, you know, do we want to development that is inclusive or exclusive right, because it's when we start to think more critically about the kind of development that we're trying to foster that we really start to see the value of democratic institutions. That's great Susan and I think that that's a really good segue into into asking Tom. You know you mentioned that there's sort of some structural sort of challenges to doing development democratically so. So if the international community were to commit to sort of building back democratically doing development democratically. What do you think would have to change about the way that we currently support both development and democracy. So starters for 10. I mean I think overall it does require quite a radical rethink. It's not something that you can kind of tweak around the edges. It really requires going back to fundamental first principles around this kind of three core governance questions around who decide in and about following the money and the three questions around who decides about the allocation of resources. Is it a donor. Is it a bureaucrat or is it actually the elected officials who have the legitimacy in the mandate to make those decisions. How are those decisions made. Are they made in donor capitals, or are they made by bureaucrats or they made through an open decision making process. And the third question is in whose interests are those decisions made around the allocation of resources. Is it does it go to politically connected firms. There's a privileged particular representatives of certain communities or our decisions made in the public interest so that's kind of if you if you focus on those three questions and if you interrogate each of your programs around those three questions. I think it helps you understand the nature of the problem and what incentives your programs are actually setting in the way that they're designed in terms of stepping back in terms of some of the kind of the three areas that we might want to think about focusing on. I mean one is I think there's a real risk when we talk about democracy and doing development democratically that we shift into a very normative Western liberal agenda. And there's a you know there's a big critique around democracy evangelism and I think we need to avoid that that knee jerk response I think we need to really think carefully about avoiding perfect institutions and we need to recognize that we can't transplant a democratic model. I mean countries transition into being more democratic because people demand it and because of changing power relations and as external actors we're going to be marginal in that process. And we've seen you know there is a vast graveyard of failed governance projects, which have had assumptions around optimism bias and hubris and all kinds of real issues there. So the starting point is we really need to deeply deeply understand the context where the opportunities for a positive change lie and then tuck in behind those endogenously led locally led processes which will lead to more open politics. I mean I think the second element is you know we need to avoid a project ties approach to doing development democratically so typically you know a democratic or political governance program it's usually one project, which sits in the margins of the portfolio. And that again there's a risk that if we go down this road that that just means I will just add a democratic project alongside of our wider portfolio so we need to think much more holistically around how we bring diplomacy and development and how the entire portfolio and the way programs are designed are done so in a way which privileges an open political decision making process. This really requires working directly with in building relationships with politicians, which again which is something that development has traditionally been very hesitant about we have really deep alliances with unelected bureaucrats and we're quite resistant to actually engage with politicians. So that's that's a really critical element. And we need to have huge patients and have a very very long term approach because these kinds of changes will be incremental and will take place over, you know, decades and external to be very very patient and they need to really understand the context and be able to weather very difficult periods but also be able to respond very opportunistically when opportunities arise. And then the last element is that we need to be very patient and recognize that aid can never really deliver democracy. And at best, we need to really understand where endogenous like change will come from which we can then tuck in behind. And finally, there's a real value in developing long term relationships and partnerships based on trust, and that gives us kind of a certain degree of legitimacy in helping facilitate some of these processes. So those are some like quite broad high level areas that you want to start with but I think we could get into much more detailed programmatic ideas if we have time. Thanks. Yeah, I definitely want to want to get some both Elizabeth and Susan sort of reaction to those in terms of you know how realistic we can with those some of them are which ones would most likely happen. But I think before I do that I just want to get to an intro because you have some recent experience of sort of implementing a program that's that's sort of modeling some of these principles that that Tom's outlined here. What has been the response in in sort of local communities when you've worked in this way that sort of approaching these issues differently. Yeah. Thank you, Graham. Let me build on to what Tom is saying and provide those nuances. I think what we've been doing I think we were talking about democracy and then you know normally in a context like Nepal when you talk about democracy it's one election and then you wait for five five years. And that's democracy. It's not about democracy and behavior change within the political parties. So we have changed the structure but we haven't changed the behavior. And I think the from the past, not only you get programming but but also other development programming. What we have learned is, you know, the resource allocation decisions if made by bureaucrats or if made by single politicians, the normally into be captured by elites. So taking the and then it excludes the society. It, it, it, it gives bias the development bias goes to the elites and your, your beneficiary your targets that are the whole society do not benefit in in fact you are harming that approach so that was one of the findings of 2015 study that we had done. Based on that, and based on the change in context on Nepal, you know the federal provincial and local government structure. We embarked on how we can change that power relation how we can change that resource allocation decision, how we can help the decision to be made by the politicians, the elected representative because in Nepal, particularly the local government are more inclusive. There are representatives in the executive committee, but they don't. There is there are one they don't have the capacity the second what the elite political elite elite says is they don't have the capability from their own selfish perspective which is more around in a perceived capacity weaknesses. So they don't engage they say, no you don't have to worry about you are elected, you can sit there will make all the decision. So that's how the resource continues to be captured. So what we have done is we have set out a process called deliberation in political decision making deliberation means it has to be formal. So the more formal you make it you avoid the informal rules of the game. So you push it towards formal decision making process. You push it towards evidence based decision making you have data and you have to help visualize those data. The decisions are not just emotional you need to make sure it's inclusive as well as participatory. And, and then if you help build the capability of those particularly marginalized group, then a kind of semblance of the whole process of decision where the decision will be made for the collective public goods, and then comes the bureaucracy, implementing it, and, and, and politicians having to make sure the bureaucrats are administratively held accountable. So that's what we've been practicing and then our approach is doing development differently actually we don't call it doing development democratically I think it comes from. Or we don't call it I mean we call it thinking and working politically in an internal way, but when you bring in the word politically then it makes it very sensitive, the bureaucrats and do not want to engage because it's much more political so but you also need to balance that engagement. So from that perspective, I think we have had experience working in 15 local government and we have had. And the approach is that you don't feel, we don't feel experienced people who have the baggage from the past, we train young graduates as mentors are helping and into the Constitution and all these processes. When they go, they become helping and they don't replace the capacity, and they really promote deliberative decision making processes from from different angle. So actually so we're not looking at particular tangible result we invest in process, a good process that leads to a better decision and better delivery of development so that's what, that's what we do and build on some of the Tom's principles I think we've been working with you kid. I'm going to give you now on some of the principles of how you are with it's much more around doing no harm development partners should not be doing ham means they should not go back to the old ways of working. They need to understand the context and priorities and how those priorities have been made. And then they need to have strategic political engagement at the highest level. The ambassador level needs to work with the minister and then you know engage and ensure that it's a joint it's a programming based on that priority needs. So that's, that's the kind of approach that we are advising and we're also advising development partners to really engage from need identification process with the politicians to programming design and conceptualization when you are engaged with politicians then they know better what is actually required or they can engage with with their community better. So I think that's that's the kind of practice and the lesson so far we have had been very positive and government and the development partners are asking, can you give us a lesson so that we can also consider it and we are engaging with many development partners based on this learning and we might have more formal capture of learning and sharing how changes have been possible at a small scale to demonstrate probably around the middle of next year so we'll have more solid examples coming forth. Thank you. Thanks. Elizabeth I think DIPD has been active in Nepal in the past I don't know if you're still there at the moment but yeah what do you have any reflections on on what Penindra shared there. Yeah, it's, it's, it's probably a fascinating example to use Nepal. And it reminded me of we've been there for more than 10 years and in a very, I mean doing very delicate and difficult times due to the developments in the country and the political developments. And I think you could say that the way that we have engaged in Nepal has been combining democracy and development aspects in a way where we, we had, we spend a lot of time on consultations with the political leaders on what they saw as their interest and interest and all through which I'm sure our Nepalese colleague can comment and confirm it. It is sensitive and it's been sensitive at all with international engagement in Nepal. And that too, as Tom also said, be very, very humble and basically ask you know what what are your needs. So, what came out of all these 10 years of discussion and dialogue and some financial support was a multi party platform which I think in the context of Nepal is quite an achievement where now the political leaders make their decisions and have a forum where they can discuss, and where they now are starting to say and to respond to some of the development, challenging development issues of Nepal, and there are many, but they are now having a common interest in aspects of climate change and what they should do to tackle this. So, you could say in that way we've we've actually used the access to the political leaders in terms of them reaching out and also having them seeing the combination between politics and development issues, but very much that they are at the center and though the political leaders of Nepal are those that make the decision. And Susan, I mean, I don't know if you had any, any thoughts on on the sort of the, the three sort of broad areas that Tom laid out there in terms of ways in which we can start to make the shift towards doing development in a different way that is more democratic and focused. Yeah, I mean I found myself really agreeing with a lot of what Tom said I think he's really kind of picked out you know three of the things that you know I really want needs to begin changing to facilitate this this kind of thing. But I think the tricky thing is that you know some of these things we've known about for a while and they prove remarkably hard to shift. For example, the sort of point about taking a longer term approaches to some of this work I mean this is a recurring theme in much of the work that's been done on you know development assistance and its effectiveness is really highlighted that you know longer term programs work better we know this we've got all sorts of evidence to back it up. The practitioners know it they would often really love to be you know taking a longer term approach, but they have these sort of constraints, you know built into the environments where they work, you know funding cycles budget cycles that make it really hard to do this. So I think perhaps we also need to think about not just what you know the practitioner community needs to be doing, but also to be thinking about look, how do we convince the people higher up about the value of doing this like what's the narrative that we need to be getting out there, you know to make these more fundamental changes, acceptable to people. So another one of the points for example that Tom raised is this question around you know who controls the money, you know really you know, and you know it raises this question of well you know our international donors willing to give up control of development funds if that's what it takes to facilitate more democratic development. So for international donors that's really hard to ask right they feel a genuine kind of need and obligation to account for how a money is spent. And so we still need to find I think ways of kind of squaring that circle of saying look it's possible to, you know, still account for this to still maintain lines of accountability to our you know domestic donors, while still passing some control and responsibility of this for this over to development partners on the ground to a better place to actually kind of work out what's needed and what they want. But I think we still need to think about well how do we do that how do we tell that story how do we make it persuasive, because these things these sort of established ways of working really hard to shoot. I think that's right Susan. I mean, so we have worked with with Heather Marquette from University of Birmingham on a really interesting piece called doing anti corruption democratically so trying to sort of get into this other sexual approach and she has a great quote in here where she says it's it's the tensions and trade offs between the ideal world of best practice governance toolkits and the messy conflicting world we live in that those of us working in this space seem to struggle with the most. And so I just wonder maybe I'll go back to Tom a bit about, you know how how do we get people to move past the obvious attraction of a sort of best practice toolkit which feels easy it's easy to scale it's easy to roll up, maybe easy to measure. To something that's a little bit more complicated. And I think, and I think what's really, you know, important to start with is is understanding the problem and asking questions and looking at the world in a slightly different way. And that's where the role of research is really really critical. It's also where, if you can get, you know, if you can bring together a few like minded development partners who are willing to open up and really interrogate their programs through a public or open more open political process way to kind of explore that the nature of the problem I think that's the most important starting point because if you can if you can identify the problem then you can begin to address it. Susan's point about the importance of a narrative is absolutely critical. And the problem with development is the narrative is very, it's very one sided it's very instrumental. It sees development as a way, you know, as charity is handouts as a way of basically addressing the symptoms of the underlying causes of the problem. And I think that's, again, that's where we need to think cleverly and be quite political in how do we open up that debate, where we recognize that development is deeply political, and it's driven through changes in the way that power is configured within a society. And these are quite deep historical changes where an external actor can't really play an instrumental role but can very effectively understand those trends and tuck in behind where we think positive change will come from. I think the other element is, you know, building positive examples of radically different approaches, where, you know, you could you could get a series of like minded development partners looking at one particular context, and trying a radically different approach and seeing whether that leads to greater impact and how it addresses some of the challenges that Susan and Elizabeth have raised around issues around accountability for funding and accountability for development results. Because I think I think if you if you have the space and the agency to design your approach in a different way, I think a lot of the common concerns around supporting the political process and sovereign process and localization. I think a lot of the problems can be actually addressed quite effectively. The challenges is that we haven't been doing this in a kind of holistic portfolio, wide way, or with all of the key donors around the same table. We tend to do it quite incrementally through very small projects. And we, which, which means we end up kind of nipping at the heels of the problem, and not being able to demonstrate a really significantly different way of working. So those are, those are a few ideas to put on the table. Thank you very much. There's a question actually that's coming on the chat, which we can sort of use to sort of continue to explore this and it's, it's someone saying says they say the shift proposed by today's panel on sort of moving development practice and engagement doing it more democratically, or at least as a sensible one, but they wondered if we can have a reflection on how to do this in context which are usually hybrid regimes without entrenching undemocratic political practices. So, I mean, this is one question we've had in the democracy field for a while is it's been a lot of time trying to define countries as being democracy or or not democracy when ultimately most are somewhere in the middle. And so, you know, how would you think about this, and in terms of doing this work in countries where they're neither a democracy, necessarily full democracy nor a full autocracy. Penindra, do you want to take that one. First. I was thinking. Nepal is, I think we in our report global democracy report I think we put in the, it's in the medium. It's, it's not transition because we have a new new constitution and new federal structure is taking in taking shape after election so I wouldn't call it transition but in terms of democratic practices. I think it's still transition I think it's a long, long way to go. And again, the whole political process that takes home. We are due for election in 2022, and we're hoping that there will be some change and we're also looking at a number of changes within, because within the political parties with the convention. And that's currently ongoing in in one of the democratic party and other two party have come come out of the convention. So things are happening. Things are quite positive. But how do you. How do I think it's a frustration for Nepali mass that democracy has not delivered. It's also frustration that, you know, one need to have that patience and people need immediate result and within democratic processes. It's very slow process. I think and then it's really a slow process I mean if I go back to India I think India didn't have real development until after 40 years of their independence I think it started opening up in 1990 and they had independence in late 40s, 47. So I think it's a long process but it's, I think you can see it begins to deliver results I think in a much more sustained way, and it can also, it's a messy process. I think you can see in in one place, you can see lots of corruption in another place, you can see politicians not knowing the real, real process the rules and regulation, and they don't work on law and policies. They rush in to spend money to deliver something for either for popular popularism sake or other things so it's a it's a very messy process, and it takes time but I think within the Nepali context, I am, I'm more optimistic. And I see Rwanda when I see Cambodia although you don't see that superficial development but it's it's a democratic process is taking shape in a slowly. So and then picking up on Tom's point. Also that I think we need to have that patience but we need to invest development partners particularly have to engage politically and invest in the right kind of process as to how the decisions are made. And we actually advocate opting in approach for the local government to participate, because we don't want to let because I'm under the federal context I think they are autonomous they can make their own decision they can make their law, but we want to help them to participate. So it's, it's a messy process, but it's, it's positive. I think people also need to see what, you know, what comes out in other countries in terms of the human rights aspect in terms of exclusion, in terms of all those opportunities, and in terms of what the opportunities Nepal had and how it can build on onto that. So we really need to drive that I think what some of the politicians were really saying is, how can we balance those democratic process with economic development, how can we drive actually the local economic development because the sustaining democratic process has to be at that local level. And if we can really work with the local level that local economic development aspects and bringing in, you know, decision making integrated into that process I think that will take us away but I think I can understand it is quite frustrating is frustrating for myself, my friends relatives, but I'm always telling I think we need to have patience, we need to invest that we also call we have a difference between trans transaction and transformation. I think what happens is development partners because with good intention I think they do lots of small transactional project, which doesn't sustain after it ends. So you start small, but you look at the transformation trajectory. And then, then that will, that will be much better at a smaller scale and gradually growing, rather than bringing in a project that's quickly, you know, finished that's something, but then disappears after a while, doesn't help. But having said that in the disaster area, I think you need that it's important. Yeah, I went little bigger but I think we need to have patience with our democratic process I think it takes long that was the reason I was giving example from India, but if you take example from China. I think it's fast, but I think there are a lot of questions there. So I'll stop it here. Thanks for Ninja. And then, Elizabeth I know you have to drop off soon so I just wanted to give you a sort of a last chance to respond there I mean so Tom mentioned there about development actors getting much more comfortable working with politicians as part of this sort of answering some of these questions around who controls who makes decisions in whose interest. Any sort of final reflections from from the IPD side in terms of the role of political parties and sort of politicians in sort of bridging this this divide between democracy and development. I think we have seen and we are trying at least the way we try to operate in in in reinforcing and supporting development of political parties that they are and can be instrumental in pushing development forward in their countries. But that's also a long complicated road. I would like to refer him to your previous comment on hybrids and the definitions and all that I mean it's also fascinating because I was just reflecting on well, I think many countries I'm hybrid also the so called developed countries so in the world, we are seeing a democratic challenge, also in the so called developed and more wealthy countries. So, democracy and political engagement as such is challenged. So I think there is a need for a revival of the whole way of how we engage in our societies and how people feel included and the political parties are instrumental but they're also in a huge challenge, because people are opting out and have difficulties in keeping faith in traditional political parties so they need also to reform themselves and to reach out and so on and then my final comment because I think. I'm using this as part of a build up to Biden summit and let's hope and we put in recommendations from different networks in the European partnership and others in that we need to look at democracy support in new ways. We need to challenge ourselves and we need to challenge countries and donors in the way we do democracy. I think the, the article that came out recently by Richard Young's and Calypso Nikolaitis on reversing the democratic gaze that we from, from the so called European perspective need to look at what we can learn from other, other parts of the world and that basically we need to globalize the whole aspect of looking at democracy and as Tom said, there's not one definition, we need to be humble and we need to accept and and develop in as it is suited for for different countries and contexts. I think I'll end there, but it's been great being with you and and I hope that our listeners have also I presume a combination of practitioners and and academics and others that we can continue this discussion also after after the summit. Thank you very much. And then just to sort of pick up on another couple of audience questions so this that they're touched on challenges. And so I had a couple of questions now. One looking more internal challenges and then one more external challenges so, so one was specifically addressed to, to Tom. One was so you mentioned that the undermining of democracy by how development programs are delivered is unintentional. Is it really how committed our development partners to supporting democracy over other trade foreign policy priorities. And I think, I think there's two issues right I think, as I said kind of at the beginning. I mean the policy of most. I can't think of anybody who actually has a policy which is says deliberately that they're anti democratic or they don't support democracy I think all external entrepreneurs will say, quite forthrightly that their policies to support more open and democratic societies. But the critical question is kind of going back to Susan's point. If you actually look at the challenge the way incentives are structured, the way donor projects are designed. I think they're, they are focused in ways that undermine those principles. I don't think it's a deliberate strategy to say one thing and do another I think I think it is genuinely unintentional, because the incentive systems are very mixed. And there's a huge incentive to deliver results, and so much of development is kind of caught in that new public management mantra around results based management, and there's a huge onus on development agencies because they're accountable to taxpayers to show how each pound or dollar or kroner is actually delivering tangible benefits to ordinary people in the countries where where we work. So, I think it is unintentional. And, but I, but that doesn't, but that doesn't mean it's not a problem, and then it actually cumulatively is not a really serious issue that needs to be to be unpacked and to be resolved. I think going back I mean again just thinking, listening to Fenindra talking and going back to Susan's point about, we've known these issues have been around for a very long time. How do we actually influence change in the kind of juggernaut that is international development. I mean one one suggestion, an idea which we could put forward as a recommendation is, you know, can we commission some independent research which looks into a series of case studies where development partners or particular programs have been designed in a way, which directly tries to reconcile this wicked problem, which tries to work with political decision making and work in ways that privileges the domestic, domestic sovereign political process, as well as delivering positive outcomes for people. And I think Nepal is a fantastic example I mean Fenindra's talked us through quite a lot of quite innovative exciting work that international idea is actually designing and implementing at the moment. I know that fcdo in Nepal has tried to realign its portfolio so that it actually matches the new quite radical form of federalism that Nepal is introduced. I think also the Swiss STC has taken really strong steps to align with the federal system, and to think about how each program is designed in a way that privileges the political decision making process be at the provincial or the local or the federal sphere. So I think, you know one way of shifting incentives is to provide positive examples and open up and explore where this has actually been tried in practice and what have we actually learned what's worked what hasn't and why. So Nepal I think is a great example but there may be people in the audience. There may be examples elsewhere which we could collectively bring together and really open it up because I think one of the one of the hardest parts of influencing changes when people can't see a way out where they can only see the problems and they can't find or see solutions and this may be one way of saying actually you can do you can do things in a different way, which has positive outcomes it's going to be tricky it's going to be difficult, but it is possible. It's going to help. Thanks. Thanks Tom. And then as I say on the on the external challenges the question which I think is probably best first directed at Penindra but then what was the open for others to join is about the sort of, you know what threat to do China and Russia play to doing development democratically and you know do they play a role in in in sort of disturbing any any any attempt to move in this direction. It's difficult I mean there is, you know it's, it could be subtle. But there is no overt, you know, evidence of that. So that's, it's, it's a difficult to answer question, but I think how I see is, I mean, Nepal is between China and India. And I think we need to navigate both very tactfully and our politicians and diplomats have to deal with that. And it's, it's in Nepal is in a very hard, hard place to deal with that and we need smart politicians and bureaucrats and and I think we're trying our best, but I don't know how much it my experience I think that Tom's example of fcdo the Swiss and probably organization like I'm in the Norway and others are listening in and it takes time I think it's, it's, it's on intentional but the bias is towards doing the easy thing, and what you have been doing and changes is difficult. So for change, and and and to shift in a very subtle way takes time, you need to deal not only with federal you will need to deal with provincial government you need to deal with local government and that takes a lot of energy and efforts. And it's about sifting that mindset and prioritizing, but getting slowly in in rightly there so thinking I mean I think I saw another question on transaction and transformation, I think I can also build on to that is thinking will be slow process but it will get there. Thinking transactional will be fast, but it may not give the result. Of course I think some transaction that helps to build towards transformational, you know, processes later on that helps some transaction like COVID response for the disaster response, immediate building rebuilding of schools and all that that are important, but some of the others. Let the democratic course take place, let the democratic decision take place. I give you one example. When we're building roads, and when we went to one of the community, the females there said, we don't need road actually we need water. We don't have we have to walk one hour two hours for water supply, what's the use of that road when we don't have water. So, if properly decisions are made, the political consultations happen with the citizens, then the priorities starts to shift, and people starts to get the benefit that they deserve. I think that's what we need to balance that democracy and development into thinking about, you know, the locals, I think we talk about, you know, sustainable localizing sustainable development but I talk about, you know, bringing in the priorities of the local and informing that sustainable development maybe that way is better rather than imposing that sustainable development at that level. I think it needs to grow from the local that's what I said, so I combined number of question into one but hope that helps. That's great. And Susan I mean just thinking about this, the question was about sort of how do we make funding available for both the sort of transactional and transformational work I mean so one of the pieces that that you and Nick cheeseman wrote for WD. You know, several years ago now was about, I think it was mostly looking at civil society, but it was looking at sort of having a portfolio where you can sort of manage risk and where you'd have some bits that are riskier and some bits that are that are maybe more conventional and this seems to align with with Tom's point there that you know could we could we not convince donors to sort of allocate a small amount of their funding to doing something different and then study it test it etc. And then saying you have to do everything differently overnight. So Susan, yes, what do you, what do you think about that as a sort of a way to wait potentially forward. Yeah, I think there's real value in sort of thinking about that kind of portfolio approach, because it recognizes that there's, there's no one way to do something right and if we can't persuade people to you know, do everything in a more transformative way, you know, perhaps we can persuade them to do some of it. And then it just becomes a question of balance and getting the right mix. But you know, at least making a start in that direction, you know, adding it, if you will, the kind of toolbox that you know development practitioners have is incredibly valuable because another thing that Tom pointed out was that we need positive success stories to kind of build this narrative about why these changes are worth, you know, undertaking. And one of the things I found in my research is that it's actually remarkably hard to find positive success stories that you can build up a case study on and you know do the analysis of okay what worked here you know what can people learn from it. It's a lot easier to find examples of kind of catastrophic failures or people critiquing things that went wrong. And so if we can just sort of start to shift things gradually we can build up, you know, the kind of examples that we have to demonstrate you know what doesn't doesn't work. So that kind of thing I think would be incredibly helpful. Right well unfortunately we've reached the end of our time. So I want to thank my all the panelists here Tom Susan Penindra and Elizabeth in her absence for for a really great discussion this morning about doing development democratically I think we've got a number of points that we can capture and hopefully send through to the organizers of the summit. Obviously I think expectations for what will actually happen at this particular summit are sort of rapidly declining but as we move into sort of the year of action that's due to follow and then into the summit for next year. So I feel like issues that should start to be raised and maybe that year of action is a good point at which we can, we can sort of catalyze these sort of small bits of change that we might want to see studied over the longer term. Thank you all again thank you for those of you online who've been listening and thank you for your questions. And yeah so do follow some other events on on the global democracy coalition website. As I said WFD event happening at that 1pm UK time on women's political leadership also promises to be excellent as well. So thanks everyone have a good rest of your day. Thank you.