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Topic Discussion I
Politics of Hard Choices
Political Transition and Economic Restructuring
Room 2
(13 of 14 pages)
Larry Diamond: Well, thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. With your indulgence
I will try to sum up some of what has been said here today and then our colleagues from NDI will do it again, and
I'm sure much better, in integrating what our discussions have been, with the discussions of the other four sessions
that have gone on simultaneously.
Let me begin by saying I think this session has been wonderful for several reasons, we've begun to get to know
one another, we've begun to hear about the particular problems in each of our countries and some of the similarities
among them, but we've also begun to articulate some of the issues, some of the problems of participation of governments
of opposition in conflict of how to include women and other marginalized groups, of how to give a voice to civil
society, that we are going to be talking about in each of the subsequent three sessions. So I think we have begun
to get deep into the agenda of this conference in this session, even if we have not gotten as specific whereas
in the ideal world we might have gotten about economic reform challenge, although to do that we probably would
need a room full of Nargeens (ph), who are actually specifically working on this challenge now. And I thank you
again very much for the comments and knowledge you have brought here.
What have we heard and what have we learned? Well, this will be a very partial and selective list and I apologize
for it, but I hope when our session ends that whatever is left out you can convey to me and to our two colleagues
from NDI, who will help to synthesize our deliberations for the broader audience.
First of all, I think a number of comments have been made about the importance of doing what the questions for
this session implies about building a broad constituency or coalition for reform. One participant mentioned the
value of broad agreements through pacts among business, labor, and government, and bringing other elements of society
in to build a broad political consensus. Whether deliberately or inadvertently we heard that in the case of Morocco
and no doubt in some of the other emerging democracies at this conference, the rotation in power between different
political parties can be a useful means of political learning, that the problems are not so simple, that the solutions
will not come instantaneously and that with governing must come responsibility, and that means the responsibility
of communicating honestly with the mass public about the time horizon for improvements, and the time horizon for
economic reform. A possible alternative to rotation in power can be inclusion in power to bring a broader coalition
together into government, so that a number of parties begin to realize in a sober way some of the very difficult
challenges of government.
We did not get into in a great deal of detail, but we began to voice and we will discuss in another session in
much more specificity, the problem of getting access to civil society. And one thing I think we should think about
before that next session is what are the specific channels and mechanisms by which different public organizations
in civil society can be able to present their views to the legislature, to present their views to the government,
and be heard and have influence, maybe not dictate policy, but be engaged in the policy process.
Forth, we've heard from several of the participants here, sometimes rather passionately that there's a great ongoing
need for transparency and accountability in governments, and for setting an example in government of a spirit of
sharing in some of the sacrifices that go with economic reform. Needless to say, this means controlling corruption,
but it also means perhaps a spirit of restraint in the way government spends the public money, particularly on
their own benefits and perquisites.
I want to stress here that it's very difficult, and I'm impressed after this session even more than before, it's
very difficult to govern in an emerging democracy in a poor country, and frankly if we eliminated all the debt
of all the countries at this table, which perhaps should be done progressively over time, it would still be very
difficult to govern because resources are very limited and they're going to remain limited for a long time. There's
no way, even if all the debt were removed, that most of the countries at this table would be able to deliver very
rapidly the developmental progress that people want. So then one needs to ask what else can they deliver besides
rapid improvement in material well being, which we hope will be forthcoming over some period of time. And one thing
that a country can deliver even if it's relatively poor is good governments, is restraint of corruption, and inclusion
in power, and in this regard, several speakers, including Mr. Niang, emphasized the importance of decentralizing
power, bringing people in even at the grass roots into the political process, giving them some authority, some
responsibility over their own local affairs, and at least bringing women into the political process as part of
this.
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