TPP Director, Neil McCulloch, has just launched a book on “Ending Fossil Fuel Subsidies – the politics of saving the planet”, published by Practical Action Publishing.  The book explains what fossil fuel subsidies are, how they inflict harm and what steps are being taken to reduce them.  It also shows why subsidies persist and why existing efforts have been so ineffective. Drawing lessons from countries which have tried to remove fossil fuel subsidies, it explains that the fundamental challenge to reform is not technical, but political.  The book lays out a new agenda for action on fossil fuel subsidies, showing how a better understanding of the underlying political incentives can lead to more effective approaches to tackling this major global problem.

This second CCG paper produced by Mashekwa Maboshe (University of Zambia), Sam Bickersteth (TPP), and Stephanie Hirmer (CCG) looks at the contrasting context of centralised energy planning in Zambia but with the potential benefits for sub-national renewable investments.  

This brief discusses supporting integrated energy planning at the sub-national level in Kenya, and reflects on the planning and governance issues arising from devolution.

TPP Director, Neil McCulloch supported work led by Marc Ayoub of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut to produce a documentary on the challenges facing solar power development in Lebanon, drawing lessons from Jordan and Yemen. The work was funded by the Natural Resource Governance Institute. The documentary, in Arabic with English sub-titles, was launched on 6 September 2022 and broadcast on Lebanese television.  It can be viewed here. An accompanying Policy Brief was also produced which can be downloaded here.

This note summarises the main points arising from a discussion in the TWP community on health systems resilience, particularly in Cameroon, Nepal, and South Africa, and highlights important policy issues and recommendations. 

Over the past two decades in Nigeria, the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and its predecessor the Department for International Development (DFID) have encouraged close collaboration between their governance, health and education programmes. This is based on the recognition that governance reform is critical to sustainable improvements in service delivery.

This report assesses the extent of this collaboration, and where and when it has been effective. In this report, effectiveness is assessed in terms of whether the collaboration enabled the programmes to perform complementary and mutually supporting roles that support improvements in service delivery in a synergistic way that could not have been achieved by programmes acting on their own.

Laure-Hélène Piron and Gareth Williams, TPP Directors, as part of the Partnership to Engage, Reform and Learn (PERL), have co-authored this flagship report analysing 20 years of governance programmes in Nigeria funded by the British Government.

This research identifies the contextual factors and causal mechanisms that explain how UK governance interventions contributed to improving governance, health and education outcomes by influencing the ‘service delivery chain’ that connects the Nigerian federal, state and local governments to frontline service providers (e.g. primary schools, local health facilities) and to users of health and education services.

This annex to the Flagship Report on the impact of 20 years of UK governance programming in Nigeria summarises key findings from the four longer case studies that form the evidence on which it is based.

Laure-Hélène Piron, TPP Director, as part of the Partnership to Engage, Reform and Learn (PERL), has co-authored this flagship report analysing 20 years of governance programmes in Nigeria funded by the British Government.

This research identifies the contextual factors and causal mechanisms that explain how UK governance interventions contributed to improving governance, health and education outcomes by influencing the ‘service delivery chain’ that connects the Nigerian federal, state and local governments to frontline service providers (e.g. primary schools, local health facilities) and to users of health and education services.

Working with the Partnership to Engage, Reform and Learn team, Gareth Williams, TPP Director, has co-authored this case study that analyses improvements to primary education in Kaduna State, focusing on the 2009– 2020 period before the COVID-19 school closures. 

Since 2011, UK funded governance programmes have supported reforms to budget processes in Yobe State in North-East Nigeria. Gareth Williams, TPP Director, has co-authored this case study that assesses the contribution and impact of this support. It provides evidence on what reforms to budget processes took place, and how they occurred through a combination of political processes taking place in the state and support from UK programmes. The experience provides lessons on what has worked, what hasn’t and why. The analysis finds evidence of important improvements in budget processes in Yobe, which have taken place in a challenging context of protracted conflict and insecurity.

In Lebanon, the current crisis has exposed the fragility of Electricité de Zahlé (EDZ’s) model, which relies on both discounted power provided by Electricité de Lebanon (EDL) and subsidized diesel fuel imports to run EDZ’s own power plant, which are both now in short supply. In this policy brief, the team has estimated the savings from a medium-sized Solar PV plant of 63 MW in Zahle area, covering 20% of the demand currently supplied by diesel-based power generation. They also tackled the challenges facing the implementation of utility-scale renewables in Lebanon and what the Government should do to enable such investments in renewables and proceed forward.

Global efforts to improve energy access and quality and to tackle climate change need a different approach to addressing poor energy governance in developing countries. Energy projects should be designed to “think and work politically.”

This Technical Brief shows how poor energy governance damages energy access and efforts to improve the quality and reliability of power. It explains the political reasons why energy governance is so bad in many countries and contrasts this with the current system of procuring technical assistance, which largely ignores the energy governance challenge.

On 4 February 2021, the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut (AUB), in collaboration with The Policy Practice (TPP) and the SOAS Anti-Corruption Evidence (ACE) consortium, hosted a webinar entitled ‘Models for tackling Lebanon’s electricity crisis’. This briefing paper summarises the views of the key speakers and discussants. It draws together the key threads of the discussion – identifying the commonalities and the points of disagreement – and provides some tentative suggestions about the way forward for the sector.

The SOAS-University of London Anti-Corruption Evidence Research Programme, together with The Policy Practice, has published a new report entitled: From dysfunctional to functional corruption: the politics of reform in Lebanon’s electricity sector. The study explores how it has been possible to establish Electricité de Zahlé’s functional, but problematic, electricity service provision within the complex sectarian political context of Lebanon.

The World Bank’s 2019 report on Rethinking Power Sector Reform recognises that many of the key challenges in power sector reform result from the political economy of the sector. However, the report is weak in some areas. This Policy Brief makes recommendations to the World Bank and other development partners. 

The UK’s engagements in Nigeria are a showcase for the gradual integration of a thinking and working politically (TWP) approach into development practice. 

The political economy of pandemic prevention and preparedness in Africa