Reflections on Ten Years of USAID’s Experience with Political Economy Analysis and Thinking and Working Politically - Brinkerhoff and Cassidy (2023)

This paper synthesises the key points arising from a webinar held by the Thinking and Working Politically Community of Practice in 2022 to take stock of how USAID and its partners have used political economy analysis (PEA) to inform programme strategy, design and implementation, and support Thinking and Working Politically (TWP). It including observations on the impacts, opportunities, challenges, and prospects for PEA/TWP to become more deeply adopted and sustained as a development methodology and approach across sectors. It starts by defining key concepts. It then highlights insights from the discussions of the impact of the application of PEA and TWP principles across sectors. The paper concludes by looking at progress achieved to date, as well as constraints and opportunities to increase the uptake of both thinking and working politically in USAID-sponsored programming, withe examples from Mexico and Zambia.