Towards a Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) at the Provincial Level in Viet Nam

Transcription

1 Report on the Pilot Project Towards a Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) at the Provincial Level in Viet Nam Centre for Community Support & Development Studies, CECODES Viet Nam Fatherland Front, VFF United Nations Development Programme, UNDP Ha Noi, January

2 Contents 1. INTRODUCTION 3 2. PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND PAR IN VIET NAM: CURRENT STATUS AND ISSUES 5 3. THE PILOT TOWARDS A PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION PERFORMANCE INDEX IN VIET NAM OBJECTIVES OF THE PILOT OVERVIEW OF NATIONAL INITIATIVES IN MEASURING PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION METHODOLOGY THE DIMENSIONS OF PAPI THE SAMPLING PROCEDURE AND FIELD WORK FINDINGS AND ANALYSIS RESPONDENT ANALYSIS DIMENSION 1: PARTICIPATION DIMENSION 2: TRANSPARENCY DIMENSION 3: ACCOUNTABILITY DIMENSION 4: ANTI-CORRUPTION DIMENSION 5: ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES DIMENSION 6: PUBLIC SERVICES FEEDBACKS, LESSONS LEARNED AND NEXT STEPS FEEDBACKS LESSONS LEARNED NEXT STEPS APPENDIXES SAMPLE SITES OF THE PILOT PROJECT (SELECTED VIA PPS PROCEDURES) LIST OF PARTICIPANTS IN THE PROVINCIAL SEMINARS THE QUESTIONNAIRE 51 2

3 1. Introduction The Public Administration Reform (PAR) programme in Viet Nam, which has been implemented from more than a decade now, has achieved some progress and undoubtedly Viet Nam s public sector today is much different than it was 10 or 15 years ago. However, important shortcomings still remain. One source of frustration relates to weak and unsystematic monitoring mechanisms to assess public administration performance, including the absence of instruments to gauge the quality of public administration and public services. Citizens disappointments with the results of the PAR programme especially in relation with policy and administrative institutions has also been referred to weak participation mechanisms. Citizen s participation in policy making, policy implementation and in holding the government accountable is limited. There is an urgent need for feedback and transmission mechanisms from citizens on the quality of public services and their impact on their own development needs and as a diagnostic instrument to ensure effective implementation of government decision and improvement of service delivery. How can government and civil society best encourage efficient public administration by developing and applying systematic approaches to measuring public sector performance, its determinants and its consequences? What type of tools can be designed to measure and assess the standards of public administration from the perspective of non-business sectors? And how can citizens engage more effectively in the monitoring and delivery of public administrative services? An effort at the national level trying to answers the above questions is the development of a policy instrument aimed to measure and ranks the standards of provincial level s public administration and public services performance from the perspective of end-users. Such instrument could complement the undergoing Provincial Competitiveness index (PCI) conducted on an annual basis and gauging the opinions and perception of businesses and enterprises. Such instrument is powerful and will ultimately support the objectives of the national PAR Master Programme in different ways, including: Public officials / authorities are provided with a tool for monitoring performance in providing public administrative services The instrument will enable evidence-based policy making: technocratic data empowers official reformists and technocrats. Monitoring creates incentives for competition: provinces will want to attract investment and be ranked as best managed, therefore strong incentives for reform will follow. The voice of the people is raised. Public officials / authorities can learn about citizen s preferences, frustrations and recommendations. By way of having discussions on research findings and survey results with the provinces, people will be empowered and given the sense that they are listened. Data available from such nation-wide undertaking will be a gold mine for social scientists to perform various related researches. Within this context, during May and December 2009, a pilot to develop a Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) at the Provincial level was carried out. The pilot was done in a joint collaboration between the Center for Community Support Development Studies (CECODES, a Vietnamese NGO under VUSTA), and the Viet Nam Fatherland Front (VFF), with the support of UNDP. The pilot exercise was carried out in the provinces of Phu Tho, Da Nang and Dong Thap with an initial sample of 180 people in each province (543 in total at the end). The pilot therefore reflects on a wide diversity in Viet Nam and aims to test a methodology and the implementation of a rigorous assessment reflecting the objective of supporting to building a democratic, strong, clean, professionalized, modernized, 3

4 effective and efficient public administration system able to respond to the requirements of the cause of national building and development 1. The ultimate goal is to develop a policy instrument able to diagnose in real-time the performance of provincial public administration. The objective is to build an action-able index, allowing provincial governments to improve their administration and public services based on feedback and perceptions from citizens as end-users. The pilot project has been led by a team including Jairo Acuña-Alfaro and Do Thi Thanh Huyen from UNDP; Dr. Dang Ngoc Dinh, Dr. Dang Giang, Dr. Le Thi Nghe from CECODES; Mr. Tran Ngoc Nhan and Mr. Hoang Hai from VFF. To support the team, a National Advisory Board has been formed including the following members: 1. Dr. Thang Van Phuc, Former Vice-Minister, Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA) and current vice-chairman, National Program for Key Science and Technology (KX 02/06-10 and KX 10/06-10) 2. Mr. Tran Ngoc Nhan, Former Head ( ), Department of Law and Democracy and Member of Central Committee, VFF 3. Dr. Pham Chi Lan, Former Vice-Director of Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce and Industries (VCCI) 4. Dr. Dinh Duy Hoa, Director, PAR Department, Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA) 5. Prof. Pham Duy Nghia, Faculty of Law, Viet Nam National University The project was also assisted by a group of international experts on governance measurement, including: 1. Dr. Edmund J. Malesky, Assistant Professor, Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California, San Diego 2. Dr. Pierre F. Landry, Associate Professor of Political Science, Yale University 3. Dr. Daniel Kaufman, Senior Fellow, Global Economy and Development, Brookings Institution This document reports on the methodology and the initial findings of this pilot exercise and talks about lessons learned and next steps to roll-out the exercise to a larger number of provinces starting in 2010 and tentatively on an annual basis. The report is structured in seven sections including these introductory remarks. Section two gives an overview of the status and issues of Public Administration Reform in Viet Nam, which serves as the context for the PAPI exercise. This section lays out the fundamental normative framework being applied and spells out on the importance of evidence-based mechanisms for data collection in the country. Section three describes the purposes of the pilot and summarizes other national initiatives measuring the quality and performance of public administration and public services. From the review of other initiatives being implemented it becomes clear an explosion of individual and sporadic instruments, but not one single instrument aimed to measure and gauge citizen s perspectives of public administration performance across the whole country. Section four gives information about the structure of the index, namely its six dimensions (participation, transparency, accountability, anti-corruption, administrative procedures and public services), and other aspects of the methodology such as sampling procedures. This is followed by section five which gives a descriptive analysis of the gathered data along the six dimensions of the index in the three piloted provinces (Phu Tho, Da Nang and Dong Thap). Then, section six discusses feedbacks received from in-depth discussions in each of the three provinces, lessons learned and next steps for replication into a larger scale. A series of appendices such as list of participants in the provincial seminars, the survey locations and the full questionnaires, are included in section seven. 4

5 2. Public Administration and PAR in Viet Nam: Current Status and Issues Succinctly, public administration refers to (i) the aggregate machinery (policies, rules, procedures, systems, organizational structures, personnel, etc.) funded by the state budget and in charge of the management and direction of the affairs of the executive government, and (ii) the management and implementation of the whole set of government activities dealing with the implementation of laws, regulations and decisions of the government and the management related to the provision of public services 2. Public administration is also very comprehensive and includes process changes in areas such as organisational structures, decentralisation, personnel management, public finance, results-based management, regulatory reforms, etc. The end objective of public administration is to provide and deliver better quality public services to the citizens, especially the poor. Therefore, there is an urgent need for feedback and transmission mechanisms from citizens on the quality of public services and their impact on their own development needs. Public administration plays a key role in reducing poverty as it encourages transparency and accountability from civil servants and State institutions (central and local levels), and it is also perceived as one of the most effective measures to curb corruption. In this context, public administration reforms falls within the framework of overall governance processes. Governance is a broad concept that may have different meaning to different people. Yet one key characteristic is that it is related to a process. In the past few years, this concept has gained prominence. It is about the exercise of economic, political and administrative authority to manage a country's affairs at all levels. It comprises the mechanisms, processes and institutions through which citizens and groups articulate their interests, exercise their legal rights, meet their obligations and mediate their differences. Frequently, governance is utilized as a synonym of government, however, unlike government; governance is not characterized by specific structures, but rather a series of procedures and practices which distinguish it from the traditional forms of government. It does not replace, but is complementary to the latter. Thus, governance mainly differs from the term government because it is a system of administration involving a range of actors and networks wider than those who are, strictly speaking, members of government institutions. In sum, governance includes the state, but transcends it by taking in the private sector and civil society. A commonly used definition of governance is provided by the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) project in the form of the traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised. This includes the process by which governments are selected, monitored and replaced; the capacity of the government to effectively formulate and implement sound policies; and the respect of citizens and the state for the institutions that govern economic and social interactions among them. 3 Progress in improving public administration performance requires measurement, in order to diagnose problems and monitor results. The major reason for monitoring is to detect change. Moreover, monitoring improves our understanding of dynamics (critical part of scientific research) and is essential to monitor changes caused by human activities. Measurement and monitoring therefore should be an integral part of public administration. In the last decade, several cross-country measures have been designed and developed with the aim to measure the impact of good governance in development. One well-known indicator is the collection of governance related indices by WGI. Using a range of statistical methods, these indicators aim to measure in general terms governance patterns and trends in three different but complementary dimensions and six indicators. The first dimension includes the process 5

6 by which those in authority are selected and replaced and includes two indicators: (i) voice and accountability, and (ii) political stability. The second dimension refers to the capacity of governments to formulate and implement policies, including (iii) government effectiveness and (iv) regulatory quality. The third dimension is about the respect of citizens and state for institutions that govern interactions among them and covers (v) rule of law, and (vi) control of corruption indicators. Such grouping is relevant as it allows cross-country comparison, as well as comparison and analysis among indicators. For example, two such indicators are labeled government effectiveness (which can be used as a proxy for public administration) and control of corruption. The former measures the quality of public services, the quality of the civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures, the quality of policy formulation and implementation, and the credibility of the government's commitment to such policies; while the latter measures the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain, including both petty and grand forms of corruption, as well as "capture" of the state by elites and private interests 4. As expected, there is a high degree of correlation and linkages among government effectiveness and control of corruption. The graph below indeed, suggests a high correlation among APEC economies in Figure 1. Control of Corruption and Government Effectiveness Source: Worldwide Governance Indicators, WGI (2008). A recent review of internationally designed tools and methods used to measure, assess and monitor the performance of public administration, found 27 sources and methods increasingly recognized and used by a wide range of stakeholders and consisting of a multiplicity of techniques and methodologies. 5 Broadly speaking, the review classified them in two broad categories: (i) assessment tools and (ii) information sources and claimed that the majority of instruments have been designed by international agencies (see table 1). In addition, a caveat with these indicators is that they tend to measure the perception of different social groups in several countries. As an analytical tool, they enable comparisons to 6

7 Information Sources Assessment Tools be made between countries, but it does not provide detailed information about the actual perception from end-users on the performance of its public administration or on the form and scope of the types of corruption that citizens have to face on a daily basis. Therefore, there is a need to move beyond the most widely used international comparative indicators, as they seem to have limited value for policy purposes at the country level. 6 Table 1. Cross-country datasets on measurements of public administration Name of Assessment Source Leadership Civil Service PFM * Policy Making Service Deliver y Citizen Report Cards Public Affairs Centre x Country Governance Asian Development x x x Assessment Bank (ADB) Common Assessment Framework European Institute of Public Administration x x x x x Control and Management System Baselines Government at a Glance (currently under development) Governance Matters (Government Effectiveness) Country Policy and Institutional (EIPA) SIGMA (OECD & EU) x x x OECD x x x x World Bank Institute x x x World Bank x x x x Assessment (CPIA) Integrity Indicators Global Integrity x x x x Source: Based on UNDP (2009), Table 1: What do assessment tools and information sources measure? pp * PFM = Public Finance Management. Overall, as suggested by Painter et al (2009) 7, cross-national comparisons of governance and public administration indicators and aggregates measures of development, such as human development, GDP and quality of life indexes reveal that successful and advanced countries tend to have higher scores on quality of governance indicators. This may be an indication that development of good governance / public administration goes hand in hand with human development. The correlations are even stronger when using government effectiveness, closest proxy to public administration performance. As can be seen in table 2, the correlation is strongest with the aggregated Human Development Index and Good Society Index. 7

8 Outcome Variables Table 2. Cross-National Quality of Government Research Findings Rule of Law Government Effectiveness Low Corruption Effect of Quality of Government Life Expectancy +.62* Positive ++ Env. Sustainability Positive ++ GDP / Capita Positive +++ GDP growth +.10 _ Positive Inequality Positive ++** Human Positive +++ Development Index Good Society Index Positive +++ * Correlation (r) ** Less Inequality Source: Taken from Painter et al (2009:340), based on S. Holmberg, B. Rothstein, N. Nasiritousi. Quality of Government: What you Get. QoG Working Paper 2008:21, Quality of Government Institute, University of Goteborg. The multiplicity of governance and public administration performance assessments offer initial insights into how countries are progressing over time. The WGI for example, has been collecting annual data since 1996 and it is now possible to establish panel-data comparison, across-countries and in-country. For instance, Figure 2 shows Viet Nam governance scores for nearly 12 years. As can be noted, considering the government effectiveness indicator as a proxy for public administration performance, the progress has been statistically insignificant. This confirms the hypothesis that PAR in Viet Nam is currently experiencing a dormant phase, which argues that even PAR has been a top priority for the Government, the translation from intention to implementation has been stagnant. Figure 2. Viet Nam s Governance scores Source: Worldwide Governance Indicators, WGI (2008). 8

9 The Public Administration Reform (PAR) programme in Viet Nam, which has implemented from more than a decade now, has achieved some advances, and undoubtedly Viet Nam s public sector today is much different than it was only 10 or 15 years ago. However, important shortcomings still remain and frustration and anxiety usually evolve around discussions on the PAR process. 8 Perhaps, one source of frustration relates precisely to the lack of monitoring mechanisms to assess public administration performance, including the blur and near absence of instruments targeted to gauge non-business and non-public sectors. Citizen s dissatisfaction with the results of the PAR programme especially in relation with policy and administrative institutions has also been referred to as due to weak participation mechanisms. In fact, the voice of civil organizations (from the mass organizations to the NGOs and community based organizations) and citizens is weak; not to mention limited citizen s participation in policy making, in policy implementation and holding the government accountable. PAR in Viet Nam, as in many other countries, is a complex process of government reform aimed at improving the quality of public services delivery and the quantity of services delivered. It is in fact more manifold than is often assumed, as it encompasses a comprehensive and inclusive process of change in a broad range of areas. Yet, one key characteristic is that it refers to the provision of better public services. One underlying argument that can be made is that the PAR agenda in Viet Nam is being reformed with a view to ensuring uniformity of treatment, predictability, clarity and due process (i.e. strict legality). However, it seems there is lack of clarity on what would ensure that these measures will bring about the consistent application of norms of legality by state actors in the use of state power. The answer may lie in mechanisms that make public officials accountable by due process in the public realm for their actions. A way to gauge that accountability is through understanding, at the provincial level, the roles and perception of non-business sectors towards their involvement and contributions (both directly and indirectly, but also formally and informally) towards the provision of public administrative services. Within this context, a project measuring the standards of public administration and services from the perspectives of civil society organizations and citizens, ranking the provinces and cities will provide a powerful tool to advance the process of empowering civil society, improve governance and therefore, ultimately support the objectives of the national PAR Master Programme A country s transition from low-income to middle-income status implies a shift in the relationship between government agencies and civil society organizations and citizens in the way they interact to each other. In low-income countries, policymakers generally rely on anecdotal and subjective evidence to assess the quality of its public administration and public services delivery, but this information is often misleading and at best incomplete. To confront the new social, economic and institutional challenges, policy-makers need to be informed; citizens (i.e. civil society) with information are empowered, and an informed/empowered citizen is a citizen with greater responsibility towards his/her community and country. The relationship between government and civil society has shifted in most developing countries in the last decade; Viet Nam is not an exception. The better fed and better educated citizens are the better and more efficient administrative services they demand from governments. Nowadays, citizens increasingly demand public administration systems free of bureaucratic and administrative corruption, patronage, nepotism, diversion and stealing of public funds. Instead, they demand public administration systems that promote development 9

10 and equity, more participation in the decision-making processes of public policies, as well as on their implementation and monitoring. In that regards, when referring to public administration performance, the analysis needs to revolve around three mutually reinforcing processes, including (i) policy making, (ii) policy implementation, and (iii) public service delivery. Policy Making is a key process with public administration, as it is when decision are made that will affect the operation and implementation of public services. Policy decisions can influence behaviors and therefore improve or decrease the quality and reliability of public services. Moreover, it is considered that when the policy-making processes involve joint decision-making and dialogue, better results can be expected. In addition, the process of policy making at the provincial level is important and crucial, not only to ensure a consistent and correct interpretation of national policies, but also as it is most likely at this level that opinions by end-users and beneficiaries of public services can be considered. Once a policy-decision has been made, it is turn to implement it. Policy Implementation therefore, refers to the mechanisms, resources and capabilities of the public sector to ensure conditions to deliver public and private services. This process requires constant monitoring regarding how well the public administration is performing in a particular thematic area or sector. During implementation monitoring is useful as it helps determine achievements and deficiencies as per previously defined criteria and objectives. And thirdly, public service delivery is directly related to the implementation process. And in this particular area there are usually two ways to assess performance. One is from the perspective of service provides in the form of self-assessments for example that simply require management to provide opinions on users satisfaction. The other is in the form of user-satisfaction survey, which actually asks citizens for their views and opinions reflecting the availability and quality of the services. How can governments and civil society best encourage efficient public administration systems by developing and applying systematic approaches to measuring public sector performance, its determinants and its consequences? What type of tools can be designed to measure and assess the standards of public administration from the perspective of nonbusiness sectors? And how can civil society organization engage more effectively in the monitoring and delivery of public administrative services? The answers to these questions are inherently complicated and context dependent. Yet, point to the importance to gauge the standards of public administration and services based on the perception from end-users. 3. The Pilot Towards a Public Administration Performance Index in Viet Nam As mentioned in the introduction section, a pilot exercise was designed to serve as an initial step leading to the development of a policy instrument able to diagnose in real-time the performance of provincial public administration and allow provincial governments to improve their performance. This section describes in detail the objectives of the pilot. Furthermore, it gives an overview of other national initiatives of measuring administrative performance which have been carried out in the past in Viet Nam, pointing out the strengths and weaknesses of these initiatives, and again stressing out the necessity of PAPI in the current Vietnamese context. 10

11 3.1. Objectives of the Pilot The main objective of this pilot research project is to develop and pilot-test a methodology and set of indicators aimed at measuring public administration performance at the provincial level from the perspective of citizens as end-users of public administrative services. In particular, to design a tentative index (based on a set of indicators and detailed methodology) to gauge the standards of public administration and services on the provincial level in Viet Nam Overview of National Initiatives in Measuring Public Administration Given the importance of social feedback in improving the public sector, as widely acknowledged in many developed and developing countries, a number of national or local initiatives in measuring local governance have been embarked on in Viet Nam. These initiatives, in either large-scale or pilot formats, have been rolled out or trialed through either state-funded schemes or donor-funded projects. This section reviews some of these initiatives with a view to putting PAPI in the wider local context, while highlighting the gap in which the PAPI aims to fill in. Simplification of administrative procedures of different sectors At the national level, a significant institutional reform effort has been shown in the Governmental scheme to simplify administrative procedures (better known as Project 30). 9 The administrative procedures targeted in this initiative include those that bind the relationship between the state and the society in relation to various aspects regarding people s lives and commercial activities. During the first phase of this process, an inventory and identification of administrative procedures suggested Viet Nam has more than 5,500 such procedures, over 9,000 regulation document and more than 100,000 inventory procedure inventory forms. The next phase is about trying to reduce them by about 30%. It should be noted that it is the first time such an initiative was taken in Viet Nam and public participation was called upon. Regarding public participation, Project 30 has asked the public to participate in this exercise by partaking in the review of administrative procedures against such criteria as legality, necessity and reasonableness in order to help the Government to simplify them. The public can contribute to this effort by accessing to the public consultation corner of the Project 30 s website or providing comments/feedback via the media. 10 Although the approach to collecting electronic feedback has excluded a larger population given the poor e-governance setting in Viet Nam, a call for public participation as such has indicated that the role of the society in public administration is being increasingly recognized by the state. Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) Another significant national scale initiative in measuring public sector performance, also a source of inspiration for PAPI, is the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI), which is a jointhands effort between the Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and the U.S. Agency for International Development-funded Viet Nam National Competitiveness Initiative (VNCI) since The PCI has been widely accepted as a critical tool for assessing and ranking the performance, capacity and willingness of provincial governments to develop business-friendly regulatory environments for private sector development. The standards of economic management in Vietnam s 64 provinces from the perspective of domestic businesses in the private sector are measured against 10 sub-indices, which include governance-related matters such as legal institutions, transparency and enabling environment for the private sector. 11

12 While under debates as for its claim for the collective voice of the private sector, PCI findings have been recognized as useful for the GoV as they help reveal why some parts of the country perform better than the others in terms of private sector dynamism, job creation and economic growth as it reveals how privately-run businesses perceive of the public administration system. For participating provinces, the better ranked they are, the more opportunities for foreign and domestic investment they have for local economic growth. Another value added from PCI is that it creates competitiveness amongst provinces in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of provincial public administration apparatuses in their responses to the business sector in particular and the whole population in general. Having noted that, PCI does not sufficiently address the needs and desire of ordinary citizens who are not engaged in large-scaled, foreign-invested and registered businesses. The sample size of over 7,000 businesses fails to represent the private sector per se. Thus, a complementary nation-wide competitiveness index revealing where provinces stand based on the perception of the population at large is needed. Measuring citizens perception of urban and rural governance Indeed, at a more local level, a few initiatives have been taken to see how citizens perceive of the quality of local governance and public service delivery in urban and rural areas. Inputs from these initiatives are reportedly aimed to enhance public participation in local governance in Vietnam. Primary data for analysis is gathered through surveys and citizen report cards on populations in selected provinces and localities. In an effort to gather citizens feedback about urban governance, public administration and autonomy of local governments, the Association of Cities in Viet Nam and Konrad-Adenauer- Stiftung e.v. carried out in 2009 a study on over a total sample size of 3000 participants including citizens and elites from Nam Dinh City, Hue City, Thu Dau Mot Town and Lang Son City. 12 Focused areas of the survey include: (i) public administrative services (i.e. onestop shops); (ii) effectiveness of the Ordinance on Implementation of Grass-roots Democracy; (iii) land use planning in urban areas; and (iv) socio-economic development and urban planning. The key finding of the survey is that access to information plays a crucial role in enhancing grass-roots democracy at the commune/ward level while people s participation in urban governance. They also show positive elements of the one-stop shops which have contributed to more users-friendly administrative services, although they also point out rooms for improvement in urban governance in the selected cities. Another similar but earlier effort is seen in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) but more on public service delivery. 13 For two years, in 2006 and 2008, the People s Council of HCMC commissioned public polls to measure the level of satisfaction of citizens with public services such as health care, notary services, public transport, waste collection, primary education, and administrative services in relation to land, construction and tax. The findings ranked services in accordance with the degree of satisfaction, with primary education being ranked the highest and land use certification the lowest. A comparative approach was adopted by the Institute for Development Studies in HCMC and HCMC Statistics Office to compare the degrees of satisfaction between 2006 and It shows that the degree of public satisfaction with selected services lowered in 2008, with the most significant fall being seen in the percentage of informants feeling satisfied with public transport, administrative procedures in granting land use rights and public health. A critical question raised in the report is that public administration reform in HCMC is on the right track. 14 The initiative in HCMC can be replicated in other provinces for local governments to see how the end-users of their services perceive of their performance in provision of public services. 12

13 Citizen Report Cards Citizen report cards (CRCs) are increasingly used as a tool for improving public service delivery at the grass-roots level. CRCs collect feedback through surveys on selected samples on aspects of service quality that user know best and enable public agencies to identify strengths and weaknesses in their work. 15 They are supposed to facilitate prioritization of reforms and corrective actions by drawing attention to the problems in public service delivery. The initiative is being introduced to different localities in Viet Nam through donor/ngo-funded projects. For instance, ActionAid piloted a model on people s framework in monitoring the progress of PAR in Viet Nam based on experience and successful establishment of community based institutions at local levels. 16 One of the key outputs of this component was the assessment of public services, including health care, primary and secondary education and administrative services at the commune level. CRCs are used as the tool to receive people s feedback in Loc Ha and Can Loc districts of Ha Tinh province and in Eakar District of Dak Lak province. Findings from the CRCs in selected districts in Ha Tinh show that the satisfaction level of rural users on administrative procedures, performance, expertise, infrastructure, costs, etc. varies from 54% to 73%, 17 while the points given to the surveyed services range from 5.8 to 6.7 in the scale from A similar exercise was carried out the Project Strengthening local governments jointly funded by a group of development partners 19 and implemented by the Ministry of Planning and Investment from 2005 to The exercise is a pilot for developing a guideline for implementing citizen report cards at the local levels in Viet Nam with the aim to to ensure that oversight, accountability and monitoring mechanisms are enhanced at local levels. 20 The pilot was conducted in four provinces, including Bac Kan, Vinh Phuc, Tra Vinh and Quang Nam, to study the degree of satisfaction of citizens of three key services, i.e. primary education, primary health and rural roads. Samples were selected by the use of the technique called Probability Proportionate to Size (PPS), the approach that PAPI is applying. Initial findings from the pilots share the same observation with those from the previously mentioned exercises: citizens have given a fairly satisfactory score to the three services under research, there is room for improvement of transparency in service provision, and equity in access to the services remain a problem. Although CRCs are for end-users who are citizens to give feedback about the quality of public services, efforts remain scattered in stand-alone projects. The MPI guidelines can be a starting point for scaling up on the India-based citizen report card model. However, how the idea will be operationalized and institutionalized is another matter that needs time and resources to be addressed. Ranking of PAR performers This review of local initiatives would not be sufficient if it does not cover an initiative on ranking of performers of PAR in Da Nang in Da Nang, which is one of the three selected provinces for the PAPI exercise, carried out on its own an exercise to review which local government agencies do better in PAR. Although the methodology adopted in the ranking remains a myth, and the findings remain questionable for their objectivity and reliability, Da Nang is the first province to publicize how different agencies perform in PAR. It can be a good starting point for a self-assessment of local governments at grass-roots level. This literature review shows that there are still a gap in the understanding of how citizens and non-business sectors perceive of public administration at large and of where different provinces stand in the ranking of good/poor performers in public administration and public services delivery. While PCI has shed light into how the public administration apparatuses at different provinces treat the private sector, it has left out the citizens and non-business sectors. In the mean time, while CRCs and surveys on satisfaction degrees have been rolled 13

14 out in a few provinces, they are to capture just a few portions of the populations in provinces. However, these initiatives have given inspirations for PAPI to be formulated to compliment to existing endeavors in involving citizens and non-business sectors in improvement of public administration and public service delivery at the national and local levels. 4. Methodology As with any undertaking measuring governance and public administration, a sound and robust methodology is fundamental so that the results are credible and accepted by stakeholders. After extensive discussions the research team decided to seek only the views of ordinary citizens as primary users of public administration services, but not of other stakeholders such as enterprises or civil servants of the public administration. The view of entrepreneurs has been well covered by the PCI assessments. On the other hand, the Ministry of Home Affairs has been undertaking a project evaluating the PAR process and assessing the perception of civil servants. In that sense, PAPI should not replicate some of these endeavors but complement them. Also, civil society organizations were not included into the population of the study. There are several reasons. First, as the definition of civil society is still evolving in Viet Nam, it would be not possible to clearly define CSOs and determine a comparable sample of them across the provinces. Secondly, CSOs as organizations would not have the direct or indirect experiences regarding several dimensions covered by the index (see below), such as anticorruption, transparency and provision of public services. Furthermore, the methodology advocated to obtaining data from a representative selection of ordinary citizens, rather than from household-heads, in an effort to know about the perception from across the population, including gender and age-differentiated groups. Additionally it is difficult to determine the household-head, as it can be the one with the highest income, or the oldest in the household. This section of the document describes the six different dimensions of public administration and public services, out of which the index would be constructed. Also, it gives details of the sampling strategy of the survey The Dimensions of PAPI As mentioned earlier public administration reform has a broader meaning than just reforming the public sector and includes the provision of public services in more efficient and effective ways. When assessing the performance of provincial public administration, this research look at the following domains: D1. Participation (of citizens) D2. Transparency D3. Accountability D4. Anti-Corruption D5. Administrative procedures D6. Public services D1. Participation Defined broadly, participation includes the mechanisms for citizens to take part in governance processes. Participation consists of a range of activities through which citizens 14

15 seek to influence government actions, either directly by affecting the formulation and implementation of public policy, or indirectly by affecting the selection of public officials. In PAPI the Ordinance # 34/2007/PL-UBTVQH11 on Implementation of Grass-root Democracy dated 20 April 2007 of the Standing Committee of the National Assembly of Viet Nam (hereinafter abbreviated as GDO) is used as the framework to assess the degree of participation of non-business actors, i.e. citizens in public administration in its broadest sense. The development of the GDO began in the mid-1990s as a response to rural unrest, when protests against corrupt and exploitative local officials made the Vietnamese leadership consider how to formally strengthen the decentralization process and management by the people. It describes the mechanisms by which citizens can take part in policy and decision making processes at the local level. It defines areas where people can make decisions themselves (such as their contribution to public infrastructure projects), areas where they can express their opinions in the form of voting (such as election and dismissal of village head and people s inspection boards to monitor public investment projects), and areas where authorities should seek comments from citizens and associations or community based-groups before making decisions (such as on main socio-economic matters). D2. Transparency Transparency can be defined as the flow of timely and reliable information (of economic, social and political nature) about government service provision. Lack of transparency may be described as the deliberate withholding access to, or misrepresenting information or failure to ensure that the information provided is of adequate relevance and quality. In regard of transparency, the GDO gives a great importance to the right to know of the people. Using this framework, PAPI assess how people are informed about socio-economic development plan of their community, especially regarding land use, land clearance and compensation policies which have been one of the largest sources of corruption. Beyond the right to know defined in the GDO, the dimension also looks at the extent to which information about basic pro-poor state policies are disseminated to the people correctly and timely. These include financial and livelihood support for families with war veterans, poor families, and old people. Lack of transparency in these cases often leads to petty corruption and impact people s life, especially in rural areas where poverty is concentrated. D3. Accountability The accountability of an administration is the extent to which those who act on behalf of the people are answerable for what they do. Accountability requires transparency (allowing everyone to be fully informed in terms of relevant information), as well as contestability (enabling everyone to participate in the choice of leaders, policies, and service providers). Accountability and transparency are closely related, and indeed to some extent a system which is transparent is generally one which is accountable. However, where accountability differs from transparency is in that it only enables feedback after a decision or action, while transparency also enables feedback before or during a decision or action. The dimension looks at the frequency of interaction between various levels of government and the citizens, and at the establishment and quality of the People Inspection Board, the body tasked by the Ordinance of Grass-root Democracy with the function of monitoring government s actions. 15

16 D4. Anti-corruption Corruption is one of the biggest, if not the biggest development problem of current public administration in Viet Nam, and this has been recognized by the highest political levels. In sum, corruption has been recognized as a systemic problem with its own distinctive logic. 22 One of the major steps in fighting corruption from the government was the issuance of the Law on Prevention and Combating of Corruption (No. 55/2005/QH11 on November, 2005). Similarly to the GDO, PAPI looks at the actual implementation of the Law as a degree of political will and seriousness of local governments in corruption prevention. Furthermore, PAPI assesses people s experiences in public services where corruption is most common (health care, land management, social welfare, among others). This dimension also looks at the extent of citizen s motivation in denouncing corruption and their fear of discrimination when doing so, as an indicator of the political climate of their locality. D5. Administrative procedures Regarding administrative procedures PAPI looks the implementation levels of One Stop Shop (OSS), rather than the establishment. The OSS mechanism is designed to embed two major functions. Firstly, it aims to serve as the key contact point for the handling of the administrative procedures of an administrative agency. The unit is obliged to post detailed information on procedural requirements, including the type of documents the applicant has to submit, the processing duration, and service fees. It is generally expected that this mechanism will help enhance transparency, reduces the abuse of power, and increases the sense of responsibility among public officials. Secondly, the concept of the inter-sector/inter-agency OSS is designed to forge the simplification of administrative procedures requiring the deliberation of several administrative levels and/or sectors. The pilot has only tested out basic questions related to OSS, but in the roll-out elaborated questions will be designed to assess the quality of the OSS at the commune and the district level. D6. Public services This dimension looks at various aspects such as government support for the poor to obtain medical insurance, health care at the commune and district level, primary education, road conditions, electricity, garbage collecting service, sources of drinking water and social security. This dimension is straight-forward and has the character of a citizen report exercise The Sampling Procedure and Field Work Sampling Procedure The pilot stage has used a four-stage clustered sampling strategy that allows selecting representatives of households at the provincial and commune levels of the pilot provinces. At the provincial level, three provinces were selected by the national advisory board: Phu Tho, Da Nang and Dong Thap. The purpose was to test the methodology in diverse and different geographical and social-economic setting. Phu Tho is from the North, mountainous and belongs to the group of provinces with the lowest level of economic development. Da Nang is from the Central, urban, and economically highly developed. Dong Thap is from the South, lowland, and economically somewhat above Phu Tho. 16

17 The hierarchical procedure for selecting sub-provincial level samples is as follows (see graph 3 for an illustration of the sampling process): At the districts level, three districts in each province were selected. The first district was always chosen purposefully as the provincial capital city, so to ensure capture services provided by provincial authorities. The second and third districts were selected using a Probability Proportion to Size (PPS) sampling approach. This basically allocated opportunities for selection to the largest units. At the commune level, here, two communes within each district were selected, again using PPS by population. So the total number of communes per provinces was 2*3 = 6. At the village level, two villages in each commune were selected, again using PPS, making the total number of villages 2*2*3=12. Once the villages were identified, the local VFF chapter provided the list of households living in the selected villages. From this list, 15 households were randomly drawn along with a replacement list of 10 households. Therefore, the total number of households in a province was 15*2*2*3=180. As the final step, local VFF provided the list of family members of the selected households. From each household, an individual was selected randomly. These 180 individuals form the respondent group of a given province. 17

18 Figure 3. Sampling Process Note: The selection process for District 1 is replicated for Districts 2 and 3 of Province 1 or Province n. 18

19 Fieldwork For each province in the preparation process, CECODES asked the provincial VFF for collaboration, informing them about the nature of the project, the concrete activities, the human resources (interviewers) to be provided by the province, and the budget available. The local VFF and CECODES worked out a time-frame suitable for both organisations. Afterwards CECODES and the local VFF engaged in the selection process as described above. In the case of Dong Thap, due to the time pressure to conduct the survey in a certain time window, CECODES only selected the 25 households, but left VFF to pick one adult in each household. The results were that there was bias (towards male) in the selection. The groundwork from VFF was satisfying despite logistic challenges when it came to the village level due to limitation in communication means and time and availability of village heads. The selected respondents were asked by the local VFF to come to a pre-arranged place on a pre-arranged date. We have been to cultural houses, private homes, VFF meeting halls (typically within the People Committee) The event was not associated with the local government, yet it still had an official character. In some localities, there were decorations such as flowers, flags, etc. People were offered drinks while waiting. Except for Phu Tho (the first province surveyed), the approach adopted was for the team to lead checking the filled questionnaries on the spot, directly after each interview was done. Interview generally lasted about 45 min to one hour, longer in some cases (such as extremly low understanding, or near-deaf). General assessment is that people were open, not reserved. Some used the chance to engage in long conversations, telling more about their life and problems. They had no problem giving out their numbers. 5. Findings and analysis This section reports on the main findings of the survey along the 6 dimensions described in the Methodology section. In order to set the context of the analysis and provide readers with background information which may help to understand better the findings the table below gives an overview of socio-economic endowment of the pilot provinces. The data show that Da Nang is leading, by a long way, in all socio-economic indicators. Phu Tho fairs slightly better than Dong Thap in health care and education, but less in term of poverty, per capita GDP and life expectancy. In each of the following sub-sections, details will be given about the PAPI indicators which form the measurement of each dimension. Information will be also given about what parts of the questionnaire worked and what not and how it can be improved in the next stage. Table 3. The socio-economic endowment of the selected provinces Indicator (2008) Phú Thọ Đà Nẵng Đồng Tháp General Annual GDP per capita (USD) Population (mio.) Population density (ppl / km2) Poverty rate (%) 17.4% 0.95% 7% Illiteracy rate (%) 2.6% 0% 3% Life expectancy Public Administration Ratioof public servant / 1000 people

20 Education Indicator (2008) Phú Thọ Đà Nẵng Đồng Tháp Primary (Grade 1-5) Ratio of teachers /1000 students Lower Secondary (Grade 6-9) Ratio teachers /1000 students Upper Secondary (Grade 10-12) Ratio of teachers /1000 student Health Care Ratio of public hospitals / ppl Ratio of beds (public) / 1000 ppl Ratio of doctors (public) /1000 ppl No of nurses in public facilities Rate of under-nourished children 20% 10.7% 22% Infrastructure Ratio of asphalt / total road (km) 60% 82% 69% Clean water outreach urban 89.5% 98% 85.6% Clean water outreach rural 72.8% 95% 79.5% Source: Departments of General Statistics Offices of Phu Tho, Da Nang, Dong Thap, 2008 As this is a pilot to test the methodology and the practical approaches which will be modified and revised based on the experiences and results, it is important to treat the findings with caution. Also, at this stage, we have no intention to rank province s performance. The survey s results of the provinces are shown together just for better presentation. The juxtaposition of the provinces is interesting, but it should be noted that the trial character of the study when trying to compare the provinces Respondent Analysis In this part of the survey, we looked at some background information of the respondents such as gender, age, education level, occupation, personal judgement of the economic situation, interest in national and local affaires, level of trust, etc. As it is a rare opportunity to undertake such a large scale survey in Viet Nam, the data collected can be valuable for other studies beyond PAPI. The key data of this module are presented below. Gender Ratio In Da Nang and Phu Tho the gender ratio correspondends to the typical ratio of the general population. In Dong Thap, however, due to some issues in the local survey management, there is a male-bias in the sample. Keep in mind this bias when looking at the provincial presentation in later chapters of the document. 20

21 0.05 Density 0.05 Figure 4. Gender ratio of respondents (%) Gender Ratio of Respondents Male Female Averaged year of birth The urban population of Da Nang is younger than in the other two rural provinces, which is most likely to be the effect of migration as young people leave the countryside for the cities. Table 4. Averaged year of birth Da Nang 1964 Dong Thap 1958 Phu Tho 1960 Figure 5. Distribution according to birth year Da Nang Dong Thap Phu Tho Ong/ba sinh nam nao? Graphs by Province On the other hand, even the averaged age of Da Nang seems to be higher than of the national population. This may hint at difficulties of getting younger people to take part in the survey, as they are more likely to be busy working. In the next stage of implementation, this issue needs to be investigated. 21

22 Averaged years of education In term of education, Da Nang has the highest level. Phu Tho, a mountainous province, has the lowest. The difference is not very big, which could be an indicator of good outreach of primary and lower secondary school across Vietnam. Table 5. Averaged years of education Da Nang 9.6 Dong Thap 10.1 Phu Tho 8.1 Economic situation Regarding the economic situation of the respondent s household, Dong Thap seems to fair best. Urban poverty is an issue in Da Nang, but Phu Tho has the largest share of huge problems. This seems at odd with the official statistics of poverty rate (see Table 3), with Da Nang featuring a very low rate, but the reason could be that the rate is calculated using one poverty line across the country which does not reflect the cost of living in cities. Figure 6. Economic situation of the family (%) Economic situation of the family Good, can even save Good, no problem Some problems Huge problems Compared to 5 years ago, Dong Thap seems to make the biggest progress in term of raising income (judging after personal perception), although there is little information about if and how much this is impacted by the male-bias in the respondents mentioned above. Phu Tho and Da Nang are similar in term of poverty reduction. All in all, this demonstrates the economic progress the country has made in the last one a half decade. Figure 7. Economic situation compared to 5 years ago (%) Economic situation compared to 5 years ago A lot worse A bit worse Same A bit better A lot better 22

23 Political interest Respondents in all pilot provinces follow the news at least few times per week, if not daily. This shows a high level of interest in national politics. Figure 8. Percentage of respondents following national news Following national news Never Less then 1 / week Once / week Few times / week Daily Similarly, interest in local politics is generally high. Phu Tho respondents are less interested, this may be linked to the level of poverty and hardship the people are facing. Figure 9. Interest in local affairs (%) Interest in local affairs Not at all Not interested Somewhat interested Very interested This high level of interest means that the population is quite receptive to information disseminated by the national and local government. This is a fertile ground for the implementation of policies such as the Ordinance of Grass-root Democracy and the AnticorruptionLaw, etc Dimension 1: Participation As mentioned in the section Methodology above, in the context of Vietnam, we understand participation as designed by the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance. The Ordinance defines the key interactions of citizens in communal politics. It contains the aspects: the right to know, the right to discuss and the right to decide, of which the first area belongs to the dimension Transparency, and the two latter belong to the dimension Participation. 23

24 Specifically, the dimension looks at the following aspects: - Whether or not the Ordinance is heard of by the people - How their rights to decide are implemented. As representation of this aspect, the process of selecting the village head is surveyed - Another area of right to decide relates to citizen s contribution to public projects in their communities and the monitoring of project implementation - The degree to which people are informed about land use plan of their communes and the ability for them to comment on it. Below the key findings are presented. Knowledge of the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance The ordinance is best known in Da Nang and Dong Thap. But overall, 40% of the respondents have not heard of it. There is a significant need for information dissemination in this regard so that people know and use better their rights. Figure 10. Having heard of the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance (%) Ever heard of the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance? No Yes Citizen s contribution to public works People in Phu Tho contribute more to communal projects. This might be due to the fact that public budget there is tighter, so that communities depend more on people s contribution for public works. It might be as well due to the fact that the local government in Phu Tho puts more pressure on the people, which is reflected by the low share of voluntarily contribution compared to other two provinces. Figure 6. Contribution to public works (%) Contributing to public works Voluntarily contribution No Yes Don't know Voluntarily Forced by local gov

25 According to the Ordinance, the People s Inspection Board is the body in charge of monitoring the implementation of public works which have people s contribution. However, only less than half of respondents believe that this is the case in their community. In Da Nang, more than 60% believe this is the task of the residential area s / village head or of the local government. In Phu Tho and Dong Thap, around 10% do not know who is in charge of the task. The People Inspection Board is an area of the Ordinance which seems to get little attention and exposure, although it could be a powerful vehicle to achieve transparency and anti-corruption. Figure 7. Monitoring projects with people s contribution (%) Who monitors the projects with people's contribution Da Nang Dong Thap Phu Tho Informing about land use plan The Ordinance also requires local governments to inform the people about the annual plan for land use of the communes. This happens much less in Da Nang than in the other two provinces. The assumption could be that the more valuable land is on the market, the more tempted governments are in not informing the people. Figure 13. Local government informs about land use plan (%) Local gov informs about land use plan No Yes Don't know 25

26 The survey also asked about if people have the opportunity to comment on the land use plan before it is published, and in case they do, whether or not they think that their comments are being heard. However, the data of these questions are not reliable trustfully because there might be an issue that respondents did not have the competency to answer these questions. In the PAPI roll-out, this part of the survey needs to be revised and extended to explore this sensitive area Dimension 2: Transparency This dimension looks at how information of economic, social and political nature about government service provision are disseminated to the people, as lack of transparency is typically due to the deliberate withholding access to, or misrepresenting information or failure to ensure that the information provided is adequate. The dimension surveys people s knowledge about the Cong Bao, an important gazette containing the latest legal news. The process of updating the list of poor households, often a source of petty corruption, is surveyed in greater details. It also asks about the knowledge on fundamental social policies re. health care, education and support for the poor. Furthermore, the dimension surveys the publication of communal budget, which is a key aspect of the right to know defined in the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance. Knowledge about Cong Bao gazette The Cong Bao is an official gazette published by each province containing the latest national and provincial legal news and regulations. This important source of information is however unknown to 60-70% of the respondents. Either the gazette is not well circulated, or people are not aware of it. Either way, legal information, key ingredient to achieve transparency, are not disseminated to the right extend. Figure 14. Having heard about Cong Bao gazette (%) Ever heard of Cong Bao Khong Có The process of updating the list of poor households Almost 80% of respondents in Da Nang know correctly that according to the state regulation the list of the poor household of the communes should be updated once per year. Phu Tho is the least knowledgeable; over 30% took don t know as an answer. This is critical, given the distribution of state support for registered poor households is a common source of petty corruption. 26

27 Figure 15. Frequency of the update of the list of poor households (%) How often should the list of poor hoousehold be updated? Never Don't knowonce a year Every 2 years or longer Misc Da Nang Dong Thap Phu Tho Upon reality check compared to theoretical knowledge, in Da Nang close to 80% confirmed that in their community, the list of poor households has been updated within the last 12 months, in contrast to 60% in Phu Tho. Also, in Phu Tho, the number of people not knowing if within last year the list has been updated or not is the highest. Figure 16. Update of list of poor households in reality (%) In reality, list of poor households was updated within 12 last months? No Yes Don't know Da Nang respondent are most confident in the correctness of the list of poor households. Da Nang has also the fewest don t know. On the other hand, only half in Phu Tho believe that the list is correct in both ways (poor households are not missing, and non-poor households should not be on the list). In Phu Tho, almost ¼ can not say about the correctness of the list. Figure 17. Accuracy of the list of poor households (%) Poor households missing in the list Non-poor households on the list No households Some hh Many hh Don't know No households Some households Don't know 27

28 Knowledge about pro-poor social policies Information about fundamental social policies, such as the poverty threshold, support for single elderly, and free medical treatment for children under 6 are well disseminated. Between 83 and 96% of all provinces confirm that they know these policies. The exception is the policy related to no tuition for elementary schools, where about 40% say it is not true. It might be possible that respondents mess up between tuition fees and extra costs incurred during their kids schooling at public primary schools. This will need to be revised in the next implementation round. Figure 18. Knowledge about pro-poor social policies (%) Income below 200k VND / month / person is classified as poor Old, single people receive state support True Not true Don't know Not true True Don't know 2 Children under 6 receive free medical treatments Not true True Don't know Elementar school requires no tuition Not true True Don't know 28

29 Knowledge about social support for Ky Suu New Year The absolute majority of respondents (91-94%) in the three provinces know that the state provided financial support for the poor households in the New Year Ky Suu However, only around 75-79% confirmed that the support actually reached the local people. Especially Phu Tho is not sure about what was going on (18% don t know ). Figure 19. Knowledge about Ky Suu New Year s support for the poor There was a policy providing support for poor households for Ky Suu New Year Ky Suu support actually reached the people in the community Not true True Don't know Not true True Don't know Knowledge about price of land compensation In term of land compensation, around 80% in Da Nang and Phu Tho believe the compensation is lower or much lower than the market price. It seems people in Dong Thap are a lot more satisfied, while overall between 10 23% do not have the information in this regard ( don t know ). Figure 20. Land compensation price compared to market (%) Land compensation compared to land price on the market A lot lower A bit lower Not lower Don't know 29

30 Exposure of communal budget Across the 3 provinces, only about 50% of respondents say that the communal budget has been published during the last year. Either the budget was not disclosed, or it was disclosed but the information didn t reached the people. This is clearly an area which needs much improvement, especially as more than 85% of the respondents say that it is very important or important for them to know about the budget. Figure 21. Exposure of communal budget and it s importance to citizens (%) Importance of communal budget being published Not Not important important at all Important Very important Don't know Like in the previous dimension, there are a few aspects where the questionnaire seems not to work well: people seem not able to judge the accuracy of the communal budget in case it is exposed. Also, perception about the transparency of land development projects and land clearance seems to be too positive. These points need to be revised in the next stage Dimension 3: Accountability In this dimension we looked at the frequency of the interaction between people and government officials from different level as a degree of how close is the government to the people. Also, we investigated the establishment and function of the two main bodies designed by the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance to monitor public work and holding the local authorities accountable: The People s Inspection Board and the Community Investment Supervision Board. Furthermore, it looks into administrative complaints and citizen s trust in various institutions. Interaction between officials and people We believe that a higher frequency of interaction between people and official indicates that the government is closer to the citizen and more available and accessible to them. Across all level vilage, commune and district, Phu Tho has the least interaction between officials and people, while Dong Thap and Da Nang s cadres are similarly close to the people. Surprisingly, around 50% (in Phu Tho 74%) have never met with representative(s) of a mass organisation during the last 3 years. 30

31 Figure 22. Frequency of interaction between people and officials (%) 31

32 People s Inspection Board Around 30% across the provinces do not know about the existence of a People s Inspection Board, a body having the mandate of holding the local authorities and local public works accountable. Furthermore, Da nang and Phu Tho are not sure about how these Boards are supposed to be established while voted by people is the correct answer, in accordance with the GDO. Figure 23. Knowledge about People s Inspection Board (%) If properly implemented, the Board can be very powerful in monitoring the implementation of policies in the communes, ensuring complaints and denounces are addressed. The findings show that there is still a great potential to setup and effectively run these Boards which is one of the most important element of the design of the Grass-root Democracy Ordinance. There are several indicators in this dimension which will need to be revised as they didn t seem to work in the pilot. We ll need a way to assess better the quality of the work of the People s Inspection Boards. (The current data is not presented in the document as with the questionnaire didn t seem to be able to capture direct experience of the respondents). Similarly, the area related to Community Investment Supervision Board needs to be modified or event moved out if it turns out that this kind of Board is merged with the People s Inspection Board in most cases. Handling administrative complaints, while an important aspect of accountability, seems to be hard to be captured in the survey. Although we have several questions dealing with the topic, the number of respondents having experience with these complaints are so small so that the data are not meaningful. Another challenge is that asking about people s trust about diverse institutions such as various levels of government, the Parliament, the court, the police The answers in all provinces mostly cluster in the middle of the scale, indicating that people either cannot or do not want to respond in a differentiated way. This and the part discussed above of the survey needs to through a reworking. 32

33 5.5. Dimension 4: Anti-Corruption While this is an important dimension it is at the same time a challenge to capture the situation of corruption. As it is about experience and perception of ordinary citizens, we can only focus on petty corruption and not grand corruption. The dimension investigates the prevalence of various acts of petty corruption at the local level: bribery involved in making a birth certificate, in clinics and hospitals, school contribution, rent of public land, obtaining a construction permit, misuse of communal public funding, etc. It also asks about nepotism (through the instance of local school, clinic or public administration), the existence of witnessed or experienced harassment when people denounce corruption. Finally, it asks people s perception about the political will and effectively of various institutions (government, police, court, People s Inspectorate etc.) in their anti-corruption work. Knowledge about the Anti-Corruption Law Most people have heard about the Anti-Corruption Law, which confirms the fact that the Law has got good media coverage. Phu Tho again has the largest number of people who do not know about the law. Figure 24. Knowledge about the Anti-Corruption Law 33

34 Instances of petty corruption Obtaining a birth certificate seems to be straight-forward and without the envelope in most communes of the three provinces. Figure 8. Bribery in obtaining a birth certificate (%) The extent of bribery in district s hospitals is expectedly higher than in the commune s clinics and is highest in Phu Tho, with 40% confirming extra payment. Figure 9. Bribery in commune s clinics and district hospitals (%) Prevalence of nepotism The importance of personal contact in getting a job in the local state sector (school, clinic, People Committee) seem to be quite high in all three provinces. This is an interesting areas and should be explored further in the next round of implementation. 34

35 Figure 10. Role of personal contact in getting a job in the public sector 35

36 Citizen s actions if being victim of corruption The majority of people want to complain if they are victim of corruption themselves. The most named authority they would report to is the commune s People Committee. Apparently, village heads and Inspectorates are viewed as not being charged with relevant mandates and having competency. Figure 11. Citizen s action when personally experiencing corruption (%) Several questions of this part of the survey are not presented in this document as it seems they didn t work and we consider the data are not trustworthy the answers again lack differentiation. This relates to all the questions about political will and effectivity of organisations and institutions in anti-corruption effort. This might be an issue of sensitivity, or an issue of lacking experience from the respondent. This challenge applies to the module on discrimination of denouncing people as well. Overall, the dimension Corruption of the questionnaires has to be modified and extended to capture more and better information. This would be one of the major task in the PAPI roll-out next year Dimension 5: Administrative Procedures The dimension Administrative Procedure covers the following indicators: - The existence and quality of the One Stop Shop (OSS) at the commune level - The existence and quality of the One Stop Shop (OSS) at the commune level - The efficiency of the process of obtaining a land use right certificate (or the red book ) - The efficiency of the process of obtaining a civil construction permit The OSS was selected into the survey as it is one of the most important achievement of PAR and it is important to see how it is implemented across the provinces. On the other hand, obtaining land use right certificate and civil construction permit are the procedure most crucial for citizens and also most prone to corruption. 36

37 OSS at commune level Both knowledge about the existence of the commune OSS and the number of visit last year are lowest in Phu Tho, while they are about the same level in Dong Thap and Da Nang. Geographical accessibility might be one of the reason of Phu Tho data, where only 2/3 of the respondents are aware of the existence of their commune OSS. Figure 12. Existence and usage of commune OSS (%) The pattern are similar for the district s OSS, although in general much fewer people know about the OSS and actually use it. Figure 30. Existence and usage of district OSS (%) Table below gives more details on what the OSS have been used for in the last year in the pilot provinces. Notary services, land use right certificate and birth/death certificates are the most common services in use in all three provinces. 37

38 Table 6. Usage of OSSs OSSs used for Da Nang (%) Dong Thap (%) Phu Tho (%) Birth/death certificates Signatures/stamps on personal papers Notary services Social welfare policy Land use rights and related matters Application for construction permits Marriage certificates Education related paperwork Complaints Permanent residence and related matters Application for social bank loans Health insurance Business registration ID cards & passports Others (unclassified) Overall quality of administrative procedures compared to 3 years ago Administrative procedures have been improved impressively in Da Nang: 78% much better, compared to just 38% in Phu Tho. Also, don t know share in Phu Tho is higher than in other two provinces. Figure 31. Administrative procedures compared to 3 years ago (%) The survey asks a great deal about various aspects of the OSS and of each of the procedures above: transparency of information, bribery, competency of staff, keeping deadline, etc. However, like in the case of the anti-corruption module, we do feel that the answers are not differentiated enough. The reason for this has to be understood, probably through conducting focus group discussions, leading to the modification of the questionnaires. 38

39 5.7. Dimension 6: Public Services This part of the survey looks at the following fundamental public services which should be common in both urban and rural areas: - Medical insurance - Quality of health care (service provision at the commune and district level) - Quality of education (through the example of primary school) - Availability of electricity - Availability of garbage collection service - Availability of clean water - Quality of roads Government support for the poor in obtaining medical insurance Da Nang fairs best both in term of the number of people having medical insurance and in the extend the government supports the poor to buy medical insurance. In Phu Tho, people are less informed about whether or not this policy is implemented (27% don t know). Figure 13. Government support in obtaining medical insurance (%) Health care services While the general picture about the development of healthcare services in all three provinces is good, there is a large difference between Da Nang and Phu Tho. Dong Thap is in the middle. 18% in Phu Tho are not sure about how health care services have changed. 39

40 Figure 14. Health care services compared to 3 years ago (%) Health care services compared to 3 years ago Much worse A bit worse Same A bit better Much better Don't know Education services Dong Thap and Phu Tho have similar rate of children between 6 14 skipping school (3-4%), while no kid in the respondent households in Da Nang is not in school in the current school year. Figure 15. Number of children skipping school and distance to school Number of children skipping school No of children 6-14 Children skipping school Generally, the large majority in all provinces attest that primary education has been improved, although there is a large difference in the extend: 72% in Da Nang say it has improved a lot, compared to just 49% in Phu Tho. 40