The Good Governance Quandary: The Elusive Search for Role Models

A substantial consensus has emerged in development circles that the reason why some countries are rich and others poor is largely a reflection of the quality of their institutions – political, bureaucratic, and legal – and that countries with seriously dysfunctional institutions cannot expect to pursue a successful long-term trajectory of economic and social development. Many studies support this consensus, but institutional reform efforts for developed countries have resulted in mixed to weak results; many of these efforts have failed, for example, to establish a robust rule of law to protect the rights of citizens, publicly accountable political regimes, a meritocratic, noncorrupt, and efficient bureaucracy, and an independent media. Reportedly up to 60% of donor-assisted reforms have yielded no measurable increase in government effectiveness. It is inferred from this disappointing result that institutional transplants are often ineffective, and the path dependence, caused by accretions of the particularities of given countries’ histories, cultures, politics, ethnic and religious make-up, and geography leaves each country, for the most part, “to write its own history”.