Adaptive programming

Adaptive Programming

Key conclusions

·      Sustainable change is behaviour change.  Understanding the incentives which govern why people do what they do is essential.

·      Learning is essential. Programmes that cannot learn cannot operate in a dynamic or challenging context.

·      Opportunity matters.  Change - of any kind - is not guaranteed to happen; and sometimes the difference between success and failure can be down to how programmes make opportunity work for them.

·      Know your donor.  Getting to know the people who will make choices about programmes – both before they start and when they are underway – makes dealing with challenge and change easier.

·      Identity counts.  Programme teams need to be more than “just another donor”; and be able to work across cultural, political and economic divides. History in a context and working to build trust, collaboration, understanding and inclusion matter.

Adaptive programming

Donors are increasingly seeking adaptive approaches to delivering development programmes.  Whilst there is plenty of theory about the approach such as  this, there is somewhat less helpful guidance on how to go about it, although this, this and this offer some sensible starting points.

Development is about politics

Development is an ever evolving discipline.  It is increasingly recognised to be a political intervention.  And often the desired outcomes for development programmes implemented in complex environments are really about achieving change.

There is a growing body of literature about this.  Thinking and Working Politically (TWP), Doing Development Differently (DDD) and Problem Driven, Iterative Adaptation (PDIA) are some which shape donor approaches today.  And there is a growing interest in understanding how change happens as well as awareness that the answer is rarely purely technical.

But such programmes are seldom merely about a single developmental outcome.  Increasingly, donor interventions take place in the wider context of donor interests which (depending on the context) might include global security, trade promotion and/or the rule of law.

Understanding the wider backdrop to donor interests is key to delivering the programmes that they fund.

No actor is neutral

Although many development practitioners like to think of themselves and their organisations as neutral, the truth is that they are not. 

The perceptions of others are what really count.  And understanding how those perceptions might colour a potential partner’s engagement with a programme is key. 

Recognising that donors and the groups who implement their programmes are usually assumed to have an “angle”; and understanding what it might be and how it influences the behaviours of others is vital. 

Politics is about life

Key to successful implementation of an adaptive programme is understanding where power lies; why change happens; and how.  Understanding the incentives – and disincentives - which play on the people who make the choices is key to this.  And some of those incentives might not be the ones which implementers and donors would wish them to be.

Implementers of adaptive programmes also need to understand that they are governed, to a degree, by the domestic politics of their – sometimes multiple - donors too.  Like the local context, donor priorities and interests change over time.  So keeping a careful eye on wider donor policy objectives is a key task too.

  

Shaping an intervention

Making sure that a proposed programme is well founded and has realistic expectations of the changes that are possible is vital to programme success.  Working with partners and also with donors to help them understand the art of the possible is a core programme activity.  In this respect it is as important to understand the political economy in which the donor operates as it is to understand the one in which citizens and potential partners operate.

Life is about people

The logical starting point for this kind of programming then, is to begin with where people find themselves now; and then to go with the grain, accompanying them on their journey rather than a route defined by others.  Understanding how people interact with the politics of their context, with institutions and with donors is therefore essential.  They will be as much governed by the class, family, ethnic group, religion and society from which they come as by a shared understanding of the anticipated developmental benefit of a proposed donor programme. 

Learning to read and understand the motivations of key actors is essential.  Complex political economy tools are available, but the Everyday Political Analysis (EPA) tool is a straightforward and helpful starting point.  The essential point of this activity is to generate a shared understanding and analysis of the political context that informs all the relevant actors – citizens; partners; programme staff; and donors.  How this shared analysis is arrived at and maintained will depend on the context and the motivation of those involved.  But this kind of political economy work should be seen as a process more than a product; and should be considered a live and evolving activity.

Skilful navigation

Within this context, then, the ability of the implementer of a programme to convene all the actors in a safe space and to understand the wider context is essential.  The art of delivering an  adaptive programmes is the ability to understand and work towards a wider programme goal whilst all the time fine tuning implementation against the back drop of what is politically possible.

Traditionally development programmes have planned to work in an orderly way through a series of milestones towards a clearly defined end point – much like orienteering, a sport in which contestants run from known fixed point to known fixed point as quickly as possible. 

But adaptive programming is a little bit more like sailing a boat in stormy weather.  In order to arrive at the desired destination, “skilful navigators” need to work constantly to adapt to the effect of wind and tide; and always need to know exactly where they are, bearing in mind that sometimes it is necessary to go backwards in order ultimately to make progress.  In this way, the final destination is reached by the most efficient possible route – even if, thanks to the elements, it was not the one upon which the sailor had originally embarked.

Key conclusion:

Sustainable change is behaviour change

Development programmes cannot, alone, bring about change.  But they can influence the behaviour of the people who make up society and its institutions.  The essence, then, of adaptive programming is to promote behaviour change in order to influence the rules of the game and to contribute towards change over time.

People shape the context

As with the pressures which play on the people with whom an adaptive programme might work, the context within which it operates shifts all the time.  This requires programmes constantly to monitor the environment within which they work; and to test and adjust their stance and interventions on a continual basis.

Over time, the practice of monitoring the context continuously translates into a form of learning culture.  Rather than continuously discovering “new” aspects of the environment, adaptive programmes start to learn how the rules of the game play out.  They – the people they employ; the partners they reach; wider stakeholders - stop observing the system as outsiders and start understanding it as actors.  The ability to form and network relationships and understanding with and between this wide range of relevant actors is how the sum comes to add up to more than its parts.

Feedback counts

The ability to know that a programme is being effective is critical.  This requires an ability to gather and understand almost real time data.  Monitoring, evaluation and learning are vital tools in an adaptive programme.  They help the programme management to switch resources between activities based on a rapid assessment of the return on investment that they represent.  Perhaps more importantly, they provide a way for partners and programme management together to plan strategically in order to learn from both success and failure, and to realise a shared vision.  In this way, evaluation ceases to be something which is done “to” partners; and is welcomed as a part of forward thinking strategic planning.

But learning from success is only part of the story.  Understanding what has not worked – and why – is possibly more helpful than knowing that an intervention is working as predicted.  A programme culture which ranks success on an equal footing with an ability to draw positive lessons from any activities which do not deliver as anticipated is likely to be more successful than one driven by quantitative measures alone.  It is often the less successful interventions which offer the greatest potential for learning about how to be successful.

In designing a monitoring, evaluation and learning strategy for an adaptive programme, it is important to focus on the programme’s contribution towards a desired change, rather than only on the inputs that it has made. 

In this approach, care must be taken to avoid diluting or undermining the important issue of local ownership.  Adaptive programmes exist to support the efforts of others, not to create a profile for themselves.  The egos of the programme team – and any desire on the part of donors to “brand” success as theirs – needs to be left firmly at the door.   

Key conclusion:

Learning is essential

Without a designed-in capacity to learn, adaptive programmes will be unable to focus on their overall programme goals, leaving them vulnerable to mission creep or misplaced donor expectations.  Learning involves discovering not just “what” to do, but “how” to do it in the local context.  The learning that such programmes develop do not just shape their actions, but they inform the choices which are made about them by others.  Donors who understand the context better will make longer-term investments.  Partners who see that programmes understand their reality will engage more fully.

Conditioning the environment

Shaping the choices that donors make is a key opportunity – one which only really occurs before a formal decision to contract an activity is taken. 

Donor choices are not always as well founded as they might be; and may be a response as much to their domestic political context as anything else.   The view from within an Embassy is not always the same as the view of an Embassy from the outside.  Programme staff can play an important role in helping donors to remain focused on what is politically, technically and socially possible in the prevailing context.  But the extent to which this is possible from within an ongoing programme is limited.  Permanent in-country representation which pre-dates a programme and will endure beyond its end offers implementers a greater stake in the choices about what to do and how to do it.  Employing this capacity to shape donor choices and expectations before they are formalised is a useful investment in helping adaptive programmes hit the ground running.

Key conclusion:

Opportunity matters

Sometimes, despite significant efforts to promote change, nothing happens.  But at other times, change happens almost out of the blue.  Adaptive programmes cannot guarantee change, but they can help to promote opportunities for change. They can help to prepare for a time – or opportunity – which has not yet come.  Often, the key factor which makes change possible turns out to be chance. 

Natural disaster – or dramatic political change – can sometimes provide an opportunity for intervention.  Being positioned to identify and exploit such opportunities in a timely manner is an important capability of an adaptive programme.

Strategic patience

An essential element of conditioning the environment within which choices about what to do and how to do it are made is the need for time.  Many of the changes that adaptive programmes seek to promote may only become truly evident long after their formal end.  Although change might happen quickly, it might equally happen very slowly indeed; and it may be that a programme’s contribution to that change is difficult to discern until some time has passed.  Programme teams and donors need to understand the value of strategic patience in ensuring that their interventions can be as effective and sustainable as possible.  As a general rule, the stakeholders in a change have not read the logframe developed between donors and programmes; and will embrace change at their own speed and on their own terms.

Flexible approaches

Adaptive programmes are all about flexibility.  But having the actual flexibility to meet goals requires more than just an intellectual understanding of progress.  In the same way that the programme needs to be flexible, programme management needs to be able to adapt to a changing environment.  Fixed budgets and rigid staffing structures, as well as procurement mechanisms designed more for commercial contractors than fragile partners can all constrain a programme’s ability to be flexible and exploit opportunity.

Impressions count

Programme teams occupy a contested space between donors and local actors.  To be really effective in the local context – to play more than just a “donor” role – programmes need to draw on an identity that is attractive to partners; one which inspires them to work with the programme in the way that it wants and needs.  Adaptive programmes need to be able to convene people in safe spaces, to facilitate processes, help to connect expertise to issues and facilitate the development of capacity.  Key to this is legitimacy.  This legitimacy stems from the ability to employ the right people; to empower them with knowledge and understanding; adopt ways of working with others that demonstrates respect for local agendas; and is based on enduring and trusting relationships founded on shared values and principles.

Implementers of adaptive programmes need to be clear about “who” they are; and in whose interests they are working.  Maintaining at least a local perception of independence from donor politics is essential.  This task is made considerably easier if the programme team can trade on a long established reputation for trust, understanding, collaboration and inclusion. 

Key conclusion:

Know your donor

Hidden beneath the formal language of donor positions and contracts are real people.  Understanding them, and the pressures and incentives which play on them (including as, over time, the key personalities change), is every bit as important as understanding the local context.  Developing positive relations with donors helps to smooth out the dialogue with them, ensuring that challenges and changes can be explored in a neutral manner.  Where you have multiple donors, time spent upfront harmonising their focus is time well spent.

Key conclusion:

Identity counts

Who you are matters just as much as who you represent.  It conditions how interlocutors perceive programmes; and how they respond to it. As the implementer of a donor funded programme, people’s expectations of your interests and conduct will be shaped from the outset.  How you work in an inclusive way to increase collaboration and develop shared understanding between actors will also, over time, determine the level of trust in your programme. Managing and shaping partner perceptions (as well as donor and other local perceptions) is key; and seeking to be more than just another donor matters.

Political Economy Analysis

Political Economy Analysis (PEA) is…

“I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never actually known what the question is.”

Deep Thought, the computer designed to calculate the answer to the ultimate question of life,

the universe and everything in Douglas Adam’s book the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy,

after seven and a half million years of working on the problem.

…about people

Although often billed as a mapping of events and institutions, it is really people who shape both.  (Although there are times when even the best intentioned people are unable to overcome the effects of a poorly conceived programme or an inappropriately designed institution.)  So, however billed, a PEA is essentially about the motivations and incentives which surround key people; and their interaction with the world around them.  These motivations and incentives might be relatively formal – known political affiliation; salary; opportunity; corruption; profile; status; etc.  Or they may be much more informal such as family and clan affiliation and the need to (be seen to) deliver advantage for others.  PEA is, therefore, about why people do what they do.  And the why can change in subtle and hard to notice ways, sometimes delivering substantial – and unexpected and sometimes unwelcome - changes in the what.

But by understanding the motivations and incentives which play on key actors, it is often possible to shape a programme’s engagement or message to deliver benefit.  Seeing programme ambition through the lens of its counterparts is key to how it makes a difference.

…a process not a product

But the motivations and incentives which shape the environment within which key choices are made are dynamic – and not in any way static.  Following the external factors which affect the environment – and the behaviour of those within it – helps a programme to sense change in the air and to predict (or, perhaps more accurately, guess) how key interlocutors may adapt their behaviour.

In this respect, the practice of political economy analysis is a continuous process of identifying change and calculating how that change can be influenced – often by programmatic means.  It follows, therefore, that programme teams should always simulate the effect of their choices on others in order to avoid unexpected and/or unwelcome outcomes.  This requires a strong interface between strategy teams and their associated programmers.  The two disciplines should make choices informed by each other’s insights and experience.

This is not to suggest that there is not value in a formal PEA product – employed, for example, as part of the analysis underpinning an inception report.  But if the value of this product is not to be measured merely in crude terms such as weight, length or word count, it should be specifically focussed on the targets of the programme; and should avoid nugatory or self-serving content.  (There is a tendency to “arm” programmes – particularly during inception phases – with lengthy PEA texts which consume resources to produce and read and which provide little by way of operational guidance to decision makers.)  It should also avoid the temptation to employ a top down approach which seeks to bend programme reality to a theory of change developed in the abstract.

But there are political risks associated with drawing up and writing down a political economy analysis.  There is a danger that key but fragile relationships could be harmed if the analysis is ever divulged; and a risk that that the analysis generated by a programme fails to “fit” the world view of the donor.  Censoring – self or otherwise – a political economy analysis risks trapping programmes teams between the vanities of a donor and the insecurities of partners.  In this respect, seeing PEA as a process helps to mitigate the political risks associated with them as the activity can be portrayed as ongoing learning, rather than one of judgement and pronouncement.

…an art not a science

There are very few “right” answers in political economy analysis.  At their very best, PEA is a guide to interpretation of events and behaviour.  This requires an acknowledgement that they are often as much about “feel” as they are about facts.  (For example, the original – and factually established – causes of a grievance or a conflict are often lost in the mists of time, and a new set of more self-serving motivations and incentives have colonised the original ideology.  Under these circumstances, an account of historical events is of general interest but does little to explain current behaviour.)

…better crowd-sourced than constructed by a lone wolf

The development and use of PEA is essential to making programmes effective.  But, being based as much on “feel” as on facts and being all about the motivations and incentives which play on the behaviour of people, is often a matter of perspective.  Ensuring the PEA approach in use by a programme is as appropriate as possible means ensuring that it both draws on a range of sources – “diversity of reception” – and is not skewed by personal and/or political bias.  Whilst the task of coordinating PEA may fall to one person on a programme team, or perhaps a small group, it should not be left to perspectives of that individual or small group.  PEA should draw on and be informed by a wide range of views and ideas, most easily available from within the programme community – the programme team and its partnerships.  To a large degree, political economy analysis should be “brokered” from within the team and led by them, although it should not be allowed to become a lowest common denominator.

Often, PEA work is carried out by an external actor. Although such an external actor can bring a wealth of experience to the process and the ability to ask what might seem obvious questions, the eventual analysis needs to be owned by the programme team.  Wherever possible, the role of the external actor should be to facilitate the generation and application of analysis from within the team – to carry it out “with” them and not to deliver it “to” them.

…is a tool for asking better questions rather than getting a definitive answer

So, in essence, PEA is not about getting answers at all.  But about improving the questions that a programme team asks of itself as they attempt to integrate their goals with the realities which they encounter in their working and private lives.  By having better questions, teams will be better placed to identify a set of potentially better answers.

The African Union at Fifty: Peace and Security

Fifty years since its original inception, the African Union (AU) reflects a significantly changed African and global environment. Its predecessor, the Organization of African Unity (OAU), established in Addis Ababa, on 25 May 1963, was dedicated to combating colonialism, promoting the economic and political future of Africa, defending the sovereignty of African states, and to promoting a better life for African people. But today, for many in Africa, freedom and sovereignty have yet to translate into significantly improved lives. 

The OAU struggled with the challenges of decolonization and securing the continent’s emerging states, buffeted all the time by Cold War politics. By contrast the AU operates in a highly globalized environment, grappling with many all too familiar security challenges – and some very modern ones too.

To a degree OAU Summits – and meetings of its various security organs – were more like a reunion gathering of senior military officers than serious intergovernmental efforts to address the complexity of life for ordinary Africans. But the AU, wielding its new broom, tries - with varying degrees of success – to hold its own in the cauldron of global insecurity and economic meltdown. But, both were born of their time, and both played vital roles in advancing Africa’s cause.

Despite the heavy hand of military leadership and apparently permanently installed presidents, the OAU did a great deal to set the future scene for the AU’s work: to promote the peace and security Africa needs to allow its citizens to develop and prosper. The declining years of the Cold War allowed significant African-led developments to take place in the continent’s peace and security architecture.

In May 1991, the Africa Leadership Forum proposed the formation of an African Peace Council. It proposed that the Council should 'move Africa from the confinement of purely reacting to events, to a capacity of anticipatory and containment measures for its security'. The Council, designed to operate under the OAU framework, was to 'have discretion to effect a measure of intervention in national security problems of participating member states'. 

Building on this, African heads of state and government issued the 1993 Cairo Declaration on the Establishment of the Central Organ of the Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution. The declaration marked a departure from previous OAU approaches to conflict by acknowledging the need to introduce fundamental changes in order to achieve peace and stability through preventing and resolving conflicts. 

This trend away from state-centric, security-led approaches towards a more citizen-centred, development-led approach continued with the signature of the AU Constitutive Act on 11 July 2000 in Lomé, Togo. Departing from the OAU's early emphasis on absolute sovereignty and non-interference, the Constitutive Act empowers the AU with the right 'to intervene in a Member State pursuant to a decision of the Assembly in respect of grave circumstances'. In effect the Constitutive Act marked the final step in a move towards formal conflict management structures.  

Following its inauguration July 2002, the AU promulgated a Protocol Relating to the Establishment of the Peace and Security Council, which articulated a broad framework for implementing preventive diplomacy. This transformation led to the development of the new and wide-ranging Africa Peace and Security Architecture (APSA), marking the end of Africa’s conceptual journey away from an elite club of undemocratic leaders to a much more citizen-centred approach.

Since its establishment, the AU – from a zero base – has mounted peace support missions of variable but generally improving quality in a number of African conflicts. Key interventions have included Burundi, Darfur, the Comoros and Somalia. Developing the capacity to design, mandate and deploy these missions – along with the less visible work the Union has undertaken on peace and security issues on the continent – has been far from easy. And it has often been a highly frustrating experience for Africa's international partners. But few visitors to Mogadishu now doubt the bravery and skill of African civilians and soldiers working in one of the most complex security environments on earth.

But even as Africa struggles to sustain some relatively classic peace support missions, it is having to get to grips with an increasing range of policy challenges. Understanding the role that security plays in promoting development, and working to promote both in a global security environment characterized by global terrorism, trans-national crime, maritime insecurity and other cross-cutting threats such as climate change, migration and the competition for economic growth, is Africa’s next great challenge.

If the last fifty years were about the continent’s security in a conventional sense, the next fifty years will be about working to promote human security in an increasingly complex environment. Africa should no longer be the place where ideological battles between West and East or secular and radical forces are played out, but the place where Africans finally complete their decolonization – of the land and of the mind – and become full partners in the global political, economic and security environment. 

Re-posted from the Chatham House website: http://www.chathamhouse.org/media/comment/view/191345

South Sudan/security sector: When turning the oil back on is not all good

The Republic of Sudan and the republic of South Sudan have quietly agreed to re-start oil production.  This is, of course, a good thing and is much to be encouraged.  In the case of South Sudan, it paves the way for paying back all the short term debt that the oil stoppage has forced upon the country, and permits the Government to dust off plans for investing in the infrastructure and services vital to this fragile country’s stability. 

The plans are already in place.  The South Sudan Development Plan (SSDP) 2011-2013 was a first and serious attempt by Government to prepare a strategic, prioritised development plan.  But some – with credibility – argue that the content was too driven by external (donor) interests.  The evidence for this is perhaps the curious downplaying of security.  The security sector consumes over 40% of South Sudan’s budgeted resources, and in reality a far greater portion of the actual cash available.  No doubt a lot of this money is misdirected – the problem being as much a reluctance on the part of security actors to be held to account as a reluctance of South Sudanese people to ask questions of them.  The most effective way to reduce the cost over time will be a change of culture, as much as anything else.

But for now, the facts of life are that South Sudan is paying a great deal to a security sector which is largely ineffective.  Frankly neither the army nor the police (or indeed any other agency) are much good.  The resources allocated to them are both wasted in terms of expenditure; and fail to represent any kind of real return on investment when measured against insecurity (which endures) and access to justice (which does not).  It was clear from the preparation of the SSDP that South Sudanese people rated security in all its forms as their highest priority.  But donors did not want to hear this, so the focus of the SSDP is on infrastructure (another source of significant corruption) and production.   The main effort needs to be a reduction in the cost of the security sector (along with a concomitant increase in both its effectiveness and accountability) in order to liberate resources for development.  This will require donors to recognise what South Sudanese people already know – (in)security holds an almost complete veto on any other kind of progress.  The trick is not to prioritise security over other forms of development (or vice versa), but to move both security and wider development forward together in an integrated fashion.  South Sudan has a plan which does this, but donors are cherry picking.

The cost of the security sector is not entirely wasted.  If the army (and to a degree the police) are actually composed of various opposing factions and groups which have been integrated for largely political-security reasons, some of the cost of the sector is in fact the price of peace.  Another inconvenient truth which donors don’t seem to fully understand.

In many respects, the oil shut down was fortunate.  It reduced the cash available to such an extent that even the security sector had to make sacrifices.  This provided an opportunity to work closely, and at a strategic level, with Government to target limited resources; and created the conditions where it was possible to engage Government on both the cost and effectiveness of the security sector.  Switching the oil back on risks dis-incentivising real security sector reform, a danger amplified by the tunnel vision of development partners who do not appear to understand that security is a development issue. 

EU/Africa: Ten years of the Africa Peace Facility

The European Union (EU) is evaluating the first ten years of the Africa Peace Facility (APF).  The APF was established following the African Union (AU) Summit in Maputo in 2003 as a means to finance (i) the development of African peace support capacity; and (ii) African-led peace support operations (PSO).  It was originally funded from left over European Development Fund (EDF) resources – although it has from time to time been topped-up bilaterally by EU member states.  The EDF origins of the APF have led to a rhetoric about shared ownership of the resources.  Since it began, the APF has disbursed slightly in excess of one billion Euros – about 85% of which has gone on the financing the cost of various African PSO with the remainder spent on capacity building at AU and sub-regional level.

There appear to be differences of view within Europe about the purpose of the APF.  This is perhaps characterised by some who contrast a one billion Euro investment with the total inability of ECOWAS to deliver a force to Mali – despite funds specifically allocated to this.  But there are deeper tensions within Europe.  Support for the APF as currently constituted is not rock solid.  Africa (and some in the European Commission) would like to dispense with the capacity building element of the APF – largely because the PSO demand is vast and apparently bottomless; and partly because there are in fact other EU funds which could be used.  But altering the balance between conflict management (PSO) and conflict prevention (capacity building) within the APF would almost certainly destroy it as some EU member states think that the purpose of the APF is actually capacity building.

Atmospherics

After ten years of the APF, a great deal of positive change is evident.  The EU (at least at official level) is less patronising in its approach to the African partners and more willing to understand that the development process will be evolutionary and long. And the various African institutions rub along better than they used to.  But the question of subsidiarity is still not yet resolved in Africa.  This is leading to inefficiency and waste – both in terms of using donor funds and in terms of who does what in Africa.

Politics

The EU are clear that the APF is a funding instrument.  This (narrow and technocratic) position is what enables them to be patient in terms of actual improved African capability.  But it is quite clear that others in Europe are much clearer that they want some return for what is anyone’s book a large investment.  There is a relative lack of any strategic link between the activities (and goals) of the APF on the one hand; and Europe’s wider political-security interests and concerns on the other.  It is perhaps naive to assume that Europe will continue to pay out at this rate without some quid pro quo – a point which many Africans assume yet European seems to ignore.

Mission creep

The one area where European political-security interests seem to have had an impact is in the (always loose) definition of what the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) actually is.  In 2003/4, APSA was largely about building institutions and capabilities: the Peace and Security Council; the Africa Standby Force; the Continental Early Warning System; the Panel of the Wise.  Now the EU’s definition still includes these institutions but adds a number of specific effects or policy goals such as counter-piracy and maritime security.   Africa does not seem to actually share the EU’s political-security goals in their entirety.  The continent is still very much in a phase characterised by the management of operations and the development of institutional capacity.  There is a gentle divergence between African and European ambition developing.  This will likely lead to an increasingly a la carte approach to developing the APSA which is unlikely to be particularly helpful going forward.

C + C = C

Getting the best – for Europe and Africa – from a future incarnation of the APF will require more than just bureaucracy.  The officials of the various inter-governmental organisations have a key role to play.  They need to work to improve their cultural awareness of their partners within the APF; and to work to improve formal and informal communication between them.  These two Cs will lead to improved confidence leading in turn to better outcomes. The formula for future APF success ought to be: Culture + Communications = Confidence.