Civil Society Consultation on Protected Social Programs in Structural Adjustment Loans
Between 2002 and 2003, three public consultation spaces were created in Montevideo, Paysandú and Florida, with the participation of local political representatives, local councilors, trade union delegates, beneficiaries, social organizations executing social programs, employers, entrepreneurs and members or volunteers of non-profit organizations. In the context of the recession of those years, structural reforms had to be carried out as part of certain loan conditions established by the World Bank. The purpose of the consultations, part of those conditions, was to promote citizen participation in the process of designing, implementing and evaluating such reforms, especially since social programs that protected vulnerable sectors of society should not be negatively affected by them. Also, part of the objective was to establish a social monitoring plan for the reforms.
Institutional design
Formalization: is the innovation embedded in the constitution or legislation, in an administrative act, or not formalized at all?
Frequency: how often does the innovation take place: only once, sporadically, or is it permanent or regular?
Mode of Selection of Participants: is the innovation open to all participants, access is restricted to some kind of condition, or both methods apply?
Type of participants: those who participate are individual citizens, civil society organizations, private stakeholders or a combination of those?
Decisiveness: does the innovation takes binding, non-binding or no decision at all?
Co-governance: is there involvement of the government in the process or not?
- Formalization
- not backed by constitution nor legislation, nor by any governmental policy or program
- Frequency
- single
- Mode of selection of participants
- both
- Type of participants
- civil society private stakeholders
- Decisiveness
- democratic innovation yields no decision
- Co-Governance
- yes
Means
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Ends
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