Africa: PRSP's One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

PRSPs have largely failed to achieve the goal of effective country ownership, according to a new World Vision report released in April for the Spring Meetings, entitled 'One step forward, two steps back'. The report demonstrates how conditionalities, accompanied by the very real threat of closing the funding pipeline, have been used as a substitute for genuine ownership of reforms. It argues that conditionality is inherently contradictory to ownership, and is not an effective substitute for genuine commitment from governments to carry out reforms that have wide support.