Sector Workers in Asia
Babken Babajanian
82Abstract
T
his chapter addresses the extent to which governance of social protection in developing countries in Asia translates into effective and equitable support to informal sector workers. The methodology used is a desk review of a number of sources, including published program reports and papers.The chapter identifies several weaknesses in the governance of social protection programs at a broader, system level as well as at the operational, program level. These weaknesses negatively affect efficiency, effectiveness, and equity of service delivery. At the system level, bottlenecks pertain to the extent of coordination and linkages across social protection programs as well as the depth of decentralization of governance functions. At the program level, governance challenges exist at all stages of the program cycle, including communications and outreach; targeting; benefit delivery; payment methods; monitoring, evaluation, and oversight; and grievance redress. These governance constraints are largely caused by inadequate design and implementation arrangements, along with weak institutional capacity.
Promoting systemic integration necessitates setting coherent policy goals and coordinating programs in terms of their objectives, target groups, benefit levels, and administrative systems. Responsive, equitable service delivery requires careful delineation of institutional and financing arrangements among different levels of government. Governance risks at the program level can be prevented,
82 The author gratefully acknowledges guidance and feedback from Sri Wening Handayani, Andrew
Parker, and Warren Turner, Asian Development Bank. The author also appreciates the insights of Silvia Masiero, London School of Economics, on India’s information and communication technology–enabled monitoring of social protection programs.
reduced, or mitigated through appropriate analysis, planning, design, and implementation of social protection programs. Good governance in social protection also requires a long-term effort to address broader institutional and political economy constraints at the national level.
Introduction
Governance in social protection is defined as “the set of incentives and accountability relationships that influence the way in which providers are held accountable for their behaviours and [their] ability to deliver services with quality and efficiency” (Bassett et al. 2012). Governance in a social protection context thus relates to two separate but related functions: (i) putting into place appropriate institutional arrangements (i.e., rules, regulations, and procedures for performing core service delivery functions), and (ii) implementation. Given the centrality of these two functions to the overall social protection effort, governance is critical for effective, accountable, and responsive service delivery. This chapter examines governance of social protection for informal workers in Asia. To date, there has been relatively limited analysis of how governance affects service delivery outcomes under social protection schemes. Several World Bank–commissioned reports (Bassett et al. 2012, Gianozzi and Kahn 2011, Rubio 2011, van Stolk 2010) have explicitly explored governance in social assistance, initiating a discussion on governance of social protection as a distinct policy and operational domain and offering concepts and frameworks that can be used as a starting point for further research and analysis.
This chapter is not meant to be comprehensive, given the variety of programs, modalities, and governance arrangements in the region. Existing studies on governance of social protection acknowledge this challenge (e.g., Bassett et al. 2012). This chapter uses case studies and examples that identify both the challenges and opportunities facing improvement of social protection programs in developing countries in Asia. It examines governance at a broader system level as well as at an operational program level.
Background
In the last decade, many countries and areas in the region have intensified efforts to strengthen social protection for supporting the poor and vulnerable, the majority of whom are employed in the informal economy. Informal sector workers make up as much as 80.0% of the labor market in some countries in the region (UNESCAP 2014a). The share of people working in the informal economy varies from 22.0% in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), to over
60.0% in India and Indonesia, and over 70.0% in Pakistan and the Philippines (UNESCAP 2014b).
The informal economy comprises economic activities outside of the official regulatory framework that governs the establishment and functioning of enterprises as well as labor, fiscal, and environmental matters (Canagarajah and Sethuraman 2001). The term “informal economy” used in this chapter is therefore relatively broad. Its coverage extends from agriculture workers— both in the for-profit and subsistence subsectors—to unpaid workers in the home-care economy, most of these being women engaged in productive work. The region has undergone an impressive expansion of programs that protect the poor and vulnerable over the past decade. However, it is social assistance— as opposed to social insurance—that has become the region’s major vehicle for supporting poor and vulnerable informal sector workers. This chapter is therefore mainly concerned with social assistance, i.e., cash and food transfers, and public works programs.
As for social insurance, there are ongoing efforts to extend its coverage. To date, however, social insurance programs do not protect informal workers against the negative economic impacts of sickness, unemployment, disability, and old age (Canagarajah and Sethuraman 2001, ILO 2013, Lund 2009). It is unsurprising that little evidence relating to the governance challenges facing social insurance schemes for workers in the informal economy is available.
Methodology
The chapter is based on a desk review and draws on a wide range of sources, including published program reports (e.g., program assessments, analytical reports, and policy briefs) and papers (e.g., working papers and academic articles).
Reviewing existing literature relating to governance of social protection is challenging. Other than a few studies, governance of social protection does not comprise a research topic of its own. One reason for this is that “governance” is a broad term that encompasses institutional arrangements and practices at the system, sector, and program levels. Analyzing the available evidence relating to the governance of social protection thus requires disaggregating this information into its various components such as targeting, benefit delivery, monitoring, and grievance redress. These aspects of governance tend to appear as components of more general studies of social protection programs. The chapter thus reviews a broad range of reports and papers that focus on different aspects of social protection as a means of identifying analyses, data, and other information relevant to the topic.
The studies that are available often focus on the operational aspects of social protection programs, and contain limited analysis of the contextual social, institutional, and political conditions that impact social protection outcomes. Where possible, the chapter addresses the context in which social protection programs are implemented.