Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

This project analyzes development assistance through a relational lens to reveal the power dynamics of externally-driven interventions within fragile and vulnerable areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Through an integrated conceptual and methodological framework of social capital theory and social network analysis, the research will take a comparative approach to examining prominent development initiatives as case studies in the two neighboring countries, where the economic and political transitions of one is dependent on the prosperity of the other (Felbab-Brown, 2013; Lieven, 2011). The project provides preliminary exploratory insights on the relevance of structural network properties to development policy outcomes, and future research directions for the next phase, which will include a qualitative comparative analysis at a sub-national and cross-national level.

Providing critical observations on the significance of stakeholder relationships within top-funded development programs in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the research examines social capital generation from an intervention as vital in the process to reducing "aid dependency" (Baliamoune-Lutz and Mavrotas, 2009). The project explores the critical conditions for successful, sustainable policy implementation among rural populations. It will produce micro and meso-level insights on development policy network structures involving primary exchanges among international actors and local counterparts that often shape and influence diverging mandates and agendas. Hence, structural properties translated from externally-driven networks, which illuminate such concepts of cohesion, power, dependency, and influence, can potentially create critical limitations on achieving goals for sustainable locally-owned processes.

This mixed-methods research design aims to enhance the aid-effectiveness literature by elevating relational insights while the global development agenda continues to incorporate new ways of advancing "social inclusion" and "localization" efforts (Sachs, 2015). As an emerging paradigm in development studies, policy network analysis and "network evaluations" (Davies, 2006) can serve as alternative and supplementary to the conventional methods of impact assessment. This study examines the significance of participatory development initiatives towards sustainability, and the need to re-conceptualize the relational orientation and social structure of externally-initiated aid-interventions. Further, the project aims to produce policy recommendations on the appropriate structural interventions or network modifications to support development programs and advance development impact studies.