Opinion of the Committee of the Regions on governance in the European consensus on development
Date: 2007-06-07
Institutions: European Committee of the Regions
Subjects: ACP countries, Africa, EU policy, cooperation policy, developing countries, development policy, governance

C 197/52

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

24.8.2007

Opinion of

the Committee of

the Regions on governance in the European consensus on

development

(2007/C 197/09)

THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS

— believes that democratic governance is the foundation for achieving the millennium development
goals (MDGs) and must be based on a broad approach, and that better governance is the key to a
successful development policy. The key element of good governance is a recognition that the best
decisions are taken as near to grassroots level as possible;

— believes that it is not nearly enough to talk about the ‘key role that local authorities can play in
achieving the MDGs’; governance requires all tiers of authority in a country to govern according to
the principles of transparency, public participation and respect for subsidiarity. As a consequence,

— believes it is essential, under these circumstances, particularly for countries bordering the Mediterra-
nean (many of which are also concerned by the Africa strategy), to reiterate the recommendations it
made in its opinion of 13 October 2005 on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Euro-Mediter-
ranean partnership and repeated in the conclusions of the Valencia seminar on 10 April 2007, for the
establishment of a Euro-Mediterranean forum of local authorities.

— draws attention to the financial support that local governance deserves: the maximum 15 % budget
allocation which, under the 10th EDF regulation, may be earmarked for support for civil society, tech-
nical cooperation and governance (where this has not been chosen as a concentration area) seems
manifestly inadequate; this ceiling should be raised to at least 25 %,
in order to cover both the
national and local dimensions.

— calls on the European Commission, in accordance with the objectives of the cooperation agreement
for the development of decentralised cooperation, to provide technical and financial support and to
work with the Committee on the establishment of a decentralised cooperation exchange with a view
to facilitating and coordinating more effectively the development of decentralised cooperation acti-
vities conducted by EU local and regional authorities and their counterparts in developing countries.

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Official Journal of the European Union

C 197/53

I. Policy recommendations

Communication from the Commission to the Council, the Euro-
pean Parliament, the European Economic and Social Committee
and the Committee of the Regions on Governance in the Euro-
pean Consensus on Development — Towards a harmonised
approach within the European Union

COM(2006) 421 final — SEC (2006) 1020, SEC (2006) 1021,
SEC (2006) 1022

THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS

endorses many of the general ideas set out in the Commis-

1.
sion's communication to the effect that:

a) democratic governance is the foundation for achieving the
millennium development goals (MDGs) and must be based
on a broad approach: it should not be limited to the fight
against corruption, but should stem from the interplay
between various factors whose smooth running determines a
country's life and progress for the benefit of all;

a) governance means the installation of credible and competent
local authorities, able to deliver the advances of democratic
decentralisation to their
respecting their
rights and meeting their needs;

fellow citizens,

b) all cooperation policies and programmes run by the EU —
Commission and Member States alike — must take proper
account of the need to give the local authorities of devel-
oping countries and countries in transition the means to
shoulder the responsibilities falling to them, and to give
European local authorities
support
the means
through their experience and know-how;

to offer

c) progress

in local governance and the obstacles
it can
encounter should be evaluated constantly at country level.
The information garnered should be collated by regional
observatories designed to be the focal points for exchanges
between local elected representatives in the various countries
and the dissemination of best practice. These observatories
could also monitor relations between the local authorities in
the region concerned and local authorities in the European
Union or possibly other regions, as is the case with the
Observatory for EU — Latin America Local Decentralised
Cooperation,
in this connection, the priority
today should be to establish a second observatory for rela-
tions between African, local and regional authorities;

in Barcelona;

b) the process of ownership and political dialogue should be
preferred to conditions set externally that can have a negative
impact on local people;

d) in general terms, the decentralisation process in the deve-
loping countries should be given special attention when
drafting each country strategy paper;

c) all European donors should be given common reference
points for implementing the principle of governance in their
various activities,
in the spirit of the Paris Declaration of
2 March 2005;

wishes to reaffirm the principle that it expressed in the
2.
recommendations made in its own-initiative opinion on the role
of decentralised cooperation in development policy reform
(CdR 224/2005), namely that better governance is the key to a
successful development policy and the key element of good
governance is a recognition that the best decisions are taken as
near to grassroots level as possible;

considers as a result that the effective implementation of
3.
democratic governance means not restricting the principles set
out by the Commission to national or intergovernmental level
but taking on the issues of decentralisation and democracy at
local level; recommends therefore planning not just for interac-
tion between the various sectors of national life only, but also
seeking good coordination between national and local tiers of
government;

4.
believes that it is not nearly enough to talk about the ‘key
role that local authorities can play in achieving the MDGs’;
governance requires all tiers of authority in a country to govern
according to the principles of transparency, public participation
and respect for subsidiarity. This is why implementation of the
Commission communication must be based on the following
principles:

recommends being prepared for the difficulties that may
5.
be encountered in relations with beneficiary country govern-
ments, when sub-national layers of government are taken into
account, in connection with the implementation of the owner-
ship principle proposed in the European Union's development
strategy.

With regard to local authorities in developing countries, particularly
those in ACP and African countries

ACP countr ies

6.
recommends first and foremost giving full effect to the
new Article 4 of the revised Cotonou Agreement and providing
for proper consultation of decentralised local authorities on the
fine-tuning of EU aid programmes negotiated with the govern-
ment of the country concerned;

7.
believes it is essential that information on the procedures
and impact of this consultation be made available to associa-
tions of local elected representatives in the countries concerned;

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Official Journal of the European Union

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8.
welcomes in this respect the dissemination of guidelines to
the Commission Delegations, so as to raise their awareness of
the local dimension of EU activities, particularly in the area of
in line with the recommendation it made in its
governance,
opinion CdR 224/2005; but regrets not having received those
documents for information;

instance the creation of the CCRA, the African branch of the
UCLG); the success of the periodical meetings of Africities, as
again confirmed in Nairobi in September 2006, shows that
the expectations of locally elected representatives are high in
this respect;

believes that

the structure of

the ‘governance profile’
9.
should be revised as it gives little room to the principle of
ownership and offers little improvement in promoting demo-
cratic governance at local level: far from being a dimension in
its own right it is fragmented and divided among a number of
the nine headings (1); conversely, the decentralisation dimension
of a number of headings (rule of law, economic governance,
etc.) deserves to be considered separately;

10.
recommends, meanwhile, that the ‘governance initiative’,
a financial reserve designed to act as an incentive for ‘real
change and decisive progress in democratic governance’, be used
primarily to develop the connection between national and local
levels of government, while upholding the principles of fairness,
transparency and public participation, and that governments
should not benefit unless they are committed to giving local
authorities the funds to match the responsibilities conferred on
them;

support

draws attention to the financial

local
11.
governance deserves:
the maximum 15 % budget allocation
which, under the 10th EDF regulation, may be earmarked for
support for civil society, technical cooperation and governance
(where this has not been chosen as a concentration area) seems
manifestly inadequate; this ceiling should be raised to at least
25 %, in order to cover both the national and local dimensions.

that

Afr ica

welcomes the fact

12.
the reports generated by the
African peer review mechanism (APRM), designed and run by
the African countries themselves as part of NEPAD, can be used
as the basis for the governance profile;

that

13.
would like to see the attention and support that the EU
is prepared to give to this national self-evaluation exercise
contribute to boosting local authority participation and progress
in decentralisation and to launching
action
programme to address the weaknesses observed;

a national

14.
reiterates that for the public to see the decentralisation of
powers as genuine progress, it is vitally important to strengthen
the capacity of local authorities. Action in this area can take
various forms, for instance:

a) providing more support for networks of local elected repre-
(for

sentatives, at national, regional or continental

level

(1) 1) Political/democratic governance, 2) political governance/rule of law:
judicial and law enforcement system, 3) control of corruption,
4) government effectiveness, 5) economic governance, 6) internal and
external security, 7) social governance, 8) international and regional
context, 9) quality of partnership.

b) boosting the means by which organisations such as the MDP
(municipal development programme, based in Cotonou) —
which provide technical support for local elected representa-
tives and enable them to pool their ideas and experience —
can increase their effectiveness;

c) giving local elected representatives access to effective infor-
mation technology, not least by means of the digital soli-
darity initiative;

15.
recommends involving organisations that bring together
local elected representatives and represent their concerns in the
bodies that oversee political dialogue between the EU and the
countries
summit
in particular
planned for the second half of 2007.

the EU-Africa

concerned,

With regard to other world regions

16.
is pleased to note that in Latin America, decentralisation
appears to be a factor in State modernisation; and wishes to be
informed of progress with the implementation of the gover-
nance programme announced for 2008 for the Asia region;

the

the

fact

welcomes

‘governance

facility’
that
17.
announced in the Commission communication appears in the
European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI),
and asks to be involved in the implementation of the coopera-
tion programme between local and regional authorities in
partner and EU countries beyond cross-border areas, provided
for in the 2007-2010 interregional programme (IRP)
from
2008;

18.
is disappointed, however, that the various agreements
signed between the EU and each of the countries concerned by
the European neighbourhood policy give very little attention to
the local dimension of governance;

believes it is essential, under these circumstances, particu-
19.
larly for countries bordering the Mediterranean (many of which
are also concerned by the Africa strategy),
to reiterate the
recommendations it made in its opinion CdR 142/2005 of
13 October 2005 on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the
Euro-Mediterranean partnership and repeated in the conclusions
of the Valencia seminar on 10 April 2007 (CdR 59/2007), for
the establishment of a Euro-Mediterranean forum of
local
authorities.

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With regard to local authorities in the EU

20.
recalls, first of all, its previous opinion (CdR 224/2005)
calling for these authorities to be given proper consideration in
European development policy, and hopes that the organisations
that represent them at international and European level will be
able to have an effective dialogue with the European institu-
tions;

21.
intends to play to the full its part within the European
institutions as the EU body representing local authorities, which
both preserve and deliver democratic governance to the people;
hopes to be involved in the EU's political dialogue with the
various regions of the world, particularly Africa, and believes
that the forthcoming EU-Africa summit should provide the first
opportunity;

22.
wishes in particular to be involved in the dialogue with
local authorities in the countries concerned, so as to pool ideas
on the implementation of decentralisation and current practice
for encouraging progress with democratic governance; considers
for that reason that when the Cotonou Agreement
is next
revised, decentralised authorities ought to be given the same
attention as economic and social interest groups in the institu-
tional mechanism, and that
the agreement should have a
mechanism similar to the one currently provided for under
Protocol 1.4 regarding the European Economic and Social
Committee;

23.
reiterates that European local authorities wish to share
their experience and know-how with their counterparts in other

Brussels, 7 June 2007.

regions of the world; they are already doing that, not least in
peace-related initiatives such as the ‘diplomacy of cities’, but
governance policy should also benefit from their help in various
ways:

a) encouraging closer links and exchanges between national
associations of elected representatives from Europe and other
regions of the world;

b) bolstering existing ties between authorities in the realm of
decentralised cooperation and, where appropriate,
forma-
lising them in networks focusing on a particular theme or
geographical area;

c) forging new links between European local authorities and
twinning

those in other world regions by means of
programmes.

24.
calls on the European Commission, in accordance with
the objectives of the cooperation agreement for the develop-
ment of decentralised cooperation,
to provide technical and
financial support and to work with the Committee on the esta-
blishment of a decentralised cooperation exchange with a view
to facilitating and coordinating more effectively the development
of decentralised cooperation activities conducted by EU local
and regional authorities and their counterparts in developing
countries. This cooperation exchange could take the form of an
online service where assistance needs and requests could be
matched with corresponding expressions of interest or offers.

The President

of the Committee of the Regions

Michel DELEBARRE

II. Procedure

Title

References

Legal basis

Procedural basis

Date of Council referral

Date of President's decision

Commission responsible

Communication from the Commission to the Council, the
European Parliament, the European Economic and Social
Committee and the Committee of the Regions on Gover-
nance in the European Consensus on Development —
Towards a harmonised approach within the European
Union

COM(2006) 421 final — 2006/1020 (SEC) 2006/1021
(SEC) 2006/1022 (SEC)

Article 265, first para, of the EC Treaty

30.8.2006

20.11.2006

Commission for External Relations and Decentralised Coo-
peration (RELEX)

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Official Journal of the European Union

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Rapporteur

Analysis

Discussed in commission

Date adopted by commission

Ms Juliette Soulabaille, Member of Corps-Nuds Municipal
Council (FR/PES);

30.11.2006

25.1.2007

29.3.2007

Result of the vote in commission

Adopted unanimously. Simplified procedures, Rule 26

Date adopted in plenary

7.6.2007

Previous Committee opinions

(1) OJ C 115, 16.5.2006, p. 42.
(2) OJ C 81, 4.4.2006, p. 46.
(3) OJ C 121, 30.4.2004, p. 18.

CdR 224/2005 fin (1), Decentralised cooperation in the
reform of the EU's development policy. Rapporteur: Ms Juli-
ette
on
16 November 2005

Soulabaille

(FR/PES);

adopted

plenary

in

CdR 142/2005 fin (2), opinion of the CoR on the Commu-
nication from the Commission to the Council and the
European Parliament on the Tenth anniversary of
the
Euro-Mediterranean Partnership: A work programme to
meet the challenges of the next five years (COM(2005) 139
final). Rapporteur: Ms Terron i Cusi, (ES/PES); adopted in
plenary on 13 October 2005

CdR 327/2003 fin (3), The Euro-Mediterranean Partnership
and local and regional authorities: the need for coordina-
tion and a specific instrument for decentralised coopera-
tion: Rapporteurs: Mr
and
Mr Gianfranco Lamberti (IT/EPP)

Jacques Blanc

(FR/EPP)