# **6. An Application to Afghanistan**<sup>**17**</sup>

The Afghanistan Public Finance Management Review included a substantial analysis of public expenditures and their management in the security sector (see World Bank, 2005b, Volume V). This work, carried out jointly with the UK Department for International Development, responded to a request from Afghanistan’s Ministry of Finance to include the security sector within the scope of the Review. It provides an illustration of how many of the themes, principles, and methods discussed earlier in this paper can be applied to analysis as well as institutional and policy recommendations for improving public financial management in the security sector of a specific conflict-affected country.

The analysis starts from an institutional definition of the security sector. The main security institutions in Afghanistan include: (i) government security management and oversight bodies: National Security Council and National Security Advisor, Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Counter Narcotics, Ministry of Border and Tribal Affairs, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Finance, and the Auditor General’s Office; (ii) security services: Afghan National Army (ANA), Afghan National Police (ANP), National Border Guards, Counter-Narcotics forces, National Directorate of Security (responsible for intelligence), Customs General Directorate under the Ministry of Finance, remnants of earlier military and police forces—the former subjected to a program of Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR); and (iii) justice and legal institutions: Supreme Court, Judiciary, Attorney General’s Office and prosecutorial offices ( _saranwal_ ).

Nearly a quarter-century of protracted conflict in Afghanistan, starting in the late 1970s, led to pervasive insecurity and destroyed or profoundly damaged the institutions that had been responsible for providing security in the pre-war period—both formal governmental institutions and traditional mechanisms. Government security forces were misused in ways that reduced rather than enhanced security, e.g. during the Soviet occupation of the 1980s, and they became increasingly “captured” by factions in Afghanistan’s civil war during the 1990s. The emergence of numerous well-armed militia groups, in shifting loose alliances, meant that the ability to use large-scale violence in pursuit of objectives was no longer the monopoly of the government but rather was widely contested, greatly undermining security (see Section 2 and Figure 2). The judicial system was similarly undermined, and traditional mechanisms for providing justice were often captured and used for their own ends by commanders and warlords. Women suffered greatly from the conflict as a result of violence against them, and also due to limited mobility and lack of access to education and health services, culminating in the Taliban’s severe social restrictions. Neighboring countries and other powers repeatedly and competitively intervened militarily—either directly or indirectly by providing arms and other support to different factions—contributing in a major way to insecurity in Afghanistan. In sum, the long period of conflict and insecurity had profoundly damaging economic, social, and political consequences for the country and its people.

The critical importance of enhancing security and reforming the security sector in Afghanistan has been widely recognized. This was signaled in the Bonn Agreement, which provided for the establishment of an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), and two subsequent donor meetings on security set targets and assigned donor responsibilities.

> 17 This section of the paper is based on World Bank (2005b), especially Volume V.  The fiscal sustainability of main security sector expenditure has been further analyzed with updated information in Byrd et al (2008); also see Manthri (2008).

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