Good governance

Good Governance (English: Good Governance ) denotes a good control and regulation system of a socio-political unit such as a state or municipality. It includes good governance and administrative action including a good budget or budget funds - management. The term poor governance ( engl. bad governance ), however, refers to the failure of the management and control system of a socio-political unit such as a state or community. In contrast to good governance prevail in the poor governance with little or no transparency, participation and rule of law; corruption is rampant. The citizens of the country are at the mercy of those in power subject and have little or no opportunities to engage in politics.

The term " governance " (or " governance " ) alone is generally factual- descriptive, that is value-neutral nature. It refers to historical and contemporary, changing and constantly changing control mechanisms in the areas of state, market and civil solidarity. " Good " governance, however, is a normative ideal wertvorschreibendes, so what should be a target in these areas.

Concept and conceptual history

While the term " governance " emerged in the 15th century and today is a concept of general terminology is in history and political science, the concept of good governance emerged in the late 1980s at the World Bank and was designed by the international organizations of development cooperation, such as UNDP ( the development program of the United Nations ) and OECD recorded as a positive reversal of the negative experience. It was a response to the negative effects of structural adjustment programs of the IMF and World Bank.

From this we concluded to an absence of functioning institutions, principles and structures, the entirety was called " governance " - and " good governance " when it worked very well. A uniform definition of good governance itself exists not within the individual organizations. The principles of good governance include but generally: administrative transparency, efficiency, participation, accountability, market economy, rule of law and justice. Democracy is often not explicitly stated, but is the normative concept of good governance based and can be found mainly in the points transparency and participation.

Good governance is therefore rather a collection of methods and tools that prefer certain normative control principles and shapes. The plaintiffs - particularly in relation to issues of political leadership in developing countries - a reference system given on the basis of the quality of political leadership and control leave a review. In recent times, the term "good governance" is received and discussed in the context of concepts of administrative ethics.

Application

• The Development Assistance Committee (DAC ) approved in December 1993, " Toward a participatory development and good governance." Thus, the Western donor countries underline the high importance that they attach to good governance, respect for human rights and democratization, sustainable development progress. At the same time their will in linking to an increasing extent the granting of development policy achievements with political reform towards democracy and human rights, that is to practice a political conditionality of development cooperation.
• Defines the ACP - EC Partnership Agreement of Cotonou / Benin / Africa (2000) " Good Governance " in Article 9, paragraph 3 as follows: " In a political and institutional environment that upholds human rights, the democratic principles and the rule of law are respected, good governance is the transparent and accountable management of human, natural, economic and financial resources and commitment to a balanced and sustainable development. It entails clear decision -making procedures for public authorities, transparent and accountable institutions, the primacy of law in the management and distribution of resources and capacity building for elaborating and implementing measures aiming in particular at preventing and combating corruption. "
• For Highly Indebted Developing Countries ( HIPC ) to benefit from debt relief under the HIPC Initiative, the G8, good governance for their classification plays a crucial role.
• The African Union, the program uses the African Peer Review Mechanism for mutual evaluation of the quality of governance.
• In 2006, the World Bank published the index " Country Policy and Institutional Assessment". This index lists 20 indicators of governance and policies on a six - point scale. It now contains concrete data away for a long time and allows comparisons between the governance of different countries.

Legal nature

The term " good governance " and " good governance " was in its lineup by institutions of donor countries legally a one-sided and therefore non-binding "political conditionality or conditionality ". When recording this conditionality into individual, specific agreements with certain countries receiving development aid was from " Good Governance " a bilateral mandatory contract clause or physical condition. By now was anchoring in countless international bilateral and multilateral treaties (such as the above-quoted ACP -EC Partnership Agreement with 92 different states ) has obtained the legal character of a general principle of international law, customary law, the principle. Since 1996, the principle can on a mandate from the UN General Assembly support ( resolution 50/ 225), which expressly mentions, inter alia, the strengthening of government capacity for policies and the restructuring of the public administration. If the stated bilateral and multilateral development assistance agreements have been ratified by the parliaments of the contracting donor and recipient countries, these agreements and thus the legal principle of "good governance" have also come to binding legal principle of internal national laws of the ratifying States. Whether the individual citizen or civic group or organization of the ratifying state of his state on a specific policy area, and the fulfillment of "good governance" can claim for the purposes of civil or human rights ( third effect ), is still unclear.

Linguistic history

In English, "governance" an old concept of the general policy language for describing, assessing and comparing the way of state government action. He stood linguistically always in competition with "government " the ambiguous " governance " (in the sense of a substantivized improvement, also: the governing ) and "the government " for the purposes of the institution ) may mean. " Governance " seems to have been less and less used in the 20th century and considered obsolete.

Beginning in 1976, is "governance" revived in the U.S. economic jargon in the composite term " corporate governance " with the new normative importance of responsible corporate leadership again and, rezipiert not only in English, but worldwide also in the German economic jargon and been widespread. A decade later, the World Bank has in the United States in 1989 "governance " has been introduced in the new composition of "good governance" with the new also normative importance of good governance in the jargon of international development policy, co-operation and assistance and therefore one of the most common terms of today's world language coined. Chronological and content, it comes to mind that " good governance" is to and from the proliferation of "corporate governance" grow up.

"Governance " has alone been resolved by these parallel and dual fachsprachlich - normative terms and is back as a self-employed much more common descriptive term returned to the general technical language of the historian and political scientist. "Corporate governance" and "good governance" are now classified as foreign words of the German language due to its mass use.

In 2007, the new fundamental right to " good administration " was, engl. "Good administration" ) codified in Article 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, which entered into force on 1 December 2009. Since " good administration" an integral part of "good governance" ( good governance ), the constitutionally prescribed requirement of " good management " are also binding legal definitions of " good governance" ( inter alia that affairs of the institutions, bodies and agencies' impartially, fairly and within a reasonable time, " article 41, paragraph 1, the right to be heard, on file access, justification, public liability, paragraph 3; official languages ​​, para 4).

Also, the term " right to good administration " based apparently content and language on the development of " corporate" and "good governance".