African Governance Report 2009

Abstract

The African Governance Report (AGR) assesses and monitors the progress on governance in Africa, identifies capacity gaps in governance institutions and proposes Policy interventions to promote good governance. The report adopts a unique methodology, combining three research instruments a national expert opinion panel, a scientific sample household survey and desk research. The main finding of this second edition of the African Governance Report (AGR II) is that there has been marginal progress on governance in Africa since the 2005 base line study (AGR I). The aggregate index for all the indicators of the AGR II expert survey indicated a marginal increase of 2 percentage points from the 2005 study. The overall governance picture for Africa is therefore one of limited progress. There is a need to scale up efforts to improve governance in Africa because good governance is central to economic development and to realizing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).There is a growing consensus in Africa that better governance is a key element in promoting growth and development and enabling African countries to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Governance remains a very sensitive issue, and a report of this nature and scope may be interpreted in some quarters as a scorecard on the governance situation in the countries covered.