| Local development and service delivery |
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Processes of local development, also in the South and in the countries of the former Soviet Union, increasingly assume a good cooperation between e.g. local governments and local organisations. This is a direct consequence of decentralisation. Decentralisation involves the transfer of duties, competencies, means and decision-making powers of the national government level to sub-national and local levels. The aim is to bring the decision processes concerning a country's development as close to the citizens as possible, with an improved basic service to those citizens as the expected outcome. The condition for the success of decentralisation is the development and strengthening of (local) democracy. For a number of reasons, the local government is forced to look for ways of cooperating with other local actors such as organisations, NGOs, educational institutions, traditional leaders, media, churches and political parties (civil society in general). The way in which all these local actors make joint decisions concerning the development of their communities is also indicated by the term local governance. ACE Europe studies, advises on and evaluates decentralisation processes in various countries. ACE Europe pays particular attention to the impact of these processes on a local level, and more specifically on the local government (as an institution with its own employees and operations) and on civil society. ACE Europe analyses the capacity of local actors and develops programmes and strategies to strengthen the capacity in the area of interaction and cooperation (local governance and local democracy). ACE Europe has specific expertise concerning local development in rural districts (e.g. concerning food security and water infrastructure) in Africa and Latin America, and concerning the provision of basic social services in the countries of the former Soviet Union. ACE Europe has cooperated for e.g. with the Ministry of local government in Rwanda, and European programmes for (local) social policy in Ukraine and Moldavia, the NGO PROTOS (water infrastructure), for example. ACE Europe has far-reaching expertise in evaluating programmes concerning food security for the Belgian Survival Fund and has evaluated programmes of various NGOs and institutions (PROTOS, TRIAS, Bevrijde Wereld, BTC, etc) in Guinea Conakry, Senegal, DR Congo, Mali, and so on. |