12.5 INSTITUTIONAL DIFFICULTY

the administrators. For example, agricultural policies may face intractable problem of implementation due to inclement climate, disease, and/or problems of farm structure. Other constraints may be linked to the vested interests of the pressure groups. For example, land reform policies in many countries faced obstruction from large land owners. Also the problem may occur from outside the political boundary, e.g., policy outcome of land use policy for North Bengal, Bangladesh became different from policy output due to water withdrawal from the Ganga flow by the Farakka Barrage in India.

12.6.2 Inadequacy of Time, Resources, and Programs

In the context of sustainability evaluation, there are a number of constraints originating from policy making and implementation such as lack of institutional resources and access to information; lack of ecological, technological, and administrative knowledge; lack of material or legal resources; and weakness of institutions in relation to vested interests. Effective policy for sustainable development requires the integration of political legitimacy, analytical competence, and administrative capacity to translate policy objective into effective sustainability actions. Even when major physical and political constraints are not present, some policies may fail due to lack of funding or unrealistic expectations that cannot be achieved in a specified period of time. For example, there are many states who are signatory to the Agenda 21 of the Rio protocol but are not able to divert fund toward conservation for sustainable action. Ex-ante evaluation will show such policies very much sustainable but not the ex-post analysis.

12.6.3 Lack of Understanding Between Cause and Effect

Often the policy to be implemented is based on a valid theory of cause and effect but the relationships between the cause and effects are very few. This is more prevalent if the assumptions on causes and effects of policy makers are implicit and unstated. If a policy is taken, not for solving a problem, but for preventive action of an anticipated future problem, it is likely that implementers will be confused and may hesitate to implement the policy unless the purpose is stated clearly. Similarly, if the understanding of the policy makers is inadequate policies may fail. Winter (1996) has drawn some example of policy failure due to lack of understanding.

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12.6.4 Minimum Dependency Relationship of Decisions

The relationships between the dependency of decisions and various organizations describe the success of the policy failure. Pressman and Wildavsky (1973) argue that the greater the number of decisions required by different actors at different points in the implementation process, the more likely there is to be a policy failure. Thus multipledependency relations among different agencies can cause significant policy blockage. Hoggwood and Gunn (1984) say,

it is now-a- days relatively rare for implementation of a public programme to involve only a government department on the one hand and the group of affected citizens on the other. Instead there is likely to be an intervening network of local authorities, boards and commissions, voluntary associations, and organised groups.

A contrast between the single ministry and more diffuse environmental policies may be drawn as an example. Though the ministry is usually responsible for planning, the implementation of diffuse environmental policy involved with two or three tires of organizations and diverse community, sometimes the policy presents a considerable dependency relationship problem such as complexity in organizing administrative arrangements.

12.6.5 Lack of Understanding of, and Agreement on, Objectives

Sometimes policies lack clear objectives. The objectives of organizations or programs are often difficult to identify or are vague and evasive. The challenge to pursuing a sustainability evaluation is the different viewpoints, needs, interests, information, and power of the different actors involved in the policy process. For example, policy makers have to balance the political imperative of securing and expanding their power base with a commitment to sustainability because the public’s response to policy problems may be driven by their own economic considerations. Even official objectives, where they exist, may not be compatible with one another. The possibility of conflict or confusion remains high when professionals or other groups try to realize their own unofficial goals within a program. This could happen due to personal disagreement with objectives or the official acts under personal interest. Evaluation of those flaws is difficult.

12.6.6 Policy Tasks not Specified in Correct Sequence

Disarray in policy tasks in “policy breaches” among different stages of the policy process—usually known as “policy breach” is a common problem in sustainability evaluation. First, policy breach comes from the difference between decision making and policy implementation. While decision making is a top-down process in which policies are driven by overall goals and political priorities, policy implementation is essentially a bottom-up process involving middleand low-level managers concerned with organizational needs and day-to-day management requirements and restrictions. The policy breach between the two processes leads to the disintegration between decision making and policy implementation and produces incoherent, ineffective, and inefficient policies. Policy breach may also exist between policy making and policy evaluation. Policy evaluation has not been routinely applied for most policy decisions, and when it is conducted, it is often motivated by procedural requirements or political considerations and thus fails to contribute to continuous policy learning. The third policy breach is between political process and policy process. The policy process is frequently disrupted by changes in the political process. There should be some specified procedures and sequence for the implementation of decisions without which apparently feasible policies may fail. For example, after clear felling an area, a series of actions are required at an appropriate time to replant it such as, procuring seed, growing seedlings, and clearing land. Some of these actions may need to have been undertaken before the actual felling operation started. If the sequences and timings of work are not maintained, the plantation is likely to fail due to lack of rain or excessive cold. Thus, the outcome of plantation failure will be seen but the cause of untimely action will be difficult to identify in policy evaluation.

12.6.7 Lack of Perfect Communication and Coordination

The potential of conflicts among the key components of sustainability poses a challenge to policy evaluation. For example, poverty alleviation policies may result in increased resource use and habitat destruction, thus creating more environmental problems; strict environmental regulation aiming at slowing down environmental degradation may cause the close-down of many small and median enterprises that are main contributors of local economic growth and employment. The segmented outlook of policy making in different sectors further exacerbates these potential conflicts. For example, the agricultural sector