Legal View of Controlling Development Cooperation Appropriations in Finland
Jäpölä, Juha-Pekka (2015)
2015
Tilintarkastuksen ja arvioinnin maisteriohjelma - Master's Degree Programme in Auditing and Evaluation
Johtamiskorkeakoulu - School of Management
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2015-11-20
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:uta-201512072502
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:uta-201512072502
Tiivistelmä
The focus of the thesis is on the control of the development cooperation appropriation maintained by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. At its foundation, development cooperation is the political pledge of the international community, the UN and the EU to eradicate poverty, hunger and similar scourges of humanity. The mandate of this pledge is relayed though a legal chain of command from the UN to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and its public servants for implementation.
The total amount of Finnish development cooperation disbursements or the flow of official development assistance has amounted to approximately one billion euros in the last few years. Following the continuing recession of Finland’s economy, the proposed development cooperation budget for 2016 is about 700 million euros. The proposal was presented to Parliament despite the advent of the UN’s new Sustainable Development Goals replacing the old Millennium Development Goals. The appropriation in question encompasses a sizeable and complex asset to control in which risk is inherent. As the State is responsible and accountable to the public, it tries to control the aforementioned risk in order to improve the effectiveness and public impact of development cooperation funds.
The method used is legal doctrine with traces of political and economic insights. The thesis explores what norms form the system of controlling Finnish public funds and especially development cooperation. The legal sources utilized range from international treaties and OECD standards to budgeting enactments of the State of Finland and internal regulations of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Due to the very nature of the issue as a combined legal, political and economic problem, the paper will utilize arguments and empirical notions from the aforementioned fields in order to fill empty spaces of law and construct viable bridges between provisions.
The key finding of the paper is the observation that national norms of control and budgeting form a fragmented and obscure network of multiple definitions and numerous criteria that do not seem to serve a uniform purpose. The concept of operational and financial planning entails the Ministry and development cooperation to induce public impact and upkeep effectiveness. At the same time, multiple external and internal control entities scan the flow of aid resources with different frameworks that are predominantly of private origin. All the while it is the wish of the Government that the control of development cooperation is harmonized and that performance guidance is sharpened. As a cherry on top, the true normative status of these provisions and doctrines is disputed.
The total amount of Finnish development cooperation disbursements or the flow of official development assistance has amounted to approximately one billion euros in the last few years. Following the continuing recession of Finland’s economy, the proposed development cooperation budget for 2016 is about 700 million euros. The proposal was presented to Parliament despite the advent of the UN’s new Sustainable Development Goals replacing the old Millennium Development Goals. The appropriation in question encompasses a sizeable and complex asset to control in which risk is inherent. As the State is responsible and accountable to the public, it tries to control the aforementioned risk in order to improve the effectiveness and public impact of development cooperation funds.
The method used is legal doctrine with traces of political and economic insights. The thesis explores what norms form the system of controlling Finnish public funds and especially development cooperation. The legal sources utilized range from international treaties and OECD standards to budgeting enactments of the State of Finland and internal regulations of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Due to the very nature of the issue as a combined legal, political and economic problem, the paper will utilize arguments and empirical notions from the aforementioned fields in order to fill empty spaces of law and construct viable bridges between provisions.
The key finding of the paper is the observation that national norms of control and budgeting form a fragmented and obscure network of multiple definitions and numerous criteria that do not seem to serve a uniform purpose. The concept of operational and financial planning entails the Ministry and development cooperation to induce public impact and upkeep effectiveness. At the same time, multiple external and internal control entities scan the flow of aid resources with different frameworks that are predominantly of private origin. All the while it is the wish of the Government that the control of development cooperation is harmonized and that performance guidance is sharpened. As a cherry on top, the true normative status of these provisions and doctrines is disputed.