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p. 2 of 10 BACK | NEXT Challenges of rebuilding From postconflict to reconstruction Role of MDBs ADB’s approach and comparative advantage Afghanistan and ADB: a partnership renewed Postconflict rebuilding From postconflict: preconditions for reconstruction Toward reconstruction: financing the transition Towrd development: setting the stage The way forward: lessons from postconflict reconstruction

Rehabilitation and Reconstruction - ADB's Role in Afghanistan and the Region

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From postconflict to reconstruction

Stages of transition

Postconflict countries go through stages during rehabilitation and reconstruction. In the days and months immediately following a conflict, relief efforts are spearheaded by international agencies such as the United Nations (UN) High Commissioner for Refugees, World Food Program, International Committee of the Red Cross, and various NGOs. This period may be relatively short and may include some reconstruction activities.

Reconstruction starts in earnest once the situation is stable and the environment is secure. Resource gaps are large during these phases and a country must often depend on external assistance.

Development resumes when normal economic activities are revived, internal resources are generated, and financial intermediation is dynamic and rapid.

Sometimes the transition is more complex. In Afghanistan, for example, a war against terrorism is ongoing. Relief operations are constantly under threat and new faces join the relief lines every day. In this situation, relief must be carried out simultaneously with resettling displaced persons, disarming people, demining, and neutralizing armed opponents of the legitimate authority.

Financing the transition

Each phase of postconflict recovery and development requires substantial external financing. The international community has usually been generous in the years immediately following a conflict. Much of the aid is directed toward relief and limited amounts toward reconstruction. This usually reflects a country’s limited absorptive capacity in the initial phase, hence considerable early attention must be paid to capacity building and policy and institutional reforms. A funding problem may arise later, however, because the initial enthusiasm to provide assistance can wane before a postconflict country is ready to absorb larger amounts of aid for reconstruction and development.

Postconflict assistance and the international community

The international community has had mixed experiences in delivering postconflict assistance.

To be most effective, aid pledges must be translated promptly into accessible resources that can be flexibly used for reconstruction according to the priorities of the country concerned. Slow disbursement of funds pledged by donors only adds to the problems that the postconflict country faces. In Cambodia, Lebanon, Mozambique, Rwanda, and West Bank and Gaza, there was a considerable lag between pledges and commitment, and between commitment and disbursement.

Aid pledges must be realistic. Given the high public profile of pledging conferences, promised assistance can be overstated and then be difficult to deliver. The ad hoc nature of pledging conferences makes it difficult to bind donors to their commitments. Sometimes pledges are made according to donors’ priorities rather than those of the recipient.

Pledges are often linked to policy conditionalities: macroeconomic; peace; and governance, human rights, and democratic reform. But the donors’ approach and emphasis in each of these areas may differ, thereby creating confusion in the recipient country and ultimately reducing the effectiveness of postconflict aid. Sometimes, in an effort to organize assistance at the onset, donors impose conditions that a postconflict government finds impossible to achieve.

Linking or bridging relief and development efforts should be improved. The availability of resources and their allocation among relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction, and development can pose problems. Donors often fail to resolve the overlapping nature of different activities, and are usually reluctant to shift resources from relief to reconstruction or from reconstruction to relief—even if the case for the shift is well understood.

The challenges and problems discussed in this chapter manifest the difficulties of aid coordination. Considerable work is under way to improve the situation. Success has been slow, but collective efforts continue.

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