Final performance evaluation - Taqadum

This process was part of a broader effort to devolve administrative, fiscal, and legal powers to local and provincial entities in Iraq and to provide local service delivery to a broader section of society through a decentralized governance model in accordance with the law. Through enhanced efficiency in delivering provincial government-based services, the project assumed that this would lead to increased government responsiveness to community needs and citizen participation in decision-making, which ultimately would garner the state heightened legitimacy and stability. This evaluation sought to delineate the failures and successes of the project with a keen awareness of the complexities in post-conflict Iraqi society and the various stakeholders and beneficiaries, namely women, the elderly, ethnic minorities and other vulnerable groups. Overall, the Taqadum effort has achieved success in supporting a partial devolution of power through training and support for development mapping and planning processes from ministries to directorates and for service delivery improvement planning and implementation at the provincial levels. Despite these successes, legal and fiscal decentralization are largely incomplete and citizen perception of both GOI and local service delivery remains low. The latter may be due to lack of inclusivity of citizen participation from a broad spectrum of society and public awareness of advances made in decentralization and service delivery.