Grindle began by saying when we talk about good governance (GG) we end up talking about virtually all aspects of public sector from institutions to decision making structures to administrative aspects of governance, from human resources to actual interface between citizens and officials.

Her presentation, which reviewed GG and suggested areas for further work, had 3 parts:
1. GG is important
2. GG agenda is too ambitious
3. Suggest ways to make it more realistic

The GG agenda is important - citizens are better off under political systems that provide for security, stability, rule of law, efficiency, etc. - but there are questions around it. She emphasised the point that the GG agenda shouldn't be understood as the basis on which political and economic development are built i.e. GG is not necessary a precursor to/precondition for growth, poverty reduction, democracy - historical and current case studies demonstrate this is not the case.

She went on to say the GG agenda is deeply flawed as a guide to development. It is a long list that developing countries are told must be done before they can develop politically and economically. It is an overwhelming task compared to local capacity. For example:

1) The number of governance reforms recommended in the 'World Development Reports' has increased dramatically from 45 in 1997 (when WDR highlighted states as agents of development) to 116 in 2003.

2) The list of requirements that need to be implemented to achieve GG is unreasonably long for developing countries that have weak institutions, little capacity in terms of resources and human resources, governments with questionable legitimacy and flawed decision making processes and disenfranchised populations.

3) Lists of requirements do not provide guidance about relative importance of different items or sequencing, or what is feasible.

She outlined what can be done to make the GG agenda more realistic. Rather than GG, Good Enough Governance allows parties to think about the minimum conditions important for the next steps for political and economic development. Not all government deficits need to be tackled at once. This raises questions about GG interventions, about how important they are and how they should be prioritised and made relevant to context. Which deficits should be tackled first?

She made suggestions about how to go about reducing the scope and size of the GG agenda:

1) Become better students of history (eg the work of Ha Joon Chang). Civil service reform in US was introduced in 1883 but it took between 40-60 years before it could be said there was effective civil service system in US, partly because implementation of reform was part of an implicit bargain between politicians who wanted patronage and those technocrats who wanted a better civil service. We tend to compare our idealised notions of GG with what is actually happening on ground in developing countries.

2) Ask the question 'good governance for what?' Need to question whether all GG interventions lead to a multiplicity of good outcomes. Civil service reform may make government more efficient but may not alleviate poverty. Need to think specifically about the goal and then the governance interventions to achieve it.

3) Spend more time thinking about what is working. Gives us insight into factors that promote change and the underlying structures that assist this (citing work by J Tendler).

4) Establish priorities. This is a political task that often outsiders may not have the capacity to influence. However, there are some things that can be done. DFID argues that it needs to start from 'where the country is'. This is a useful starting point for thinking about GG agenda. Priority might be (e.g., in Afghanistan and Sierra Leone) to provide basic physical security, or to increase legitimacy of government. Other countries (Burkina Faso, Honduras, etc) might already have institutional coherence so they can start thinking about expanding public services and tackling most development-adverse forms of corruption. Elsewhere (e.g., SA, India, Mexico) might undertake more difficult governance reforms e.g. transparent budgeting processes, risk mitigation systems etc.

Grindle said Dfid asked her, what would a practitioner in field do with 'good enough governance'? She said her answer to Dfid is to use a series of matrices that might be useful in particular instances to help narrow down agenda (see 'Good Enough Governance Revisited' paper for Dfid and Mick Moore's matrix on political systems and different characteristics, capacity, institutions etc. in different types of states). States differ significantly in terms of capacity and interests of political elites in taking on governance reforms.

She concluded with the following points:

1. There is a need to reformulate the GG agenda to be more realistic and think about 'good enough governance'. This can be done through research, analysis of what it takes to have different kinds of reform initiatives, and country-specific assessments of how realistic certain types of change are in different circumstances and in different types of states.

2. What can donors and outsiders do?
Invest in more research and build analytic capacity in developing countries;
a) Emphasise a reasonable agenda and expectations for what can be achieved on GG in short, medium and long term;
b) Reward movement in the right direction with reasonable goals;
c) Build capable civil society as a counterpart to capable government;
d) Think about 'the demand side' of GG in terms of helping civil society to develop capacity and desire to be represented in policy process, to seek out information, and to hold government accountable.

Lawson said GEG is a powerful concept. It is useful and clearly changes the nature of the debate. In this series of meetings it is striking how different experts from different disciplines tend to define GG in different ways. Grindle brings us back down to earth by saying she thinks 'good enough governance' is a more useful starting point. He posed 2 questions: what could be wrong with it and where might it lead us that could be dangerous?

He outlined 2 potential problems:

1. 'Good enough governance' is difficult to operationalise. It could end up in tautology if we're not careful - needs to be context specific.

2. There are problems in trying to persuade different donor agencies that they have little influence; that societies change because of internal processes of protest and demand, which are often driven by economic processes that donors have little control over.