Increasing Social Inclusion through Social Guarantees

This World Bank policy note considers social guarantees as tools for the design and/or monitoring of social policy and service delivery. It proposes a range of options to improve the delivery of and access to social services that can further social inclusion and democratic governance. It is based upon the application of a social guarantee framework to a series of country case studies (Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Peru, Paraguay, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Uruguay) that were conducted by national researchers in collaboration with the World Bank and the Chilean Foundation for Overcoming Poverty (FUNASUPO).

According to the document, "social guarantees are sets of legal or administrative mechanisms that determine specific entitlements and obligations, related to certain rights, and ensure the fulfillment of those obligations on the part of the state. Social guarantees have five key characteristics:

1.  they have a legal expression that results in an explicit state responsibility;
   
2.  they are constructed in reference to a specific rights-holder;
3.  they involve mechanisms of access and redress;
   
4.  the mechanisms that they envision are defined in a precise manner; and
   
5.  they are flexible and revisable. As a result, they facilitate reducing opportunity gaps across social groups."

The document points to a change in social service provision of most nations that changes the model from using taxes to provide social services (the welfare model) to a more complex model of more private provision with service "transfers" available for the economically poor. Additionally, local level communities are often engaged in ‘coproduction’ of services through contributing to the provision of facilities (through community contributions to the construction and maintenance of social infrastructure, for example). The three challenges of this transition are equity (access to high quality services becomes segmented), transparency (standards become diversified by providers), and accountability (responsibility for ensuring that citizens have basic services becomes less clear, which risks undermining the relation between citizens and the state and undermining social cohesion and solidarity).

Using a rights-based approach coupled with social guarantees provides mechanisms to move from abstract rights to concrete actions. "The difference between a right and a social guarantee [is] that the former has an abstract and ethical content, while the latter complements this abstract content with specific mechanisms that a government can put in place to realize a right....Since social guarantees protect fundamental rights, they help societies transition from a corporatist to a universalist model of social policy, in which the entire population has access to a set of basic social minimums. These entitlements relate to policies in areas such as education, health and housing that in the long run determine the resources and social capital of the [economically] poor."

A social guarantees approach means that there is an emphasis on redress, i.e. the availability of administrative, judicial, or quasi-judicial channels through which citizens can claim agreed-upon benefits, particularly through 5 sub-guarantees:

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  Sub-guarantee of access: rights-holders are able to access the set of defined services.
  
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  Sub-guarantee of quality: social services are delivered according to established quality standards.
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  Sub-guarantee of financial protection: individuals who cannot afford the costs of receiving the service would still be able to access it through financial commitments from either public or private sources.
  
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  Sub-guarantee of participation and continuous revision: the guarantees and sub-guarantees are continually updated according to the availability of resources, changing risks, political and social consensus, and the advancement of science and technology. This requires defining the rights and duties linked to this participation and identifying the stage/s of political or programming cycle in which civic participation shall take place.
  
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  Sub-guarantee of redress: redress ensures that individuals or groups can claim access to the guaranteed services, as well as claim the fulfilment of each sub-guarantee.
  

The document states that the benefits of adopting this system include: social and political pacts that bring different stakeholders together to agree on specific levels of and mechanisms for service delivery, monitoring, and redress. At the same time, implementing a programme inspired by a guarantee framework implies developing the institutional and inter-institutional capacity, required for the effective functioning of programmes. This can bridge existing social gaps. It can increase transparency and accountability through communicating clear definitions of rights and right holders, institutional arrangements, operational mechanisms, and budget allocation. It can empower vulnerable groups by ensuring that redress and enforcement mechanisms are available to them. It can increase voice and participation and gives opportunity for a more open dialogue on social entitlements. A common definition and widespread communication of rights enable citizens to hold institutions accountable. Participation of local communities in service planning can help to dismantle biases. Social guarantees can be modified or updated without harming the values they protect, because they take into considerations aspects such as culture, availability of resources, public consensus, etc. Therefore, social guarantees are flexible, adaptable, and make it possible to avoid falling back on standardised solutions. The requisites for establishing a social guarantees system include broad consensus on social and fiscal pacts with documentation and communication on policies, decision-making, budgets, and systems of rights redress.

Tools can include matrices that define the specific content of each sub-guarantee and an Index of Social Guarantees or an Index of Inequality of Opportunities to monitor and evaluate more effectively the implemented guarantees to ensure:

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  Coordination of social development and social sector ministries
  
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  Public-private-civil society partnerships
  
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  Independent monitoring and feedback to policy makers
  
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  Strong civil participation in design and implementation
  
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  Robust mechanisms for redress