UNDP Jobs - 13553- Consultant: International Short-Term Expert

Consultant: International Short-Term Expert

Location :

Place of residence/work, in Ankara and cities of the selected cities as necessary, TURKEY

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

14-Dec-2009

Application Deadline :

30-Nov-09 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

A minimum of 20 working/days (plus up to 10 additional working/days, depending on the need)

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

UNDP-Turkey has been cooperating with the national counterparts in the area of local governance since 1997, through the Local Agenda 21 (LA-21) Program. The overall objective of the Program is to strengthen local governance by ensuring that civil society participates in decision-making processes. The first three phases and sub-projects of the Turkey Local Agenda 21 Program were supported by the corresponding decisions of the Council of Ministers and was published in the Official Gazette of Turkey (dated 6 March 1998/No. 3278, 8 February 1999/No. 23605, 22 January 2001/No. 24295, 4 December 2001/No. 24603, 11 June 2003/No. 25135 and 12 November 2003/No. 5287 respectively). The Decrees dated 19 March 1998 and 7 November 2000 issued consecutively by the Ministry of Interior have made a significant contribution to the development of LA-21 processes.

The Turkey LA-21 Program enabled the development of a new local governance model in Turkey whereby public institutions, local authorities and civil society organizations are forming the triangle of the local decision-making processes. In this context, the major achievements of the Program can be summarized as the City Councils, the primary participatory structure of the LA 21 processes that bring together the central government, local government and civil society within a collaborative framework of “partnerships” have been established; the Women’s Councils and the Youth Councils established for developing policies and mechanisms to increase the participation of the women and the youth in local decision-making processes have started to be regarded as a “best practice” at global level. The active participation of the Special Interest Groups, including the physically and mentally disabled persons, the elderly (“senior citizens”) and the children in the participatory mechanisms under the umbrella of the City Councils was also achieved. Significant advances have been made toward the preparation and implementation of Action Plans that delineate sustainable development targets, policies, strategies and action proposals of respective cities, developed with the participation and consensus of local stakeholders. The Working Groups, constituting the key mechanism of the action planning processes, have been designated as an organ of the City Council in the By-laws of the City Council. The LA-21 Program demonstrated its potential to trigger social transformation that accelerates the decentralization and democratization process in the country, as well as the process of Turkey’s integration with the European Union.

Upon the completion of the fourth phase of the Project by December 2008, LA-21 Program has launched the fifth phase that aims the training and capacity building for strengthening the City Councils and their functioning as local democratic governance mechanisms. In the scope of this phase, a Needs and Perceptions Analysis Study will be conducted to identify the aspects of the City Councils that need to be supported and strengthened.

Objectives

The objective of this assignment is to identify the institutional capacity needs of the City Councils to lay ground for their structuring and functioning to be more inclusive and responsive. Findings of the needs and perceptions analysis will be the basis for tailor-made training programs as well as the Communication Strategy of the City Councils. The needs and perceptions assessment will benefit from the data obtained from the City Councils, representatives of local stakeholders, including the local administrators, local NGO community, development actors, community based organizations working with and/or interested to the work of the City Councils and public at large. This analysis will essentially be a snapshot of the institutional mechanisms in place that is the structures of management, partnership and participation those are used by administrators of the City Councils and their local civil society partners, both organized and unorganized.

Scope

The scope of the Assignment includes: (1) development of a methodology, through which the assignment will be carried out; (2) fulfillment of analytical studies, including desk research, interviews with national and local stakeholders (The local project stakeholders are the City Councils, representatives of local authorities, local NGO community, development actors, community based organizations working with and/or interested to the work of the City Councils and public at large.) with a view to develop a sound understanding of the current state, with a special emphasis on the inclusiveness, representativeness and responsiveness; and (3) development of the “Analysis Report including Recommendations and Proposals for More Inclusive, Representative and Responsive Local Governance Structures”.

Deliverables with required timeframes

As described above the Assignment team will deliver 3 main outputs:

Inception Report (by the fourth week of December 2009): The report should demonstrate the methodology along with a concrete time plan, through which the assignment will be carried out.
Interim Report (by the fourth week February 2010): In summary, the interim report will present the findings of all the studies to be carried out at Stage 2 (defined above) and provide preliminary proposal on Analysis Report (i.e. mandate, management structure, decision making mechanism, membership policy, communication lines, relations with the public institutions and other stakeholders)
Final Report (by the fourth week March 2010): The final report should reflect the feedbacks received from the Ministry of Interior and other national and local stakeholders upon the presentation of the interim report.

The Proposal on the Analysis Report should take into account the following issues:

should be based on a balanced combination of public offices, local authorities, CSOs,
including community based organizations in a gender sensitive manner.
should be impartial motivated to generate a shared vision for inclusive, responsive and
representative structures and solutions to common problems of their localities.

The scope of the final report should reflect the detailed elaborations, at the minimum, following contents:

Executive Summary: A summary of the methodology deployed, key findings of the analyses
and concrete recommendations.
Methodology: A detailed description and justification of the methodology and techniques
deployed, with supporting materials (such as interview sheets, list of interviewees, reference
documents) annexed to the report.
Current State of Play: A detailed discussion on the findings of the national and local level
analysis, concluding with a list of key issues that need to be addressed.
International best practices on management and governance of local governance structures:
A detailed description of the selected international best practices, along with the rationale for
using them as benchmarks. An analysis of the key success factors, and lessons learned
from international best practices.
Proposals for Inclusive, Responsive and Representative Local Governance Structures:
Proposed mandate, vision, mission, management structure, membership policy,
communication strategy and decision making processes, supported with strong justifications.
Sustainability strategy for the Local Governance Structures

All reporting will be done in Turkish and English.

Timing, Duration and Place of Work

The Assignment is planned to be launched on 14 December 2009 and be completed by 31 March 2010. Each of the consultants will need to invest a minimum of 20 working/days (plus up to 10 additional working/days, depending on the need). The consultants will be required to work at their place of residence/work, in Ankara and cities of the selected cities as necessary. The travel and accommodation costs of the Consultant for cities other than the duty station shall be borne by UNDP.

Services and Facilities to be provided by UNDP

UNDP will provide project documents and background information. The meetings planned for the assignment will be organized by the project team. If requested, UNDP shall provide the Consultant with an office space equipped with a PC and access to the Internet and a local telephone line.

Payments

The short-term experts will be hired under a Special Service Agreement (SSA) contract and be paid in USD (or equivalent TRL) on the basis of the number of days worked, as approved by UNDP. One interim payment (indicatively maximum 25% of the contract value, excluding the provision for contingency) will be made upon submission and approval of the Inception Report. The final payment will be made (i.e. the remaining part of the contract value, including the provision for contingency, if any) upon submission and delivery of the final report. The amount paid shall be gross and inclusive of all associated costs such as flights, hotels, social security, pension and income tax. Assignment-related travel and accommodation costs will be borne by UNDP upon submission of documentation.

Evaluation of Applications

Applicants meeting the minimum requirements listed in the Terms of Reference will be short-listed and asked for price proposals. The selection of the Consultant will be made in accordance with the quality- cost based selection method (70 % technical component and 30 % price component).

Duties and Responsibilities

Specific Activities

A team of 2 consultants (i.e. 1 international short-term expert and 1 local short-term expert), hereinafter the Assignment Team, will be mobilized. The focus areas of the 2 consultants are expected to be as follows:

International Senior Expert on Local Governance Structures: Development of the fine-tuned methodology in close collaboration with Local Short Term Expert (defined below). Assurance of the technical quality and coherence of the outputs to be generated within the scope of the Assignment. Provision of guidance, technical expertise and know-how for all the assignment-related activities. Incorporation of international best practices into the analytical framework, studies and the final output.
Local Senior Expert on Local Governance Structures shall focus on analysis of the current state of play in Turkey, in general and in the selected City Councils in specific (including review and analysis of legal and administrative framework etc.) with a view to develop a realistic and actionable proposal that would not create redundancies.
Along with the framework depicted above, the duties and responsibilities of the consultants are highlighted below.

Stage 1: Development of the Methodology and Delivery of the Inception Report

The methodology to be developed should be based on two pillars: (a) international best practices; and, (b) local situation and dynamics. International best practices should ideally come from countries that have sustainable inclusive responsive local governance structures which resemble that of Turkey. The analysis of local situation and dynamics should concentrate on how issues of local governance, particularly inclusiveness, representativeness and responsiveness are being addressed; on institutional structures and set up with particular emphasis on accessibility, transparency and accountability; on the skills, capabilities and capacities of the local actors; coherence between the institutional set up and the policy objectives in this regard.

The consultants will initially review the Project document and other background materials (primarily) to be provided by UCLG and UNDP in order to identify the possible priorities to be considered within the scope of the assignment. These will result in delivery of the inception report of the Assignment, which will explain in detail the methodology to be used, a detailed list of activities and the long-list of international best practices (including justifications).

This will be a joint effort of the two short-term experts involved in the Assignment, with the international consultant carrying the primary responsibility for the quality, responsiveness and timely delivery of the inception report.

Stage 2: Analysis and Development of the Interim Report

At this stage, the short-term experts are expected to focus on their areas of specialization, as briefly described at the outset of this section. This would include

Analysis of the current situation and the state of play, to be carried out primarily by local STE, under the guidance of international STE. This would include desk research, review of legislative and administrative framework, and semi-structured interviews with national and local stakeholders. The stakeholders to be interviewed include, at the minimum, the Ministry of Interior, the relevant department of the State Planning Organization, selected City Councils, the Governorates, the Municipalities, if available universities, a select group of local NGOs and community-based organizations. It is essential that the analyses be carried out methodologically so that the findings can be easily benchmark against the international best practices, and can point out the bottlenecks in the local governance platforms and structures.
Review of international best practices, to be carried out primarily by the international STE. This would include desk research on similar successful platforms in other countries. The international STE will make sure that his/her analyses go well beyond the information that can be reached from the Internet and include insights of the experts involved directly in the international best practices. An important issue that should taken into account during the analysis of the international best practices is the identification of key success factors, which will later be further scrutinized by the Assignment Team with a view to contextualize such findings in accordance with the local dynamics. At the minimum, the analysis and review of international best practices should include management structure, staff, legal status, strategy and mission.
Development of the draft Inclusive Local Governance Structures, suggested content of which is described in the following section, along with the key issues that should be taken into account during the elaboration of the proposal.

As the preceding descriptions suggest all of the activities to be carried out at the second stage of Assignment are inter-related. At the end of the second stage the ISTE will deliver an interim report, which will presented to the Ministry of Interior and to the local stakeholders for their feedbacks.

Stage 3: Finalization

The third and final stage of the Assignment will concern finalization of the Assignment outputs as per the feedbacks received from the national and local stakeholders. The ultimate responsibility to submit the final output will rest with the international STE. The local STE will also provide his/her inputs, as per the feedback to be received from the national and local stakeholders.

Competencies

Preferably hands on experience in developing and establishing or advising to local, regional or national authorities,
Knowledge of Local Agenda Program of UNDP, as evidenced by the relevant work experience,
At least 5 years of experience on projects and/or initiatives on inclusive local governance structures, more than 10 years of such specific experience is considered an asset

Required Skills and Experience

General Qualifications

University degree in political sciences, social sciences or relevant fields advance degrees preferred,
Fluency in English
Computer literacy
Excellent reporting skills

General Professional Experience

At least 15 years of professional experience
At least 10 years of international experience, in particular in local governance structures.