In-house dialogues are CPD's most
frequently held events, and involve
a selected group of participants
addressing a particular issue of
topical interest. These dialogues
are intended to cover a broad
spectrum of areas. Some of the
recent dialogues have addressed such
issues as Quality of Municipality
Services, State of Local Governance,
Efficiency of Fiscal Policies and
Gender Dimensions in the Development
Process. Another in-house dialogue
format has been designed to expose
visiting donor missions to a
cross-section of opinion from civil society, concerned with issues
of both aid policy and domestic
policy reforms. Agencies which have
participated in such dialogues
include UNRISD, DGIS from the
Netherlands, CIDA, NORAD, the Ford
Foundation and the World Bank.
The need for an ongoing process of
policy dialogue has arisen due to the fact that the tradition of
public discussion of critical policy
issues has rarely flourished in
Bangladesh. The Bangladeshi public
thus remains largely uninformed
about the policy regime which
conditions their daily lives or the
circumstances which have influenced
the adoption of particular policies
where they specifically touch
particular individuals or groups. In
order to move away from the
prevailing tradition of rhetorical
exchanges which have served to
undermine the efficacy of most
public discussions, CPD designs the
dialogue format to provide a
more constructive exchange of views.
This requires careful advance
preparation of the format for each
dialogue. This involves spelling out
more fully the main themes of the
discussion and the principal
questions to be addressed. Each
dialogue is expected to serve the
dual purpose of exposing
the participants to key policy
issues and educating the public
about the issues under discussion.
The dialogues thus target policymakers
and public representatives as
well as civil society. In practice,
CPD brings together, on a regular
basis, high government officials,
senior agency executives, members
of parliament, the business community,
professionals, academics, NGO
activists and donor representatives
to discuss specific policy issues
in which they have some involvement
or relevant expertise.
CPD also seeks to initiate
policy dialogues with public
interest groups such as trade
unions, peasant organisations,
women's organisations,
professional associations and
local community groups when the
dialogue is moved to the field.
Eventually, the idea is to take
this dialogue process, in
co-operation with other
membership organisations, to the
village and factory floor, where
policymakers and academics can
be exposed to audiences drawn
from the public who actually
have to face the consequences of
particular policies and may have
quite plausible ideas as well as
concerns about the validity of
such policies. Because of the
importance of bringing together
political parties to promote a
consultative process for
designing the reform process,
CPD aims to be completely
non-partisan in its outlook and
composition and retains complete
independence in designing its
dialogues. This non-partisan
position has enabled CPD to
bring together cabinet ministers
and opposition leaders around
the same table even at times
when these contending parties
were not communicating with each
other in the Parliament. CPD
dialogues thus proceed in an
environment where the most
controversial issues can be
discussed in a
non-confrontational manner and
constructive solutions can be
jointly explored. These
initiatives of CPD to bring
political protagonists together
have now extended over two
successive political regimes.
This suggests that political
forces, even in times of
political contention, may find
it useful to draw upon such
institutions as CPD to maintain
a dialogue with each other.
Since the goals of CPD are not
merely academic, but
operational, the dialogues are
designed so as to culminate in
specific recommendations to
current and prospective
policymakers for both redefining
policies and for ensuring their
effective implementation. A
lucid summary of the proceedings
of each of the dialogues is
prepared which is later
published with a set of
recommendations as a CPD
Dialogue Report. These Dialogue
Reports are widely disseminated
as part of the process of public
education which informs CPD's
activities.
CPD dialogues
are grouped into five
categories, click in a link
below for more information: -
