Coordinating Fragmented Ownership in Malawi's Social Protection: The Actors Standing Between the Government and Donors

Abstract

In the global debate on aid effectiveness and state capacity, “country ownership” is often portrayed as a unified national commitment to development goals. However, this macro-level perspective often overlooks the complexities of implementation on the ground. This paper bridges the gap between ideals and practices of policy by exploring the lived experiences of social protection sector practitioners in Malawi. It investigates how civil servants and development professionals exercise their agencies while navigating the tension between international aid mandates and domestic political incentives.

Drawing on 26 in-depth interviews with government officials, donor staff, and other stakeholders conducted between late 2023 and early 2024, the study employs a political economy analysis using the Political Settlements (PS) and Adapted Political Settlements (APS) frameworks. These lenses reveal a state of “fragmented ownership,” where the sector is divided into competing sides of influence. The analysis shows that donors dominate the technocratic national social support policy framework through their financial leverage and global norms. In contrast, politicians retain tight control over agricultural input subsidies, prioritising these programmes to secure electoral support and political survival.

In this fractured landscape, social protection workers are active mediators, not passive implementers. The study reveals that they face substantial ‘coordination costs’ — the undocumented administrative burden required to maintain these discordant systems. Facing a government reluctant to engage with their concerns, practitioners attempt to translate donor logic into political language, framing social protection as “investment” to capture elite attention. Furthermore, they are strategically pursuing the establishment of legal frameworks as a mechanism to reclaim professional autonomy and force donors to comply with national rules. This study argues that in aid-dependent contexts, ownership is not a static institutional attribute. Rather, it is a dynamic process. It is sustained only by the adaptive mediation of practitioners who hold these fragmented elements together through their daily labour.