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-----Original Message----- From: owner-harriman-news@columbia.edu
[mailto:owner-harriman-news@columbia.edu] On Behalf Of Kevin Eric Laney
Sent: Friday, May 14, 2004 10:11 AM To: harriman-news@columbia.edu
Subject: [aaus-list] fellowship opportunity Open Society Institute
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Reply-To: Robert DeLossa <radelo@earthlink.net>


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	fellowship opportunity
Date: 	Fri, 14 May 2004 10:49:03 +0200
From: 	Scott Abrams <ascott@osieurope.org>
To: 	<kel1@columbia.edu>



Scott Abrams
Project Manager
Open Society Institute
Hungary-1051 Budapest, N…dor utca 11.
Phone: (36 1) 327 3100 ext. 2268
Fax: (36 1) 327 3105
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------


Dear Colleagues,

The Local Government and Public Service Reform Initiative of the Open
Society Institute is pleased to announce two topics for its 5th annual
policy fellowship program.

Topic 1: "Subnational Budget Watch"

Topic 2: "The EU's Wider European Neighbourhood Initiative: Ensuring the
free movement of people, goods, services, and capital"

Detailed information about the topics, the application procedure, the
target fellows and regional focus can be found in the document below.





OPEN SOCIETY INSTITUTE

LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC SERVICE REFORM INITIATIVE

Nador utca 11, 1051 Budapest, Hungary

Mailing Address: H-1397 Budapest, P.O. Box 519

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------

Call for Proposals

Local Government and Public Service Reform Initiative (LGI)

Policy Fellowship 2004/2005

I.      Purpose
The LGI Fellowship program is about fostering positive governmental
reform.  Each year LGI selects talented professionals to participate in
its one-year multinational Fellowship program. Fellows work in small
teams under the guidance of a well-respected mentor to produce
analytical, policy oriented studies on a given topic. The mentors help
build the capacity of the LGI policy analysts and experts.

LGI Fellows produce high quality studies presenting policy options and
recommendations geared towards the policy-making community in their
respective countries.  LGI provides its Fellows training in how to write
effective, concise, fact-based, practical policy reports.  Other
training modules LGI offers its Fellows are public speaking and
presentation skills and advocacy methods.  At the conclusion of the
program LGI works with its Fellows to determine what steps it can take
to support the proposed recommendations in the completed studies.

      * To learn more about the Open Society Institute see:
        http://www.soros.org/
      * To learn more about the Local Government and Public Service Reform
        Initiative see: http://lgi.osi.hu/index.html

II.     The project

The primary goal of the LGI Policy Fellowship program is to support
policy research aimed at stimulating innovative and practical policy
reform related to various areas of governance and the provision of
public services. Each year broad topics are identified for candidates
from different country groups.  LGI is currently calling for Fellows for
its 2004/2005 program, which will run from October 2004 to October
2005.  For more background information about the fellowship program see:
http://lgi.osi.hu/fellowship/

This year LGI is featuring two topics:

Topic 1: "Subnational Budget Watch"

Topic 2: "The EU's Wider European Neighbourhood Initiative: Ensuring the
free movement of people, goods, services, and capital"

III.    Fellowship topics for 2004/5

Topic 1: "Subnational Budget Watch"

Team Mentor: Katarina Ott, Institute of Public Finance, Croatia

As the principal document for the distribution of governmental
resources, budget decisions should be subject to public scrutiny and
influence.  Proper scrutiny coupled with functioning recourse mechanisms
should ensure governments are more responsive to the needs of society.

Much work has been carried out in recent years to input into and monitor
the budget cycle-meaning formulation, approval, implementation and
audit-at the national level of government.  Methodologies have been
developed and tested and numerous civil society and governmental
mechanisms are now in place throughout the world that monitor the
budgeting process.

There has been an insufficient focus, however, on models of
participation and monitoring for local and regional government
budgeting.  This LGI Fellowship topic seeks to engage talented policy
researchers and advocates from South Eastern Europe and the Newly
Independent States to work under the guidance of an expert mentor.
Fellows will aim to create a usable sub-national budget watch template
for their own countries by synthesizing the lessons of best practice
that are now in place in many countries at the national level. Fellows
will also be tasked with formulating an action plan for launching the
effort and working to generate momentum for the initiative by connecting
with the right institutions.  Medium to large sized
cities/municipalities would be the target of this project.

Recognizing this topic is broad and multifaceted, Fellows would be
expected to narrow down their research by focussing on specific areas of
enquiry, such as low-income housing policy, health policy and primary
and secondary education.  Once the sectoral focus has been identified, a
selection of the issues highlighted in the following bullet points
should be addressed:

1) Any budget watch program must begin with access to reliable and
sufficient data, which often exists and is just as often overlooked or
withheld.  The researcher should provide a detailed map of how to
navigate the informational system, from the ministry of statistics or
national bank to the data being collected by City Hall.

2) A key issue should be the "translation" of budget lines so that
anyone who is interested can easily understand what allocated funds are
precisely being spent on.  Meaning what activities fall under a certain
line and who is responsible for implementing those activities and how.
It is one thing to be transparent by laying out the numbers, but another
thing to match those numbers to clearly defined activities.

3) Matching the rhetoric of public officials to the budget lines they
formulate and approve is important for those monitoring the governance
of budgets.  How do stated policies or goals fit into budgetary
considerations?

4) Examining the role of Audit Chambers, the supreme auditing
institution. In most jurisdictions they seem not to go beyond central
agency budgets leaving a huge amount of money unwatched.  The question
of treasury functions at sub-national levels is also important.  How can
the heightened oversight that takes place at the national level be
incorporated into lower levels of governance as well?

Although this Fellowship will cover counties on an individual basis and
is geared only towards sub-national levels of government, it is
anticipated that the findings of this program will point to approaches
valid for all.

Target Fellows:

     1. Policy researchers, especially those connected to prominent policy
        institutes
     2. Members of advocacy-oriented professional associations
     3. Governmental auditor-generals
     4. Media members focussed on budget oversight

Applications will be accepted from South Eastern Europe, the NIS States
and Mongolia.

Topic 2: "The EU's Wider European Neighbourhood Initiative: Ensuring the
free movement of people, goods, services, and capital"

Team Mentor: Michael Emerson, Senior Fellow, Center for European Policy
Studies

In March 2003, the European Commission published the communication
"Wider Europe - Neighbourhood: A new Framework for Relations with our
Eastern and Southern Neighbours" as a step towards developing the
relations of the enlarged European Union with Russia, the Western NIS
(Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine) and the Southern Mediterranean
countries.  In mid-May Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia are also slated
to join this list of countries included under the program.  The EU
objective is to create a "zone of prosperity and a friendly
neighbourhood". In return for the new neighbors demonstrating concrete
progress in implementing political, economic and institutional reforms,
the Wider Europe countries will be offered, in the long-term, the
prospect of joining the EU internal market including participation in
the four freedoms, i.e. free movement of people, goods, services, and
capital.

This Fellowship topic will focus on the above-listed free movements of
people, goods, services, and capital. On May 1, new border regimes will
be introduced along the new EU boundaries, with critical implications
for the affected states.  Recent research by the OSI-related policy
centers network has found that for the new neighbors the single most
disruptive aspect of the EU enlargement is the requirement to obtain a
visa to travel to new EU member states.

The following text contains the stated objectives of the EU regarding
the freedom of movement under the Wider Europe initiative: "The EU and
the neighbours have a mutual interest in cooperating, both bilaterally
and regionally, to ensure that their migration policies, customs
procedures and frontier controls do not prevent or delay people or goods
from crossing borders for legitimate purposes. Infrastructure, efficient
border management and interconnected transport, energy and
telecommunications networks will become more vital to expanding mutual
trade and investment. Cross-border cultural links, not least between
people of the same ethnic/cultural affinities, gain additional
importance in the context of proximity. Equally, threats to mutual
security, whether from the trans-border dimension of environmental and
nuclear hazards, communicable diseases, illegal immigration,
trafficking, organised crime or terrorist networks, will require joint
approaches in order to be addressed comprehensively."

The new border regime will impact upon different people in different
ways: i.e. border area residents who have strong social and economic
ties to neighboring regions; millions of New Neighborhood citizens who
will now for the first time be required to obtain a visa before
travelling to the new EU member states (which often means traveling to
the capital city or a neighboring country to obtain that visa) and;
importers, exporters and investors who will face a new set of
regulations and restrictions before moving their goods and/or capital in
and out of the affected countries.

Fellows will research the threats and opportunities their respective
countries are confronted with relative to the new border policies.  In
formulating their analyses and policy recommendations, Fellows will be
expected to determine what is being done to address these new concerns
and, moreover, what can realistically be achieved and how.   Since the
action plans currently being developed between the EU and the New
Neighborhood states will not be legally binding, and will have highly
flexible implementation terms, it is expected that there should be ample
room to influence the policy-making process.

Sample Questions:

     1. How can it best be ensured that the new border with the EU will
        not be a barrier to trade, social and cultural interchange or
        regional cooperation?
     2. What mechanisms can be put in place to help offset some of the
        challenges imposed by the new regulations?  For instance,
        establishing multi-national consulate offices to facilitate the
        visa application process.

Target Fellows:

     1. Policy researchers, especially those connected to prominent policy
        institutes
     2. Members of advocacy-oriented professional associations
     3. Select civil servants

Applications will be accepted from, Ukraine, Moldova, Russia, Belarus,
Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia.

IV.      Methods and procedures

Grant

LGI will award successful applicants with a stipend for a period of 10
months between October 2004 and July 2005. The stipend will cover
monthly expenses related to research and travel costs.  Additional funds
will cover costs related to attending three international workshops, at
least two of which will take place in Budapest, Hungary.

Eligibility

Descriptions of ideal applicants follow each topic being offered.
Fellows are normally civil servants, members of advocacy groups or
professional associations, policy researchers and policy advisers. A
graduate degree or equivalent is required. Applicants should be citizens
of the countries noted under each topic. As a rule, Fellows will be
based in their home countries and will be required to attend three
international Fellowship workshops. Fellows are expected to continue
with their current employment, spending only up to fifty percent of
their time on the Fellowship program.

*Please note that LGI looks favorably upon applicants who can
demonstrate in their application that they have secured practical
institutional support from a reputable policy center or similar institution.

Methodology

LGI will group Fellows into teams of 4-5 members.  Teams will be led by
an expert mentor. Mentors will guide Fellows in formulating their final
research plans, draft reports, and implementation strategies.  Mentors
will also facilitate professional cooperation and communication between
members of the team.  Fellows are encouraged to support each other's
work with their expertise and comments within their teams. LGI
encourages teams of Fellows to develop joint or comparable research
agendas.

Expected outcomes/ products

Fellows are expected to conduct high quality research according to the
mutually accepted research protocol.  As a final product, Fellows will
submit a research report that is a persuasive policy document.  Reports
will be fact-based and will include policy  recommendations.  Teams are
expected to submit a joint report concluding their comparative results.
LGI may publish these studies in English and will now also begin to
publish them in their native languages.  Finally, LGI will seek ways to
work with Fellows in the future on implementing some of their proposed
policy recommendations.

Application procedure

Step 1. Submission of the Application:

      * Applications should be emailed to LGI at the following address:
        lgprog@osi.hu
      * The subject heading must identify which Fellowship Topic you are
        applying for.

Applications must include ALL of the following materials:

     1. Statement of interest (1 page maximum)
     2. Research proposal (1,500 words maximum) including a well-defined
        research problem, topic justification, research methodology, and
        expected outcomes of the research.
     3. Professional CV (which includes: full name, email and telephone
        number of the applicant, country of residence)
     4. English language writing sample (maximum 2,000 words.  This can be
        an article published in a relevant periodical, a chapter of a
        book, etc)
     5. The name and contact information of three people familiar with the
        professional capacities of the applicant.

**Please note that failure to submit all of the above documents will
likely result in your application being immediately disqualified.

The deadline for submitting applications is June 25, 2004 (17:00 GMT).
Late applications will not be considered.

Step 2. Review and selection:

Proposals must respond to domestic needs, be policy-oriented, focused
and creative.  Each incoming application will be registered by LGI upon
reception.  LGI will check each submission to ensure that it meets the
formal criteria and quality. Submissions will be reviewed by LGI (see
timetable below) and the team mentors. LGI may contact the applicants to
verify or request further information relevant to the Fellowship.
Shortlisted candidates may be asked for a follow-up interview.

Step 3. Feedback

All applicants will be notified by LGI of their status by July 31, 2004.

Step 4. Fellowship program

June 25, 2004                   Deadline for submitting applications

July 31, 2003                   Selection process finalized and
applicants notified of their status

Summer/Autumn 2004              Selected Fellows sign contracts with LGI

October 1, 2004                 Fellowship program begins, Fellows
initiate their research and submit their detailed research plans

Oct/Nov, 2004                   Budapest Opening Trainings and Workshop

                                                  Fellows and Mentors will
                                                  discuss the research
                                                  they have thus far done,
                                                  develop a terms of
                                                  reference for
                                                  standardizing the
                                                  individual reports
                                                  (structure, language,
                                                  key terms, approach,
                                                  etc), and discuss
                                                  possible conferences or
                                                  workshops to attend
                                                  during the year that
                                                  would strengthen the
                                                  reports.

March 1, 2005                   First Drafts and advocacy strategies due

March/April 2005                Interim Team workshop.  Groups meet to
discuss and comment on each other's first drafts.

July 1, 2005                    Deadline for full drafts - including
executive summary, policy report, policy brief - of Fellowship projects

September 15, 2005              Mentors submit their review of full
drafts.  Submission of final team manuscript.

Oct/Nov  2005                   Closing workshop in Budapest

August/December, 2005           Fellowship reports are reviewed and
evaluated by external experts with regard to publishing.  If deemed
publishable, Fellows may be asked to revise certain aspects of their
reports.

*Note: dates are subject to minor changes.

Step 5. Follow-up

Alumni-Fellows are often invited to participate in various LGI
initiatives including curriculum development, technical assistance,
consultancy work and LGI publications.


Applications should be submitted via email to:

The Local Government and Public Service Reform Initiative: lgprog@osi.hu
<mailto:lgprog@osi.hu>

In the subject line please include:

"LGI Policy Fellowship 2004/5" AND the name of the topic you are
applying for.

Project Manager: Scott Abrams: ascott@osieurope.org

Project Coordinator: Angela Radosits: aradosits@osi.hu


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