OECD Public Governance Reviews: Jordan

Executive summary

In 2021, the Jordanian government launched a ten-year, three-track political, public sector and economic modernisation programme. This reform programme emerged from the overall objectives of democratising political life and moving closer to a parliamentary style of government, including the inclusion and empowerment of women and youth, consolidating sustainable economic growth, improving living conditions and reinforcing the effectiveness and accountability of government.

Progress in modernising the public sector can already be seen. In 2023, 90% of the approved priorities were achieved, including digital government, public service delivery, organisational structure, civil service management and institutional culture.

This Review provides an analysis of progress on these reform priorities as well as policy recommendations to build on, and sustain, this momentum going forward.

Key findings

Strategic planning

Jordan’s reforms are guided by a new generation of comprehensive national strategic documents. These are supported by executive and action plans, dedicated support and monitoring units, and a new planning law that can help consolidate functions. The government aspires to improve the complementarity of strategic plans, and focus on implementation and public sector capacity. However, the lack of clear roles and responsibilities, and complementarity among its numerous strategic documents risks hindering the monitoring and evaluation of the policies outlined in the plans. Reform efforts, like the new planning law, could contribute to clarifying roles, ownership and guidance.

Transparency and access to information (ATI)

Jordan has recently amended its ATI Law and has also established transparency as a central principle and objective of public sector modernisation. Jordan has the opportunity to harness the positive amendments to the law to reinforce information disclosure mechanisms and the institutional framework for ATI oversight.

Citizen and stakeholder participation and responsiveness of the public administration

There is a high-level commitment to directly involving citizens and other stakeholders in public decision-making across the public administration. Mechanisms have been introduced to educate citizens about elections, political parties, and ways to activate their role in public life as well as promote digital participation. Lastly, efforts have been made to improve the enabling environment for civil society organisations (CSOs). The current reform agenda provides an opportunity to translate this commitment into concrete action to respond to citizens’ needs and expectations while partnering with them and other stakeholders to achieve shared objectives that are greater than the sum of their parts.

The role of young people in public sector integrity, accountability and policymaking

Nearly a third of Jordan’s population is aged between 15 and 29. Jordan has taken important steps to promote young people’s participation in political life through the 2022 Political Parties Law and Election Law, new commitments to engage young people in the implementation and monitoring of government plans, and a national youth strategy to deliver youth-responsive programmes and services. While these measures are important steps, additional efforts are needed to systematically consult and engage young people across all areas of policymaking and in the design and implementation of measures to promote integrity. Moreover, building awareness and skills among national and local decision-makers and young people will be critical to enhancing their participation in politics – as voters, candidates and elected officials.

Accountability and oversight for gender equality

The government of Jordan has undertaken institutional reforms and developed strategic documents to improve public sector accountability with respect to gender equality, such as the National Strategy for Women and its Action Plan. Moreover, there is growing awareness of the importance of involving women in policymaking. Nevertheless, greater horizontal co‑ordination is needed among responsible institutions to drive progress on gender equality and mainstreaming, and in advancing on previous recommendations in this area. In addition, there are limited mechanisms for managerial accountability in the public sector to promote gender equality and mainstreaming, as well as a limited role of independent oversight institutions in promoting gender equality.

Policy recommendations

• Reinforce the policy framework for strategic planning and the implementation of strategic documents by streamlining national and sectoral plans. This could also imply cancelling obsolete or irrelevant documents to ensure coherence and complementarity and facilitate implementation. A robust monitoring and evaluation system is needed at the sectoral level, as many sectoral strategies lack implementation documents and key performance indicators, making it difficult to measure progress. Additionally, Jordan could consider strengthening the co-ordination, monitoring and evaluation of implementation by responsible institutions.

• Build on the momentum generated by the amendment of the Access to Information (ATI) Law to ensure full implementation, promote proactive and reactive disclosure of information, and reinforce the institutional framework for ATI. In addition, consider complementing the ATI Law with regulation in line with international practices. Jordan would also benefit from improving inter-agency co‑ordination, increasing the number of information officers and committees appointed across the administration, and fostering greater awareness and trust in this law’s benefits among both public officials and citizens.

• Ensure an enabling environment for citizens and civil society organisations (CSOs) to actively participate in policy design and delivery, and enhance public administration response systems. Developing a CSO strategy, and facilitating registration processes and access to funding would support this. To enhance responsiveness across the public administration, Jordan could improve co‑operation among bodies with a mandate on civic freedoms, guiding public officials in responding to human rights complaints and streamlining complaints and feedback mechanisms on policies and services. In addition, citizens and stakeholders could be more systematically involved in decision-making processes, including through innovative means such as the new e-participation platform.

• Create an enabling environment for young people to partner with government, and hold them to account, protecting their rights and promoting their participation across all areas of policymaking. Jordan could establish structured opportunities to consult and engage youth stakeholders across the policy and service cycle, scale up local youth-led initiatives to monitor public service quality and invest in youth-responsive public communication. Jordan could also improve co‑ordination among awareness- and capacity-building programmes targeting youth, and establish effective systems for collecting, using and disseminating age-disaggregated data. Jordan could further consider promoting the participation of young people in political life in line with the objectives of its political reform agenda, notably by rolling out formal and informal programmes to promote young people’s civic and citizenship literacy, addressing financial constraints and supporting young elected officials to perform their duties and act as role models in line with the highest standards of integrity.

• Strengthen government and managerial accountability for gender equality and mainstreaming and the oversight role of relevant institutions. Further efforts could be made to ensure that the government provides Parliament with timely information on gender equality policy to fulfil its oversight role, while other oversight institutions, such as the Audit Bureau, could have their function strengthened. Finally, Jordan could reinforce citizen participation channels to improve gender equality outcomes and accountability.