Paperwork, Not Progress: Why Central Oversight Stalls Governance Reforms in Pakistan

The World Bank’s Development Impact Group, under the Development Economics division, has released a striking policy research working paper titled “Command and Can’t Control: Assessing Centralized Accountability in the Public Sector.” Authored by Saad Gulzar, Juan Felipe Ladino, Muhammad Zia Mehmood, and Daniel Rogger, the report investigates whether strengthening centralized accountability mechanisms in government actually improves the performance of public agencies. Produced by the Research Support Team, the study is both rigorous and provocative, challenging assumptions about how states can best govern. It blends empirical evidence, case-based illustrations, and theoretical insights to question whether central control can truly substitute for trust, autonomy, and capacity.

The Tension Between Oversight and Autonomy

At the heart of the report is a clash of two long-standing perspectives in governance. The principal-agent framework argues that closer oversight, reporting obligations, and performance contracts reduce slack and align bureaucrats with political goals. In contrast, the complexity view suggests that excessive centralization suffocates flexibility, erodes intrinsic motivation, and ultimately hinders performance. The paper situates this theoretical debate within the practical context of Pakistan’s federal bureaucracy. This system has been the subject of repeated waves of reform aimed at tightening central oversight. It is a prime test case for examining how centralized accountability plays out in practice.

A Data-Driven Exploration of Bureaucratic Reform

The authors draw on an unusually rich dataset, combining personnel records, agency-level administrative information, surveys of bureaucrats, and audit reports. By exploiting the staggered rollout of reforms across different agencies, they employ quasi-experimental methods such as difference-in-differences estimations and matched comparisons. This design allows them to trace the causal impact of accountability reforms with a high degree of credibility.

What emerges is a sobering picture. Agencies subjected to stricter central oversight did not significantly improve their performance compared to those operating with looser controls. Charts presented between pages 45 and 55 illustrate flat or even declining trajectories of service delivery indicators under stricter accountability regimes. Earlier tables show how reporting requirements multiplied year after year while core outcomes barely shifted. The gap between reform theory and bureaucratic reality is laid bare in stark statistical detail.

Paperwork Burdens and Declining Morale

The study does not stop at numbers. It vividly illustrates how reforms played out in the lives of public servants. Education officers, for instance, were burdened with lengthy compliance reports that consumed hours better spent mentoring teachers and inspecting classrooms. Health administrators faced central directives that ignored the realities of local staff shortages or disrupted supply chains. These examples reveal the unintended consequences of well-intentioned reforms: paperwork displaced performance.

Equally telling are the surveys of bureaucrats themselves. Officials working under stricter accountability regimes reported lower morale, diminished autonomy, and reduced job satisfaction. Rather than energizing them, central oversight often left them feeling distrusted and demotivated. The study shows how reforms designed to tighten accountability at the top often loosen the sense of responsibility at the frontlines, producing a paradox of diminished effectiveness.

Rethinking What Accountability Should Mean

The policy implications drawn from the findings are both pragmatic and forward-looking. The authors argue that governments should not equate accountability with an ever-thicker web of central controls. Instead, they propose “smart accountability,” a model where oversight is focused on outcomes rather than compliance checklists. Building capacity, equipping local managers with resources, skills, and infrastructure, is presented as a more promising route than drowning them in directives.

This does not mean abandoning oversight altogether. The report calls for a balance, one that combines minimal but strategic monitoring from the center with genuine local discretion. The right model is not command without control, but rather trust supported by accountability mechanisms that recognize complexity and allow adaptation to local realities.

A Global Message Beyond Pakistan

While the study draws on Pakistan’s federal bureaucracy, its relevance stretches far beyond national borders. Many low- and middle-income countries, often encouraged by donors, adopt centralized accountability reforms that look neat in design but falter in practice. The World Bank report serves as a cautionary tale, urging policymakers worldwide to resist one-size-fits-all solutions. It highlights the need to account for local contexts, to value frontline discretion, and to build the state’s capacity before tightening its controls.

Ultimately, the study delivers a clear message: command without trust rarely delivers effective governance. Reforms that focus only on top-down control risk producing bureaucracies that are more preoccupied with compliance than with service delivery. By documenting the limits of centralization and suggesting more balanced approaches, the report contributes both evidence and insight to the global debate on governance reform.