Introduction

The role of think tanks is probably most critical in transforming economies. The challenge of transition from a centrally planned to a market economy is huge. These countries have to introduce many new institutions required for the smooth functioning of a market economy, and learn how to formulate and implement a new set of socio-economic policies. Policymakers in these economies are often ill-prepared for this challenge since their education, training and experience are inappropriate for the tasks they face. think tanks in the broadly-defined public sector may play an important role helping policymakers to better meet the challenge.

Since the late 1980s when Vietnam adopted the doi moi policy, the country has been very successful in transforming its economy with the introduction of many new market institutions and the achievement of respectable economic growth and stability. This success has led to a substantial reduction in poverty and a rapid increase in general level of people's material well-being. These achievements are indeed remarkable given that few senior- level policymakers have been systematically educated or trained on the market economy. Even though younger people have been educated on the market economy, the quality of education has been rather poor and they are not well-prepared to deal with increasingly complex policy issues facing the Vietnamese economy.

In this transformation process, Vietnamese think tanks seem to have played an important role in assisting lawmakers and policymakers with their policy-oriented research and public policy training and advice. Mostly located in a government ministry or agency, the think tanks have been tasked to provide practical assistance to address the impending agendas of the ministry and agency. They have been active in retraining their staff and undertaking research and training programs together with foreign experts and institutions, often with the financial support of external donors. In spite of this initial success, the Vietnamese think tanks suffer from various problems: lack of independence from the line ministries and agencies, poor cooperation among think tanks, inadequate capabilities of their staff and brain drain, insufficient budgetary support, and poor management.

1. Dominance of Ministerial Think Tanks in Vietnam

Surely, it costs resources to address some of these problems, and the government may not be ready for it given its priorities for resource allocation. However, there seem to be many other measures that can strengthen the capacities of think tanks for more effective policy research, training and advice. Some examples include institutional innovation for increased independence of think tanks as well as better coordination and cooperation among themselves and better selection of research/training agendas. These are actually the key concerns of this volume.

Currently, most policy-oriented research/training institutes are located in government ministries and agencies. As such, they lack independence in setting the agendas and suggesting policy directions, and they are constrained in constructive criticism of government policies. Furthermore, being preoccupied with accommodating the ministerial needs and concerns, these think tanks are likely to fail to foster broader perspectives beyond those of their ministries and agencies. Unfortunately, however, independence is often obtained at some cost. Independence might mean that think tanks becoming less responsive to emerging policy issues and less involved in policymaking process. It may also mean that financial support of the government will become weaker and think tanks will have more difficulty in securing information and data for their research activity.

The types and functions of think tanks across countries, which are described in detail by Diane L. Stone in the following chapter, depend very much on some key factors of national environment. They include the stages of economic development, the characteristics of political institutions, and the availability of qualified researchers.¹ Given the current income level and the political regime, it is hardly surprising that the Vietnamese society cannot support many strong private think tanks including those of NGOs. Also, the Vietnamese political system and level of decentralization indicate that potential demand for policy research/training and advice is high from the legislative body and the local governments. However, the demand is largely not met due to the shortage qualified human resources. As the result, think tanks are mainly clustered under the executive body: ministries and agencies in Vietnam.

2. Changing Policy Environment

As the Vietnamese economy keeps growing, resulting in diverse concerns and aspirations of the people, and as it gets structurally more complicated and more globalized, policy-making will become increasingly interdisciplinary requiring more sophisticated analyses and much broader perspectives than before. Policy issues will increasingly have to be addressed on the basis of close consultation and coordination among many relevant ministries and agencies rather than single-handedly by any one ministry/agency. Short and medium-term socio-economic planning will also require more coordination across sectors for the consistency and credibility of the plans. These developments indicate that the current system of ministerial think tanks in Vietnam should be critically reviewed for improvement. The chapter by Nguyen Dinh Cung, Bui Van and Pham Hong Ha aims to contribute to such a critical assessment. Ministerial think tanks may be given more independence and/or conscious efforts may be made to foster a center of excellence as a strong comprehensive think tank outside of any ministerial control.

The center of excellence may logically be located under the planning ministry, which plays a critical role in medium-term resource allocation and has no major interest groups behind the ministry. However, the center is desired to have a substantial degree of independence from, or a loose affiliation with, the planning ministry. This may be difficult without the strong patronage and support of the nation's top leadership as well as distinguished capacity of policy analyses and advice on the part of the think tank. Adequate support from the government budget or the donor community that ensures decent salary, prestige and job security for the staff is likely to be instrumental in fostering a center of excellence.²

Vietnam may learn some lessons from the evolution of the Korean system of think tanks, which is presented in detail in the chapter by Jongryn Mo. Witnessing an essential role played by the think tank affiliated with the planning ministry (Korea Development Institute, KDI) since the early 1970s, other ministries also established research institutes under their control and supervision in the 1980s. However, these ministerial think tanks lacked independence, were often abused to defend narrow ministerial interests, and had their research topics duplicated among different think tanks without any mechanisms to coordinate among themselves. As a way to deal with these problems, all the government think tanks were put under a National Research Council and a consolidated committee under the Prime Minister's Office in 1999. Line ministries no longer directly control these think tanks, even though they have a close working relation with one or more think tanks using the ministerial research fund as an incentive for maintaining such a relationship. This system also promotes stronger competition among think tanks.

3. Attributes of Effective Think Tanks

There seems to be little dispute that the core asset of a think tank is human resources. How to attract good people and motivate them to do their best at their tasks is the key to the success of a think tank. Usually the best people are 'tradables'; they easily leave to other places if they are not well treated - even by international standards - in terms of their compensation and working environment, including the relationship with the government and the style of managing the think tanks. Think tanks will have difficulty in attracting and keeping good people if they are under the tight control of ministries and agencies with bureaucratic working environment lacking the culture of open discussion among the fellows. Even though compensation may be far short of an international standard, it should be made up by merit-based compensation and strong sense of contribution to policymaking.

These conditions hardly seem to be satisfied in the Vietnamese think tanks. Qualified human resources are in short supply to start with, and brain drain is prevalent. Subject to the ministerial pay schedule, compensation is low and rigid. As part of a ministry, research agendas are dictated by the ministry and independent voices are not tolerated on specific policy directions. Even though think tanks are heavily relied upon for policy analyses, they are not always major actors in high-level decision- making processes. Sometimes, think tanks have difficulty in accessing necessary information and data from the departments of their own and other ministries. Even under the system of ministerial think tanks, it seems imperative that they be given more independence and flexibility - in terms of budget, recruitment and compensation of staff, organizational structure, setting research agendas, international cooperation, etc. Also critical is actively involving the think tanks in major policymaking with the full support of information, data and other administrative matters.

4. Public Policy Training

Public policy training is particularly urgent for officials in the economic ministries and agencies. This is because doi moi is essentially economic management reform and the challenge is mainly to foster markets and ensure their smooth functioning. The chapter by Nguyen Dinh Tai provides an in-depth analysis of the situation. Vietnam should utilize every opportunity for the training of its officials: sending as many as possible abroad for short and long-term training and actively joining various donorfinanced training in the country. However, given the huge training needs, substantial improvements seem to be needed in the backbone of civil service training: training at each ministry and agency for their own staff as well as general training at the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA). Training within a ministry/agency seems to be mainly focused on specific skills or relevant new laws and regulations, while training at NAPA is mostly concerned with administrative matters rather than policy issues.

As a more serious effort of (re)training the officials in the economic ministries and agencies, it may be worth considering to establish a consolidate Economics Training Institute. As mentioned earlier, it is not desirable to train officials by each ministry in their narrow ministerial perspectives. Thanks to the economies of scale, the consolidated Institute should be able to give higher quality training with more careful design and ex post evaluation of training courses. It may provide courses for deeper understanding of economics and major public policy issues as well as on common analytical tools required for officials. The consolidated Economics Training Institute can better ensure inter-ministerial coordination and will be better able to mobilize best talents as training resources across different ministries and agencies as well as academic institutions. The creation of the consolidated Institute will also facilitate coordination among international donors for more systematic support for training programs currently provided on a rather ad hoc basis.³

5. Better Networking

With or without a center of excellence, it is essential to have good networking among think tanks. This point is presented in a systematic approach by Dang Kim Son in the concluding chapter of this volume. There are at least four merits expected from the networking of think tanks. First is information sharing - information about the activities of other think tanks will help avoid any duplication of activities and encourage collaboration among think tanks. Second, the collaboration allows them to mitigate the constraints of a limited human resource pool in tackling major policy challenges facing the economy. Third, better information sharing and more collaborative work enable the involved think tanks to have better overall perspectives concerning specific policy issues, which help them overcome narrow ministerial interests and achieve inter-ministerial coordination and policy consistency. Lastly, networking among local think tanks is likely to lead to better coordination, and a parallel network, among international donors for more effective support for research and training activities.

In Vietnam, there seems to be little formal networking among think tanks - among research institutes, among training institutions, and between research and training institutes. In spite of many merits of networking, it may not be an easy task without a strong leadership initiative. The constraints may include rivalry among ministries and institutions, reluctance to share information, desire for operational autonomy, and lack of incentives for collaboration. For public policy training, the above-mentioned consolidated Economics Training Institute may go a long way towards collaboration among ministerial and academic institutions. For policy research, there are several options for promoting cooperation among institutions: invitation to an informal and flexible network for information sharing and collaboration; encouraging joint work through financial incentives without a formal network; or formation of an official network for collaboration and coordination.

It is encouraging that a group of policy and strategy research institutes voluntarily joined together in June 2005 to adopt a memorandum of understanding on cooperation among them. The nine participating research institutes agreed on specific collaborative efforts including: exchange of information and data and cross-participation in, and joint organization or development of, seminars and forums as well as other research and training activities.⁴ In order to make the cooperation effective, the participating institutes further agreed to set up an Executive Board, office of the Secretariat, nomination of a contact person at each institute, and development of a joint website, forum and a newsletter.

The Japan Fund for Public Policy Training, an initiative under the Asian Development Bank Institute, supports these developments. Together with three strong local counterparts - NISTPASS, CIEM and IPSARD - a roundtable was organized in August 2005 in Hanoi, at which over 100 experts assembled to discuss ways of strengthening public policy research and training in Vietnam. Participants included academics, researchers, policymakers, members of the diplomatic corps and international organizations, media representatives and business persons.

This volume is a result of the roundtable. It assembles contributions by leading Vietnamese and international experts and practitioners in the field. We hope it can make a modest but useful contribution to the ongoing modernization of public policy research and training in Vietnam.

In particular, we hope this volume will provide useful and comprehensive information on the policy research and training situation in Vietnam to both the concerned domestic audience and to international partners. For this reason, we have decided to make the material available in Vietnamese and English language. We also hope that the contributions in this volume will be thought provoking and can contribute to the next steps of modernizing institutions, renovating curricula and strengthening networking and cooperation. Ideally, some elements, strategies and ways forward presented in this volume will resonate in future policy decisions in the field of public policy research and training.

Comment(s)

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1. Rathindranath Pal
   (posted 23 April 2008 / 08:10:32 PM)
   
   It’s a good initiative and relevance to Viet Nam at this moment as its economy is quickly growing like China and India. Without strengthening the capacity of public policy and research it is difficult for a country to be on right track of development.