The GAB is a tool for scrutinising and improving the practical outcomes of legislation for marginalised communities. Where legislation results in variable practical impact (good, average and bad) the GAB identifies at what level improvements to legislation can be made (i.e. during formulation, implementation or enforcement). It can be used to identify what is working, what is missing and what legal changes are required to improve the situation. This paper describes the tool and its use in identifying ways to improve required community-concessionaire forestry negotiations in Mozambique.

A summary card of this tool is available to download in four languages in PDF format:

English (42K) | French (42K) | Spanish (42K) | Portuguese (43K)

The complete tool is also available (PDF format):

English (84K, 10pp) | French (89K, 12pp) | Spanish (88K, 10pp) | Portuguese (98K, 10pp)

Please cite this tool as:

Johnstone, R., Cau, B., Norfolk, S. and Macqueen, D. 2005. Good, average, bad: law in action. Power tools series. Terra Firma, Maputo, Mozambique and International Institute for Environment and Development, London, UK.

A related report assesses the tactics used to try and improve the impacts of forest policies on sustainable livelihoods and sustainable forest management in Mozambique:

Macqueen, D.J. and Bila, A. (2004) Gleanings on governance - learning from a two year process of forest policy support to ProAgri. IIED, London, UK. View PDF (532 K).

For further information:

• Contact Terra Firma through Rouja Johnstone (roujaj@hotmail.com), Boaventura Cau (netuem@zebra.uem.moz) Simon Norfolk (simon.norfolk@teledata.mz)