Fostering problem driven collaboration in a development context: The ASEAN study of health workforce governance

Transnational challenges such as societal ageing, rapid epidemiological transitions from managing chronic disease and infectious disease such as COVID-19, and environmental vulnerabilities raise urgent concerns for collaborative governance. This study addresses the challenges of monitoring outcomes and accountabilities i n a development context. Problem-driven collaboration, with a focus on identifying urgent, locally defined problems offers a potential solution to designing relevant performance management systems. Based on a case-survey design, the study analyses two collaborative governance networks in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) promoting the mobility of health workers. The analysis draws on 20 (n = 20) in-depth interviews with high-level country delegates and officials and a content analysis of 380 confidential reports from 10 countries in ASEAN. The results provide a deeper understanding of how a problem-driven approach can foster collaborative governance and overcome barriers to policy implementation. Implications for monitoring practices include the role of measuring “felt needs” – perceived gaps in implementation of policy objectives, and how problem-driven collaboration can add value to performance management systems in a development context.