"This paper identifies four primary drivers of proactive disclosure throughout history. The first is the need to inform the public about laws and decisions and the public’s right to be informed, to know their rights and obligations. The second is the public’s demand for the information needed to
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hold governments accountable both at and between elections. The third is the demand for information in order to participate actively in decision-making. The fourth is the provision to the public of information needed to access government services, which has expanded significantly in the past decade with growth of electronic access to services or “egovernment.” [...] The recently adopted legal frameworks which include proactive disclosure regimes (Section 3) point to an emerging standard on the classes of information which should be made available at the core of any national proactive disclosure regime. The national standards are reiterated and complemented by provisions by international international bodies (Section 4). These international provisions make clear that, in addition to having numerous benefits for public bodies and for members of the public, proactive disclosure is an obligation that is part of the right of access to information. From comparing the national and international provisions it is possible to identify a set of 14 core-minimum of classes of information for proactive disclosure." (Executive summary, page 1)
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"This Guidance Note suggests concrete ways to enable the people in a country to influence the work of government and public agencies - and in that way ensure democratic development results. While both the Paris Declaration and the Accra Agenda for Action point to the need for better use of communica
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tion, it has become increasingly apparent that good communication is an inextricable component of good development practice. The point of departure is to propose how a public agency should provide information to the citizens and its representatives, and what kind of initiatives the agency should aim at to create conditions for public participation, interaction and collaboration. Different policy and practice perspectives are combined with the purpose of guiding Sida in supporting partners to get it together with the public – in other words, to take advantage of communication for increasing accountability, transparency, participation and non-discrimination." (Back cover)
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"This Working Paper from DFID’s Evaluation Department offers a menu of Voice & Accountability (V&A) indicators, and suggests steps for building monitoring and evaluation frameworks for V&A interventions. It provides a check list of management issues, and some ideas for data collection. It does not
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attempt to make any judgement about the indicators identified, as this work will be further developed under DFID’s ‘Suggested Indicators for Governance’ work, due in 2010. The paper is intended for DFID advisers and managers working on V&A initiatives at the country level. It will also be of use to people outside DFID who are interested in understanding how V&A work contributes to development outcomes; or who want more information about data collection methods for V&A measurement. V&A interventions range from work with governments on policy and reform processes, to activities at community level on civic education and rights awareness. DFID supports a significant amount of V&A work through government and non-state actors, in sector programmes and in work with civil society organisations including the media. We now need to establish the evidence base to show what change has resulted." (Executive summary)
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"Citizens’ Voice and Accountability (CV&A) work has emerged as a priority in the international development agenda from the 1990s onwards. In their CV&A work, donors recognise the importance of context: it shapes relation to that context. However, context awareness has not proven sufficient to enab
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le donors to grapple with key challenges posed by the interaction between formal and informal institutions, the prevalence of the latter over the former in many instances, and underlying power relations and dynamics. Some examples of positive impact of CV&A interventions have emerged from the interventions analysed for this study. This is mostly at the level of positive citizen awareness, empowering certain marginalised groups, and encouraging state officials. However, within the sample analysed, such impact/effects have remained limited and isolated, and have so far proven difficult to scale up. A critical factor leading to the observed limited nature of results is related to the fact that donor expectations as to what such work can achieve are too high, and are based on misguided assumptions around the nature of voice and accountability, and the linkages between the two. There is a tension between the long-term processes of transforming state-society relations and donors’ needs/desires to produce quick results. Scaling up sustainability are also issues not currently sufficiently addressed within intervention design and implementation." (Executive summary, page v)
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"Donors and practitioners could make greater use of evaluations, and their findings, to increase the effectiveness and results of public communication, advocacy and education about global development. The first step is to understand the evaluation process and respect its rigours. The second is to ac
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knowledge and learn how to deal with the political nature of evaluation, the third is to understand its limitations. DAC members, along with their partners, should work together to strengthen evaluation of public awareness and learning by creating a space (e.g. website) to share perspectives, experiences and results from evaluation; pooling resources for scientific research on the long-term impact of public awareness raising activities; building a stronger knowledge base for what works and what doesn't work in this sector; and finally, working together to develop minimum standards for the evaluation of communication, advocacy and education about global development." (Abstract)
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"Enhancing citizen voice and accountability has increased in importance for donors since the 1990s. This paper reviews existing literature and the strategy and policy documents of seven DAC donors in order to contribute to the design of an evaluation framework to assess the effectiveness of these do
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nors’ voice and accountability interventions." (Executive summary)
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"This book provides the first comprehensive examination of the issues and politics of NGO accountability across all sectors and internationally. It offers an assessment of the key technical tools available including legal accountability, certification and donor-based accountability regimes, and ques
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tions whether these are appropriate and viable options or attempts to 'roll-back' NGOs to a more one-dimensional function as organizers of national and global charity. Input and case studies are provided from NGOs such as ActionAid, and from every part of the globe including China, Indonesia and Uganda." (Publisher description)
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"Las páginas que siguen tienen, además de un rico arsenal teórico, un evidente carácter testimonial.Refleja los esfuerzos cumplidos por los Comités de Vigilancia Ciudadana respecto de los congresistas electos por los departamentos de Arequipa, Cuzco, Huancavelica, Loreto y Ayacucho. La elecció
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n del Congreso, como objeto de vigilancia, no es, por cierto, arbitraria. Responde a una necesidad universal de reonciliación entre el pueblo y sus órganos representativos que, con la video política, han ido perdiendo presencia y paulatinamente, también legitimidad. Y ello afecta, de modo grave al sistema democrático que se asienta precisamente sobre la base de la representación y, desde luego, de los partidos. Lograr esa reconciliación pasa, sin duda, por una mayor eficiencia en la tarea parlamentaria pero también por una comunicación, directa e inmediata, entre representantes y representados y entre el pueblo y los órganos de intermediación política." (Cubierta del libro)
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"This book brings together key readings in the NGO managment literature, focusing on NGDO's working on issues of poverty and injustice in developing countries and on a global scale. The contributions which are drawn from a wide variety of sources ranging from books and journal articles to agency pub
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lications." (D + C 5/2002)
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