Lessons and Insights for Citizen-led Accountability

Lessons and Insights for Citizen-led Accountability

by | Jul 22, 2019 | Budget Transparency, Citizen participation

This post was originally published on the Politics, Governance and Development blog.

As I discussed in a previous blog, SPARK is a new IBP program that will support and leverage public engagement around service delivery issues that affect citizens’ lives as an entry point to shaping budget processes and outcomes in the directions of justice, inclusiveness and democracy.  One of the key elements of SPARK is an embedded action research program led by Institute of Development Studies along with the Accountability Research Center, called Learning with SPARK (LwS).  The LwS core team involves key thought leaders in the fields of accountability, citizen engagement, power analysis and public financial management.  As we began a strategy development processes in SPARK countries, we wanted to open up a space to bring the ideas and evidence from the broader field into dialogue with the on-the-ground realities of our country teams.  In order to do this, we set up four webinars on topics related to SPARK, each led by one of the experts from LwS (with links to recorded webinars):

The content of each of these webinars was too rich to fully summarize in a blog, so I encourage you to view the webinars themselves.  Taken together the four webinars give a concise, but comprehensive, overview of thinking on how citizens engage the state for meaningful change with respect to public resources and services.

A few useful reminders that stuck out in my mind were:

  • If you build it, they might not necessarily come…In other words form does not lead to function. Creating a formal space for citizen engagement does not necessarily mean that the space will be inclusive or meaningful.  Designing a perfect PFM system will not necessarily result in efficient and effective public resources use.  This reinforces the idea that universal, best-practice ‘solutions’ need to be balanced with a view to local conditions – including prevailing attitudes and ideas among citizens and government actors – that will enable or undermine these efforts.
  • The ‘citizen’ and the ‘state’ are often categories we use simplistically. “Citizen engagement” almost by definition means that some citizens engage [in the way you had planned], while others might not engage or might engage in a very different manner.   Similarly, “state accountability” really involves multiple ‘accountabilities’.  These include drivers of accountability, such as internal checks and balances as well as external oversight and pressure, but also diverse recipients of accountability, as certain elements of the state might be more accountable to some actors (and not others), and other parts of the same state more accountable to a different group.  Of course, citizens from more marginalized groups are those to whom few (if any) elements of the state are generally accountable.
  • Collective action is a prerequisite for meaningful change by citizens. Citizens acting together through their own organizations and movements is the expression of civic participation that most often results in citizens building civic capacities, promoting more inclusive societies, and shifting government institutions to be more responsive.  That said, collective citizen action is hard, with many barriers, particularly by more excluded groups.  Furthermore, collective action is no silver bullet, it can target relatively superficial symptoms of state dysfunction, lead to backlash from powerful actors, or be generated based on messages of fear and intolerance.  Yet for disadvantaged groups, collective action is most often the only way to ensure meaningfully responsiveness and inclusion by the state.

Overall, I think the messages from these four webinars fit into four categories:

Systems

Citizen and civil society engagement with the state takes place in a multi-level, multi-layered system.  Alta Folscher reminded us of the complexity of the PFM system, in which many processes and actors link together.  This means bottlenecks or other challenges can occur throughout the system, as her illustrative diagram below suggests.

Source: Alta Folscher presentation to IBP (July 2018)

Alta reinforced the fact that this formal PFM system is embedded in a broader context in which political economic, social, and other factors influence how the system works in practice.  Similarly, Rosie McGee emphasized that the spaces for citizen engagement can be more or less formal, and exist at differing levels of governance.  Engagement in any one space may be insufficient to result in meaningful outcomes, particularly for less powerful actors.  Jonathan Fox proposed approaches to taking scale into account that come from a systems perspective, emphasizing engaging strategically at various points in the system to target the causes (not just symptoms) of corruption, exclusion and inequity.

Power

Each of the webinars emphasized the importance of power dynamics.  Formal PFM processes and citizen engagement mechanisms exist in contexts of unbalanced power relationships, which work to exclude some groups and favor others.  Power shapes whether and how citizens organize, and often citizens need to build up collective power to then engage with the state on a more level playing field.  Power is both tangible – holders of political and economic power who can shape decisions and action to their advantage – and intangible – ideas that go viral and open up new possibilities or the subtle ways that language shapes our perceptions.  When we take power into account in our support for inclusive and equitable fiscal governance systems, this may lead us to working more indirectly to build up the kinds of power (including the power of ideas or discourses that can shape behavior) that allow citizens and government reformers to act in meaningful ways, rather that more directly to push through technically-sound changes that will undermined by unequal power arrangements.

Accountability

Alta Folscher reinforced the idea that technically sound PFM systems are necessary, but not sufficient to achieve effective and equitable service delivery; effective accountability is equally important.  John Gaventa discussed that from the 100 case studies of citizen engagement he reviewed, collective citizen action through associations and movements that engaged in multiple spaces (formal and informal), were most effective at achieving real accountability gains.  This dovetails with Jonathan Fox’s ideas about pursuing multi-level, multi-actor strategies that are vertically integrated across levels of governance in order to monitor and engage in multiple links of the accountability chain.  This can involve professional NGOs, but also needs to connect to a broader civic base if it is to have the legitimacy and influence to challenge the causes and not just the symptoms of low accountability, i.e. those actors and institutions that undermine and resist accountability towards the public.

Change

So far, this all sounds complicated and challenging – which it is – so how does meaningful change happen?  Obviously, we don’t have any magic formulas, but the consensus from these four discussions is that change can and does happen in small but important ways, and that thinking about power and systems can help us understand what kinds of changes can be linked up to have a more meaningful impact.  This is a key question that IBP and our partners wrestle with, that of ensuring that we are pursuing realistic incremental change, but doing so in a way that ensures that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  That was Alta’s point in looking at the necessary entry points to ensure accountability in PFM systems, Rosie’s argument about shifting power in diverse spaces of citizen engagement, John’s evidence about the kinds of civic mobilization that make a difference, and Jonathan’s point about thinking about scale as linking efforts strategically across governance systems.  This is certainly much easier said than done, but it actually gives us a set of strategic principles that could guide our work going forward:

  • Focus on efforts that connect to and build citizen collective agency through citizen-led organizations and movements and citizen-created/controlled spaces for agenda setting and claims making
  • Support strategic and effective citizen participation with the state by pushing for these spaces to be inclusive and linked to other actors and accountability mechanisms to ensure meaningful results
  • Understand the formal and informal dynamics in the PFM system and work in ways that addresses the systemic causes not just the symptoms through a focus on shifting power and bolstering accountability
  • Support efforts to link complementary actors and efforts – such as professional NGOs, broader social movements and government reformers – across levels of governance, that reflects and addresses the systemic nature of the causes of inequity and exclusion.
Sharing Insights on Strategy and Learning for Fiscal Justice

Sharing Insights on Strategy and Learning for Fiscal Justice

by | Apr 9, 2019 | Budget Transparency

Recently, Oxfam America, the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), and the International Budget Partnership (IBP) engaged in a series of learning exchanges to share insights and lessons from our respective Planning, Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (PMEL) systems and practices. Participants from all three organizations share an understanding that fiscal governance systems around the world are becoming increasingly challenging, and that many of our strategic assumptions are being called into question. Though efforts to ensure public resources are used to promote inclusive and equitable human development have made some progress, exclusionary fiscal governance, reflecting and contributing to deepening inequality, remains the reality faced by millions of people around the world. Continued advances towards more open and accountable fiscal institutions are not guaranteed, and are already subject to reversal in diverse contexts.

To be effective in the future we must reexamine our theories of change (ToC) and assumptions to make sure they reflect emerging evidence and shifting contexts, such as civic space. It also means ensuring that our organizations have in place frameworks, practices, and an organizational culture conducive to adaptive learning and management. These areas are essential to navigating the complex and challenging fiscal governance systems in which we work.

Process

The learning exchanges, formatted as roundtable meetings, were conceived of and supported by the Open Society Foundation’s Fiscal Governance Program. The goal was to learn from each other’s experiences to improve our organizations’ approaches and abilities to contribute to change for more inclusive and equitable governance. Core participants were MEL teams from each organization; senior program staff and individuals external to the three organizations also participated.

The first learning exchange was centered around what our organizations are learning and how it shapes our work – focusing on ToCs and theories of action (ToAs). We compared our thinking and tried to surface assumptions and introduce relevant evidence produced by our organizations and external sources. We situated the comparison of our strategies and theories of change within a conversation about the deeper drivers of exclusion and inequality, as well as the shifting contexts in which we work, particularly with respect to civic space.

At the second exchange, we discussed how our organizations learn through diverse PMEL systems and practices, and honed in on the ‘last mile’ for PMEL – using our evidence and learning to inform decision making. We also wanted this roundtable to be practical, so we intentionally built in space for each organization to workshop a particular PMEL challenge, drawing on the collective insights of all the roundtable participants.

Across the two learning exchanges we brainstormed inputs for what might be a common learning agenda. This was based on questions we wanted to answer, evidence gaps we identified, and areas of research and learning in which we are already engaged. What emerged was ambitious and needs to be refined and prioritized, but represented a useful map of what knowledge would be most useful for the field going forward. Our organizations are exploring how we might address elements of this agenda individually and collectively, and hope to have further conversations with other organizations in the future. In particular, we began initial discussions of possible geographies in which we may jointly seek to address some of the learning questions we identified.

Insights

Theories of Change and Action:

Digging into and distinguishing between ToC and ToA was useful in forcing us into explicit conversations about the systems in which we operate and how we seek to shift them. Comparing our thinking, we noticed that our biases about what makes change happen are reflected in our frameworks (e.g. our ToCs frequently emphasize promoting transparency or information disclosure as a solution to the problems identified). In addition, the Fiscal Futures conversations have highlighted the big question marks, assumptions, and black boxes in our thinking. For example, we are seldom explicit about the drivers of inequality and exclusion, nor how these connect to each other. Our focus tends to be on getting the right government policies, yet implementation can be just as hard or more so. Much evidence suggests that it is the underlying political and power dynamics that shape these possibilities, but we are seldom focused on the longer processes of shifting these structural elements. What does it take to shift systems towards inclusiveness, accountability and equity, and what are the most relevant roles for our organizations and allies?

Honest conversations that took place during the learning exchanges pointed to the need for more field-wide efforts around evidence, learning, and ToCs. We even floated the idea of a shared ‘generic’ fiscal governance ToC that each organization could then tailor to their own contexts and nest their specific ToAs within.

Organizational Learning:

We fairly quickly realized that we are all facing a similar set of challenges around PMEL, making this exchange highly relevant to all of us. We agreed that the significant new challenges of changing external political contexts and closing civic space reinforced the need for critical reflection and meaningful utilization of evidence-based learning in our respective organizations. Now, more than ever, we need to foster organizational cultures, systems, and practices that enable and encourage tough questions about our efforts and require evidence to support strategic decisions in situations of complexity.

Hearing about how each organization is building their overall PMEL system, as well as experiences of putting in place specific tools and practices, gave each organization ideas and insights. For example, IBP is currently in the process of developing an organizational PMEL policy, and the feedback and experiences of the other organizations helped us think about what was useful and realistic. Similarly, NRGI recently launched an external evaluation aiming to inform its 2020-24 strategy, and received useful advice on how to maximize the evaluation’s relevance to the strategy development process.

Much of the learning exchange was spent hearing about how we negotiate useful PMEL, i.e. PMEL that meets our requirements (including for donor reporting) but more importantly, that meaningfully shapes our decisions and practices – the ‘last mile’ of PMEL. It also means thinking about the formal and informal dynamics and relationships that connect PMEL teams, program teams, and organizational leadership. This ‘last mile’ conversation was perhaps the most enlightening, as we realized that PMEL in each of our organizations is an evolving, negotiated, political, and to a certain extent, contested, domain. Thus, our teams often spend as much time building relationships, trust, and understanding with others in our organization as we do on formal systems and frameworks. We agreed that this was not only necessary, but also desirable to foster internal buy-in for PMEL.

Conclusion

The two learning exchanges were extremely useful for all involved. We realized the value of collaboration and some kind of learning community of practice to facilitate the exchange of ideas and practices, as well as to build relationships among PMEL practitioners that allow for honest conversations. This kind of exchange was useful both for sharing practical tools and experiences, and for helping us take a step back to think about the broader challenges and opportunities we face as organizations and as a field. In particular, our shared commitment to ensuring that PMEL in our respective organizations is relevant and bridges the ‘last mile’ to decision making and practice in ways that meaningfully and strategically shape our organizations’ approaches. This includes helping us think about how to sharpen our strategic thinking around how change happens for fiscal justice as well as enabling adaptive management to better navigate the complex and challenging contexts in which we work. Finally, there was an appetite to continue to explore areas of collaboration going forward. Areas we will continue to explore include contributing – individually and collectively – to a shared learning agenda, exploring common ToC elements, and broadening the conversation to other organizations working in fiscal governance issues.