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This is the World Bank's blog on governance and anti-corruption. It aims at providing a space for debate and knowledge sharing on this critical field of development. | Learn more...

public service delivery

Twittering your way to improved governance

Submitted by Tanya on Fri, 2009-06-05 16:47

San Francisco is setting the US standard for using technology to improve accountability.  The Mayor recently announced the launch of a 311 Call Center through Twitter. Check out the site here.  San Francisco is the first US city to roll out a major service such as this on Twitter.

E-Government: moving beyond services

Submitted by Tanya on Wed, 2009-04-22 17:56

A recent exchange between the members of the W3C group on e-government and the content of the last GSA’s newsletter on Transparency and Open Government, coordinated by Lisa Nelson, got me thinking about how narrowly we often conceive the scope of e-government, and in the process ignore important aspects of governance. 

To most people, e-government is all about better and improved services flowing from the government to the citizen (G2C).  Improvements in service provision usually imply more efficiency in the delivery and services of better quality.  However, the conversion of manual processes to automated processes -which is how most G2C implementation is done- discourages us from using new technologies able to change the paradigm of the relationship between citizens and their government.

Violence and crime in Mexico at the crossroads of misgovernance, poverty and inequality

Submitted by Alfredo on Mon, 2009-03-02 06:32

"Hello, son, are you Ok?  We just got a phone call, and someone told us that one of our sons/daughters was kidnapped. We wanted to be sure that you are fine."  You can imagine how scary was the movement that these parents went through after they picked up the phone and received the ugly and unexpected message.  As sad as it sounds, this situation is something that some families in Mexico have experienced.  Sometimes they are lucky to find out that their relatives are fine, and that everything was faked by someone looking for a profit by creating confusion among relatives.  In other unfortunate cases, the message is real and families have to go through very difficult experiences that may last several months and that not always have a good outcome.

It's not new that Mexico is having problems with violence and crime, coming either from drug-cartels or from organized mafias of kidnappers and car thieves, among others.  It's also true that the entire country is not a jungle and lawless area where nobody is safe.

Over the last decade and a half, most of the approaches to solve these issues have looked at the rule of law and law enforcement elements of the equation.  Better legislation that penalizes these criminal activities; well paid, trained, appropriately equipped and not corrupted police corps; military support to fight drug-cartels; better prison's system that functions as social rehabilitation centers and not as universities of crime... and the list goes on.  This is a good direction to follow.  However, I've always told my friends and colleagues that there are other elements in the equation that also matter a lot, namely, poverty reduction and inequality.

The most useless procedure: cutting red tape and corruption in Mexico

Submitted by Alfredo on Tue, 2008-11-11 16:15

It’s been recognized that civic engagement is fundamental to hold governments accountable and to improve the quality of governance.  This bottom-up approach was recently put into practice in Mexico, where the president decided to reward citizens who denounce the most absurd bureaucratic procedure that they have faced, and who propose the best solutions to cut red tape and bribery.

“The most useless procedure” is the name of the temporary campaign launched by the Mexican government to get citizens’ inputs about how it can improve its effectiveness to deliver public services and goods as well as to combat bribery. The citizen with the most original proposal at the federal level will win about $30,000, while more than $9,000 will be awarded to the best case and solution proposed at the state and local level of government.

So far, procedures related to health and social security , tax administration, education, civil registration and property rights protection are among the most denounce by citizens.

As innovative and attractive as this approach looks, in order to be effective it must be appropriately linked to major plans of modernization and reform of the public sector.  Moreover, even though more than 20 thousand citizens participated in this campaign, there needs to be more massive and permanent, rather than temporary, options to empower citizens in the fight against corruption and red tape.

Corruption without borders… is there any difference around the world?

Submitted by Alfredo on Wed, 2008-10-29 08:33

Some people still believe that corruption is a development “disease” experienced only by developing countries.  Actually, for some of us who lived for many years in low or middle income countries, we can tell that among the population there is a general perception that governments, politicians and citizens in the developed world do good and are exempt from corruption.

This perception might not prove wrong if we think in comparative or relative terms.  However, it doesn’t mean that developed countries are corruption-free.  Dani Kaufmann has blogged about this myth and specific cases, such as Hotel Baranoff in Alaska.  Recent events in the US and Europe bring again this debate into light.  For instance, earlier this week Senator Ted Stevens was convicted of receiving bribes from an oil company based in Alaska.  A few weeks ago, the OECD claimed that the UK was lacking the will to tackle corrupt firms –this issue was also raised during the 2008 Corruption Perception Index release by Transparency International.