WUNRN
Huairou Commission
Transparency & Accountability
Initiative
When grassroots women organize at the community level to design and implement anti-corruption strategies, they build gender sensitive governance that leads to improved service delivery, increased access to justice, and decreasing levels of corruption and poverty.
The Huairou Commission Transparency &Accountability Initiative formed out of a growing partnership with UNDP, which gained traction in 2011 during HC's Global Summit on Grassroots Women's Leadership and Governance. As a direct result of the Summit, UNDP committed to funding an action research project examining grassroots women's perceptions and experiences of corruption, notably lacking in existing corruption research
The Transparency and Accountability Initiative, launched in September 2012, was built out of the consolidation process of the MDG 3 Initiative, the creation of a new Action Plan for the Governance Campaign and the study “Seeing Beyond the State: Grassroots Women’s Perspectives on Corruption and Anti-Corruption.”
Corruption
is a symptom of a larger problem
Grassroots
women focus on improving governance structures to reduce corruption and
increase access to service and justice
Non-confrontational strategies are more effective at the grassroots level
Partnering with
civil servants, service providers and government authorities to promote
transparency and accountability creates safe and sustainable mechanisms to
reduce corruption
Organizing
is the key to creating incentives to stop corruption
Grassroots
women are more empowered to raise their voices against corruption if they
belong to a grassroots organization. They feel supported and confident to
address misuse of power.
Knowing the
budget is crucial for monitoring public spending and influencing service
delivery
Access to
budget information varies from country to country. When this information is
updated in real time and accessible, grassroots organizations can better
monitor and act on misuse of public money
Grassroots
women and youth are affected differently by corruption
In the case of
women, sexual demands and physical abuse are two ways that corruption
manifests; therefore, anti-corruption mechanisms focused on only bribery would
not be able to reduce corruption from the perspective of grassroots
women.
Bottom-up
and top-down approaches are complementary in reducing corruption
Grassroots
women have developed important mechanisms to improve service delivery and
access to justice.
Policy and legal
reforms have the potential of creating sustainable and responsive governance
structures to recognize and scale grassroots women-led initiatives. It is thus
important to partner with policy makers.
“Grassroots women experience corruption as endemic,
pervasive, and as a part of everyday life experience. ”
Global Level
At the Global Level, we promote exchanges and increase the visibility of the gendered aspects of corruption in anti-corruption policies and programs to improve the accountability and transparency of governments and institutions.
Local Level
At the Local Level, the Huairou Commission supports six women-led actions to
initiate dialogues, share their knowledge (locally, nationally and globally)
and build partnerships to ensure their solutions to fight corruption gather
visibility and legitimacy:
DAMPA (PHILIPPINES): Grassroots Access to Health Services
DAMPA focuses on better and easier access to health services for grassroots people at the local and national levels. The project addresses budget allocations and focus on women's issues in national health policies.
UCOBAC (UGANDA): Grassroots Women’s Transparency and Accountability Initiative
This grassroots women’s initiative aims at improving local health service delivery to women and children with a specific focus on maternal health services. UCOBAC is building and sustaining the capacity of grassroots women to monitor, advocate, and ensure effective health service delivery for women and children at grassroots level.
LUMANTI (NEPAL): Report Card Testing on WASH governance in Pokhara Municipality
By mobilizing and educating the community on issues of good governance and sanitation service delivery, Lumanti is developing a WASH governance report card to monitor and evaluate corruption related to water and sanitation services in Pokhara Municipality. It is expected that these actions will lead to increased good governance practices.
SWID (UGANDA): Improved transparent service delivery in the Land Offices
SWID is improving transparent service delivery in the land offices that will enable 150 grassroots to secure and acquire land titles. With this project SWID also expects to have a more informed public on corruption and anti-corruption strategies.
Espaço Feminista (BRAZIL): Monitoring of Urbanization Processes in Ponte do Maduro
Grassroots women want to closely monitor current urbanization processes in order to make sure that the process complies with residents’ needs and are implemented observing grassroots women’s interests. The ultimate goals are to advocate for public policies designed to attend to community priorities, and to improve grassroots women’s access to public policies, especially those related to security and basic services.
Las Brumas (JINOTEGA, NICARAGUA): Anti-Corruption Plan of Pantasma and Wiwili
Las Brumas is monitoring the issuing of
identity cards, increasing women’s involvement in municipal budget
training, and maintaining the participation of grassroots women in the Gender
Roundtable, as well as increasing transparency, commitment and efficiency of
the Municipal Councils of Pantasma and Wiwili.
Left: Community women gather for a public
forum on Anti-Corruption Strategies in Jinotega, Nicaragua. Photo courtesy
of Haydee Rodriguez.
To learn more
about the Transparency and Accountability Initiative, please read our Concept Note Summary which
outlines the history and trajectory of our work on good governance and
anti-corruption strategies.
Recent News:
Read more about the most recent work our groups in the Initiative have been
doing: "What Does Mobilization Look Like? First Report Backs from
the Transparency & Accountability Initiative."
Reports:
First
Quarter Progress Report to UNDP: Transparency and Accountability Initiative
Final
Report from the 15th International Anti-Corruption Conference
Videos:
The "Gender and Corruption"
video, produced by UNDP, features findings from the Huairou Commission and
UNDP's joint study "Seeing Beyond the State."
For more information, please contact: Carolina.pinheiro@huairou.org