Stories

World leaders have just agreed upon the Global Goals for sustainable development; a to-do list for the world for the next 15 years with the lofty ambition of ending extreme poverty. There is a receptive global public -- a movement…

Citizens today have higher expectations and demand effective solutions to every day issues and challenges. From climate change to expedient postal services, governments are required to act with transparency and diligence. Public accountability demands us, public servants, to act with…

In 2015, a new global development agenda setting priorities for the next fifteen years has been launched. World leaders adopted Agenda 2030 and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in September at the United Nations. These goals represent a commitment…

For 20 weeks in a row the citizens of Guatemala protested the corruption at the heart of their government, in the heart of their capital. First the vice president, and then the president, were arrested and charged. Now, following elections…

This is the fifth in a six blog series written by winners of the IDRC grant for research on OGP. According to Transparency International’s Global Corruption Barometer 2013, the judiciary is perceived to be the third most corrupt institution in…

All throughout the Open Government Partnership (OGP) Global Summit 2015, which was held in Mexico last October 27-29, I tried to steer discussions around the idea of government financing of citizen participation. I purposely used this opportunity to sound off…

This is the fourth in a six blog series written by winners of the IDRC grant for research on OGP. The Open Government Partnership (OGP) has 69 participating countries around the world, with over 2,000 commitments made and countless citizens and…

Linida, as beautiful it may sound is not somebody’s name, nor a government project. It is a story of people engagement in negotiating their demands to shape the development agenda and improve public services in Batang district, Central Java, Indonesia.…

There has been much discussion in the global transparency community around the key theme of sustainable development, especially following last month's adoption of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Central to the SDGs is building resilient infrastructure (goal 9). Given…

With the ink barely dry on the Sustainable Development Goals, naturally the just-completed Open Government Partnership annual summit focused on how greater openness can accelerate progress toward the goals.   The open government agenda is most closely linked to the ambitious Goal 16 on…