Background: Partnership for Democracy and Accountability

Embedding inclusive participation within government decision-making, public service deliveryTo ensure that citizens of all groups are better supported by the government, OGP participating governments are working to improve the quality of and access to public services. Commitments in this are... More, and accountability mechanisms is central to healthier democracies and can help improve citizens’ trust in government. At the heart of OGP lies the domestically-owned co-creation processCollaboration between government, civil society and other stakeholders (e.g., citizens, academics, private sector) is at the heart of the OGP process. Participating governments must ensure that a dive... between government and civil society, who work together to co-create action plans with concrete commitments across a broad range of policy areas, ensuring that citizens and civil society have a role in shaping and overseeing governments.

OGP’s new strategy has the ambitionAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, OGP commitments should “stretch government practice beyond its current baseline with respect to key areas of open government.” Ambition captures the po... to accelerate open government action across select policy areas, including anti-corruption, civic space and inclusionOGP participating governments are working to create governments that truly serve all people. Commitments in this area may address persons with disabilities, women and girls, lesbian, gay, bisexual, tr... More; and mainstream open government across all branches and levels of government. As part of the new strategy, OGP will seek to inspire, connect, and enable an ever-growing community of reformers and champions from government and civil society to take action together. This will require to focus on equipping leaders and reformers with the skills and resources, competencies and coalitions, to drive change.

With the support of the European Union, through the Partnership for Democracy and Accountability (PDA), OGP will actively support governments and civil society in 7 OGP member countries to advance inclusive co-creation and implementation of policy reforms through innovative open government approaches and peer support. This support will be focused in Colombia, Ghana, Honduras, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria and the Philippines.

While the political context in each of the target countries is very diverse, they share key challenges to fight corruption, improve accountability systems, and strengthen citizen engagement in policy making processes, particularly of underrepresented groups. These countries are mostly open government stalwarts in their regions, with a diversity of government institutions and civil society stakeholders involved in the OGP process, availability of resources for the implementation of reforms – from donors and elsewhere – as well as a track record in advancing open government reforms. Some of these countries are promising bright spots with clear opportunities to enhance open government with a small but strong set of supportive leaders and partners, with potential to inspire other countries in the region in a race to the top to make governments more responsive and accountable. Despite their strengths, all selected countries require targeted support to sustain and build on their previous successes, deepen open government reform agendas, and build in democratic resilience across different levels of government.

At the country level, this initiative will provide enhanced support to both the co-creation and implementation of open government reforms/ commitments in target countries. Co-creation support will be provided through commitmentOGP commitments are promises for reform co-created by governments and civil society and submitted as part of an action plan. Commitments typically include a description of the problem, concrete action... workshops and technical assistance on inclusive participatory methods, as well as by strengthening resources for civil society to participate and play a key role during this process. Furthermore, it will support efforts towards broader outreach to key state institutions like legislatures and oversight institutions, which are essential to building strong accountability ecosystems domestically. Implementation of key reforms in priority thematic areas of this action will be supported by brokering connections with technical partners, granting subcontracts to expert consultants and international partner organizations for the provision of technical assistance, and organizing roundtables with financial and technical assistance providers to enhance provision of implementation support for reforms.

It will also facilitate knowledge and innovation sharing, and peer exchange, have proved to be an effective way to inspire reformers and help tackle shared challenges. Over time, these peer exchanges help strengthen working relationships between reformers, forging coalitions for change that can drive greater collective ambition for open government reforms. In tandem, it will support the building of leadership skills and competencies of open government leaders and practitioners in these countries to help them drive change in their contexts.

Through this initiative, OGP will also seek to recognize and showcase open government reforms and reformers in the areas of accountability and anti- corruption, genderOGP participating governments are bringing gender perspectives to popular policy areas, ensuring diversity in participatory processes, and specifically targeting gender gaps in policies to address gov... More and inclusion, and participation and civic space. innovation and recognition of open government reformers by capturing and sharing inspiration, innovation, evidence and stories:

OGP will, further, provide flexible forms of enhanced support and rapid response to countries with windows of opportunity that open up during the lifetime of the program. Through this partnership, OGP will also look to possibly include, over time, other target countries who are eligible to join the Partnership

At the global level, there is a need to strengthen linkages between global pledges and country actions, and build continuity between global platforms. OGP will continue to bridge this gap between global pledges and country actions by strengthening domestically-owned action-oriented processes that are in place to advance open government priorities.