What’s New 2018
November/December 2018 – ARC newsletter for November/December 2018: First हिन्दी Publication │Videos from Recent Events │ICYMI 2018.
December 2018 – The first ARC publication in हिन्दी (Hindi) has arrived! From authors Samir Garg and Suchi Pande, ARC published स्थाईबदलावकेलिएसीखनेकीरणनीतिकीभूमिका (Hindi version of the Accountability Note “Learning to Sustain Change: Mitanin Community Health Workers Promote Public Accountability in India”).
November 2018 – ARC and JASS co-hosted a panel discussion on Movements, Power and Accountability: Grassroots Organizing Perspectives from Asia, Africa and Latin America. Panelists included Joy Aceron (Philippines), Paulina Culum (Guatemala), Nani Zulminarni (Indonesia) and Lucy Mazingi (Zimbabwe).
October 2018 – ARC newsletter for October 2018: Movement-building in Indonesia │New documentary on Guatemala’s health rights defenders │ ARC @ GPSA.
October 2018 – ARC organized a session on Investing in grassroots leadership development strategies for social accountability during the 2018 GPSA partners forum. ARC Director Jonathan Fox moderated a discussion among panelists Joy Aceron, Director, Government Watch, Philippines; Paulina Culum, Network of Community Health Rights Defenders, Guatemala; Wunna Htun, Myanmar Program Coordinator, Bank Information Center; Nani Zulminarni, Director, PEKKA, Women-Headed Households Program, Indonesia.
October 2018 – Nani Zulminarni of PEKKA documents Movement-building for Accountability: Learning from Indonesian Women’s Organizing in a new Working Paper bringing fresh and reimagined language, analysis, and strategy ideas to the transparency, participation, and accountability (TPA) field.
September 2018 – ARC newsletter for September 2018: India’s Mitanin (CHWs) | PSAM Conference | Crowdsourcing on Language Rights for Accountability.
September 2018 – ARC advisor Fletcher Tembo and associate director Angela Bailey joined a panel on learning, reflection and adaptation at the Public Service Accountability Monitor (PSAM) 2018 Social Accountability Conference. The conference report on exploring what it takes to enhance social accountability in practice is available online.
September 2018 – ARC associate director Angela Bailey facilitated a round table discussion with accountability actors in Lilongwe, Malawi. The meeting was co-convened by UNICEF and USAID. Her report from the event is available here Round Table on Social Accountability in Malawi, September 2018: Report and Suggestions Moving Forward.
August 2018 – Samir Garg and Suchi Pande’s Learning to Sustain Change: Mitanin Community Health Workers Promote Public Accountability in India Accountability Note illustrates how the CHW program of the Chhattisgarh state government in central India— known as Mitanin—has, over time, developed a learning strategy that permits CHWs (Mitanins) to enable sustained action on public accountability, whilst simultaneously providing health services and education, and linking communities with government healthcare services.
August 2018 – ARC with Frente Indígena de Organizaciones Binacionales (FIOB), the International Mayan League, and Comunidades Indigenas en Liderazgo/Indigenous Community Leadership (CIELO) hosted indigenous interpreters and indigenous rights advocates in Washington, DC. Over 20 US-based Maya, Mixteco, Zapoteco and Nahua peoples convened to improve interpretation and advocacy skills and to address the pressing language access challenges facing indigenous people from Central America and Mexico. This exchange is informing ARC reflections about the broader issue of how the field of transparency, participation and accountability addresses language rights issues.
July/August 2018 – ARC newsletter for July/Aug 2018: Sandwich Strategy Research | Accountability Alliance in Colombia | Indigenous Interpreters.
July/August 2018 – From July 31 to August 2, a workshop was convened in Bogota, Colombia by the Comisión Étnica para la Paz y la Defensa de los Derechos Territoriales made up of delegates of the Organización Nacional Indígena de Colombia-ONIC, Gobierno Mayor, and Consejo Nacional de Paz Afrocolombiana-CONPA to address the goals and priorities of indigenous and Afro-Colombian citizens in the Colombian peace process.
July 2018 – The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has awarded $500,000 to Professors Jonathan Fox (ARC Director) and Rachel Sullivan Robinson, both of American University’s School of International Service, for a multi-year project entitled “Sandwich Strategies: Comparative Analysis of Institutional Change in the Global South.”
June 2018 – ARC newsletter for June 2018: Ugandan citizens trigger WB reforms + Going Vertical in the Philippines.
June 2018 – Bank Information Center and ARC published How a Community-Led Response to Sexual Exploitation in Uganda Led to Systemic World Bank Reform. The Bigodi community’s 2015 request to the World Bank’s Inspection Panel, bolstered by international media coverage, led Bank management to respond both to the specific harms and to the underlying policy failures that made them possible.
May 2018 – ARC newsletter for May 2018: Citizen Action for Accountability in Philippines + 2 new ARC publications.
May 2018 – Duncan Green’s blog What kind of Evidence Influences local officials? A great example from Guatemala highlights lessons from the February 2018 Accountability Note by Walter Flores of CEGSS.
May 2018 – ARC published La escala: Su importancia y uso en iniciativas de transparencia y rendición. Versión en español de un resumen originalmente publicado en diciembre de 2016.
May 2018 – ARC published an English summary of a Learning Exchange Report from the First Meeting of Auxiliary Watershed Organizations, convened by Controla Tu Gobierno in Mexico City in September 2017. The full report is also available en español following the same link.
April 2018 – ARC newsletter for April 2018: Guatemalan media, Philippine Democracy and Political Construction of Accountability Keywords.
April 2018 – ARC director Jonathan Fox delivered a keynote address at MySociety 2018 #TICTeC on the Political Construction of Accountability Keywords: Lessons from Action-Research. An article in the March 2018 IDS Bulletin covers the topics in more depth, arguing for a two track approach to communicate public accountability strategies: (1) searching within popular cultures to find existing terms or phrases that can be repurposed, and (2) inventing new discourses that communicate ideas about public accountability that resonate with culturally grounded common-sense understandings.
March 2018 – ARC director Jonathan Fox’s article on The political construction of accountability keywords appeared in the March 2018 IDS Bulletin. The article argues for a two track approach to communicate public accountability strategies: (1) searching within popular cultures to find existing terms or phrases that can be repurposed, and (2) inventing new discourses that communicate ideas about public accountability that resonate with culturally grounded common-sense understandings.
February 2018 – ARC’s inaugural newsletter circulated ARC Updates: February 2018.
February 2018 – Together with Center for the Study of Equity and Governance in Health Systems (CEGSS), ARC published our first dual language Accountability Note. Walter Flores, director of CEGSS, traces the lessons learned from a decade of evidence-based citizen action for health in Guatemala. Read the publication in your preferred language: Lecciones sobre acción ciudadana y rendición de cuentas en los servicios públicos de salud de Guatemala or How Can Evidence Bolster Citizen Action? Learning and Adapting for Accountable Public Health in Guatemala.
January 2018 – ARC and AMDD published the Report on the Think-in on Community Health Worker Voice, Power, and Citizens’ Right to Health. Authors Marta Schaaf, Caitlin Warthin, Amy Manning and Stephanie Topp summarize key themes emerging from a June of 2017 learning exchange among 30 researchers, health advocates, and program implementers from eight countries. Can Community Health Workers be all things to all people – extending health services and working with citizens to hold the health system accountable?