Presented on May 23, 2018 during the G-Watch 2018 Learning Exchange on Movement Approach to Accountability held in Cebu City, Philippines

1. G-Watch
National Meeting
Learning Exchange
and
May 23-26, 2018
Cebu City

2. Learning Exchange on
Movement Approach to
Accountability
23-24 May 2018

3. (write in metacards)
Expectations-Setting
What are the questions about
your work/ about social action
in general that you want
answered in this learning
exchange?

4. Background
• Recent empirical research has shown that integrated and ecosystemic
approaches to doing TPA is more promising in achieving lasting results.
• However, how to replicate and scale up the application of an approach in
such level that will tilt the balance of power towards social justice and
inclusive and sustainable development in today’s context is an enormous
challenge.
• One approach that is being explored by G-Watch is citizen movement-
building for accountability.
• The movement approach has been most successful in achieving
substantial changes in the Philippines: from ending Martial Law to passing
progressive policies.
• However, even movements are in crisis given the changes in today’s
politics and governance.

5. Learning Agenda
• What is our understanding of movement-building as a community/ network
in today’s context of Philippine civil society?
• What are the opportunities, challenges and limitations in using/ applying
movement approach or doing movement-building in exacting
accountability?
• What are the factors that determine our choices of approaches/ tactics/
strategies at different levels of public decision-making?
• How to plan for a given advocacy given a strategic goal based on the
analysis of the root cause of the problem [Learn to use the Enhanced
Scaling Accountability Matrix to improve impact on a given advocacies/
context]

6. Session 1
What is our understanding of
movement-building as a
community/ network in today’s
context of Philippine civil society?

7. Discussion/ Processing
• What are the key characteristics/ elements of
movement-building based on what you heard from
the input presentations?
• What part of your work would you consider
movement-building and what part is not?
• Which key characteristics/ elements of movement-
building are most easily understandable or most
effective in making us understand what movement-
building is and is not?

8. ACCOUNTABILITY
• Accountability is the process by which those in power are made (1) to
answer for their decisions, actions and inaction, (2) to perform their
obligations and mandates set in laws and norms (3) to respond to citizen
demands and voice. Accountability is a response to the strategy of pro-
status quo to concentrate power and perpetuate impunity.
• Accountability actions aim to make use of spaces, mechanisms and tools
that have opened up in recent years to hold power to account. These
include accountability mechanisms in the state that can be utilized to win
reforms. These include international norms and standards on governance
and development that can be leveraged to push for implementation of
progressive policies.
• Movements have yet to fully explore these new developments.

9. Accountability Politics
(Fox 2007)
• the arena of conflict over whether and how those in power are held
publicly responsible for their decisions
• involves challenging who is accountable to whom, as clients become
citizens and bureaucrats become public servants
• accountability campaigns often involve protest, but are not limited to
contestation. Constructing accountability involves challenging the state,
but also transforms the state

10. • Movement approach to accountability is the intersection of sectoral/
developmental/ human rights issues that movements focus on (which
makes their causes relevant and useful to the people) and governance
mechanisms and international norms that movements can leverage in
further advancing their sectoral/ developmental/ rights agenda.
• Strategy is
• multi-level: present at all critical levels
• multi-action: utilizes a wide variety of tactics and approaches
• multi-actor: broad-based actors from both government and civil society
common citizens to international players and organizations
• Vertical integration: covering all stages of public decision-making; give
attention to anti-accountability forces (power of abuse and impunity is
vertically-integrated and so should efforts for accountability)
Movement approach to accountability

11. Session 2
What are the opportunities and
challenges in using/ applying
movement approach or doing
movement-building in exacting
accountability?

12. Session 3
What are the factors that
determine our choices of
approaches/ tactics/ strategies at
different levels of public decision-
making?

13. DISCUSSION
What kinds of approaches/ tactics
do we use under what conditions
and for what objectives?
What approaches do you find
useful in all cases in addressing
the challenges you face in your
advocacy?

14. Session 4
What provides hold in our strategy
is our analysis of the root causes,
which defines our strategic
objectives/ goals.

15. Problem Analysis
• Involves identifying what is/are the main problem(s) by
establishing the cause and effect relationships between these
problems.
• The key purpose of this analysis is to try and ensure that ‘root
causes’ are identified and subsequently addressed in the
• Analysis provides a sound foundation on which to develop a set
of relevant and focused objectives.

16. TOOL: The Problem Tree
• Identification, exploration, and graphic display, in
increasing detail, of all the possible causes related
to a problem or a condition to discover its root
cause
• Focuses on causes, not symptoms

17. causes
PROBLEM
Principal factor Principal factor
Causal
factor
Causal
factor
Causal
factor
Causal
factor
Principal effectPrincipal effect
effect effect effect effect

18. Objectives Tree Analysis
• Same as the Problem Tree, but it sets and
establishes connection of objectives/ goals/
results

19. goals
MAIN OBJECTIVE
Principal goal Principal goal
goal goal goal goal
Principal resultPrincipal result
result result result result

20. DISCUSSION
Given your problem tree, what is
your strategic goal/ objective?
What are our challenges in
analyzing/ determining and
addressing root causes?

21. • Your strategic goal/ objective determines your choices of approaches,
tactics, etc.
• How to plan for a given advocacy given a strategic goal based on the
analysis of the root cause of the problem
• What are the choices of actions, approaches and tactics and how did
you choose? What are the challenges in making those choices?
Learn to use the Enhanced Scaling Accountability Matrix to improve impact on a
given advocacies/ context
SESSIONS 5 – 7

22. Tactical (Mainstream) TPA
• Founded usually on "linear" and "simplistic" logic that disregards complexity of
context and power dynamics
• Tool-based, "demand-side" intervention only or "supply-side" intervention only
employing a single, short-term tactic in isolation with other possibly
complementary and supportive tactics and forces
• Weak impact: ‘low accountability traps,’ ‘squeezing of the balloon,’ low political
clout
Strategic TPA
• Using an ‘eco-system’ perspective, accountability is viewed as: Complex; Consisting
of many inter-related parts; Operates in a context of power (‘accountability
politics’)
• Fox, 2014: while the existing empirical evidence is mixed, strategic approaches
seem more promising: “Strategic approaches to SAcc…bolster enabling
environments for collective action, scale up citizen engagement beyond the local
arena and attempt to bolster governmental capacity to respond to voice.”
Tactical vs Strategic TPA

23. Different accountability goals: Prevention or reaction?
• Preventive:
• pro-active to prevent corruption
• Institutional reforms
• Reactive:
• After-the-fact
• Legal action
• Punitive
Preventive vs Reactive

24. • Public sector accountability to whom?
• Upwards
• from public sector workers to managers to policymakers
• Downwards
• from public sector agencies to citizens
• Horizontal
• checks and balances, oversight agencies
Upward vs. Downward
accountability

25. • Varied terms of engagement between CSOs & govt
§ Adversarial
§ Protest
§ Naming and shaming (outsider)
§ Constructive engagement
§ partner with insiders
§ Critical collaboration
§ partner with some insiders to challenge other insiders
Adversarial vs. Constructive

26. • Invited space
• arenas for dialogue between authorities and citizens in which the terms of
engagement are set by the authorities
• government-controlled
• Claimed space
• ‘created spaces’, in contrast, are spaces which have been claimed by less
powerful actors from or against the power holders, or created more
autonomously by them
Gaventa 2006: 27; Cornwall and Schattan Coelho 2007
Invited space vs. claimed space

27. Strategies for power shifts:
• Sandwich strategy
• Monitoring plus advocacy
• Vertical integration

28. Place your screenshot here
“…you push from
below, and we will
squeeze from
above…”
Reformist director of Mexican rural food
supply agency (before electoral
democracy), address a national
assembly of autonomous Community
Food Councils

29. Place your screenshot here
Unpacking vertical
integration:
Working across scale
while bridging
monitoring and
advocacy…

30. Four dimensions of
transparency:
§ Demand-driven (FOIA)
§ Proactive disclosure (of govt docs & data)
§ Targeted transparency (actionable for citizens)
§ The right to know (not limited to govt data)

31. Two very different kinds of
transparency:
§ Opaque (data w/o relevant information)
§ Clear (shows who gets what & how decisions
are made)

32. Two dimensions of
accountability:
§ “Answerability” (govt explains actions)
§ Enforcement (sanctions)