State-Society Synergy for Accountability : Lessons for the World Bank

The paper first surveys the literature on accountability and establishes a categorization of the different ways by which civil society can interact with the state in order to improve accountability. It then explores in detail seven case studies of successful experiences of state-society synergy for accountability. The studies draw from a wide range of different contexts (Brazil, India, Mexico, the United States) and from a variety of different areas of government activity (corruption control, environmental regulation, poverty reduction, election monitoring, infrastructure provision, school reform, police reform). The paper concludes with a series of conceptual and practical lessons for World Bank staff on how best to initiate, design, and implement successful pro-accountability mechanisms grounded in state-society synergy. Some of the most important lessons include the need to fully institutionalize participative mechanisms, to involve societal actors from the very beginning of the design stage of the process, to open up participation to a wide diversity of social and political actors, and to complement decentralization with centralized supervision.