The project aimed at identifying corruption-generating practices in the work of local authorities. The project fulfillment included three stages: 1. an analysis of the Municipal Council documentation and the local newspapers; 2. a focus-group discussions with Municipal Councilors and community representatives for determining the target groups and spheres of competing interests; 3. social experiments in resolving typical cases in three of the selected municipals. As an outcome a Policy Paper and a Handbook comprising analytical material, suggestions for amending the Rules and Procedures of Municipal Councils’ functioning and for public feedback was developed.
Activity Type: Advocacy
New IDP Settlements – Beneficiary Voices
The project sought to:
1. improve future IDP resettlements by bringing the experiences and concerns of already rehoused IDPs to the attention of government figures, donors, implementing agencies and the media;
2. advocate for better provision of aid to already relocated IDPs.
Advocacy and Legal Advice Center (ALAC)
Legal councils provided advice to citizens who were victims of corruption or who knew of corrupt cases.
Typology of the corruption practices in higher education in Bulgaria and a strategy for counteraction
The project aimed to develop a typology of the various forms of corrupt activities in the higher education, to analyze reasons and systems proposals for institutional change. Some of its main activities include: 1. national representative polls of the universities and focus group discussions with the stakeholders in the educational system; 2. Work groups on the social roots of the various types and forms for corruption practices in the higher education; 3. preparation of a final report and recommendations for increasing the transparency in the higher education and combating the corruptive practices.
Education on corruption practices and establishment of a forum for corruption counteraction and sustainable development in Stara Zagora municipality
The project aimed to institutionalize the civic control on the territory of Stara Zagora Region through establishment of a Forum for Corruption Counteraction.
Health Budget Monitoring
The project surveyed hospitals and processed the collected data to elaborate an analytical report entitled “Monitoring of the Medical Assistance State Program for the Population below the Poverty Line”.
Regional support for the realization of the strategy for local self-governance
The goal of this bilateral project (between BIH and Serbia) was to (1) analyze the importance of decentralisation, especially the fiscal decentralisaton, governance, good quality management in local adminsitration, vertical and horizontal relations between local and other level of governance, as well as to analyze the level of cooperation betweeen local communities – after this analysis the goal was to (2) prepare and distribute the publication on good practices, challenges and experiences and to promote alternative steps towards decentralisation in BIH and Serbia.
Promoting Quality Dialogue between Political Leaders and the Public
The goal of the project: to support a quality dialogue between political leaders and public that was created as a result of the lack of good practices to encourage public participation.
More active civil society – more trust in the work of the local administration
The project aimed to improve the cooperation between the structures of the civil society and the public administration in the Southwest region (NUTS II) in Bulgaria in order to: improve the civil control and monitoring; prevent the corruptive practices; and increase the accountability of the administration. The project included: 1. survey of the public opinion in the region regarding the work, transparency and accountability of the local and regional administrations; 2. realization of educational seminars for representatives of the civil society regarding mechanisms for monitoring, control and prevention of corruption in the administration; 3. realization of round tables with representatives from the civil society sector and the public administration; 5. development of a web site of the initiative.
Public procurement City of Zagreb – Financial Management Policy Analysis project
The objective of the project was improving transparency and accountability of the City of Zagreb business dealings – i.e. transparency of all departments within the City of Zagreb) and establishing new and/or to improve the existing mechanisms of independent and accurate control of financial management related processes.
Advocacy and Legal Advice Centers
Goals of the project:
Provide the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina with an effective instrument for combating corruption in their everyday lives;
Provides citizens with free legal advice for reporting complaints of suspected corruption of public officials, or where the citizen is a victim or has knowledge of corrupt practices;
Makes information on citizens’ rights easily available and accessible to the public;
Raises citizen’s awareness of their rights and possibilities to take actions against corruption;
Opens a dialogue with the national institutions to support the establishment of appropriate mechanisms for citizens’ complaints in order to systemize and organize fight against corruption;
Monitor the work of responsible public institutions during processing of cases of corruption.
PROJECT ACTIVITIES:
Case studies of citizen’s complaints against corruption, using statistics and qualitative examples (who complains about what, which agencies were involved, which authorities were most vigilant in pursuing corruption, etc.);
Monthly press releases and reports to the public;
“Should I complain?” an ethical brochure for citizens about why individual action is important for combating corruption;
Training manual for government agencies on dealing with citizen’s complaints and obligations under freedom of information and conflict of interest;
Cooperation with journalists and radio and TV broadcasters on small programs about corruption cases.
Determining actual and potential hypothesis of conflict of interests in the state administration in Bulgaria
The project aimed at limiting the manifestations of conflict of interests hypothesis in the work of the Bulgarian public administration bodies, and a research methodology for analyzing such manifestations was elaborated. Furthermore the EU and other relevant international legislation was analyzed and a sociological survey on the public perception for the effectiveness of the conflict of interests regulation. As a result a Catalogue of Effective Legal Mechanisms for limiting the possibilities of conflict of interests manifestation in the work of the state administration was elaborated. A training course with administration officials for recognition and counteraction of the conflict of interests problem was realized.
Promoting Civil Society Monitoring of Secondary Healthcare
During October 2007 – May 2008, Transparency International Georgia implemented the project Promoting Civil Society Monitoring of Secondary Healthcare Reform with funding from the Eurasia Partnership Foundation. The proposal was designed to follow on the heels of the government’s initiation of hospital sector privatization and had two main objectives: promote the effectiveness of the healthcare system in Georgia and improve the capacity of civil society to monitor the reform of secondary healthcare in Georgia.
Capacity building in public procurement Serbia
The project aimed at improving administrative structures, mechanisms and skills, to identify and suggest rectification of loopholes in public procurement legislation.
Mitigation of negative environmental impacts of projects implemented in a frame of foreign aid pledged to Georgia following the August 2008 armed conflict
The project was designed to 1) advocate for envisaging environment protection requirements in the process of implementation of various projects; 2) to support protection of environmental norms while extracting natural resources; 3) monitor legitimacy of issuing authorizations and licenses on environmental impact, construction and natural resources extraction; 4) elaboration/advocacy of alternative ways and mitigation activities; 5) support civil society participation in decision-making process in regard with environmental impacts; 6) protection of socio-economic rights of the potentially affected population.
Policy Forum
The Anti-Corruption Policy Forum is a high profile public event for anti-corruption initiatives, supporting the efforts of the civil society and public institutions in the fight against corruption. The Policy Forum convenes once a year to review the results of the preceding period, and to provide guidelines for the work over the next year. Members of the Policy Forum are prominent public personalities with established integrity and reputation as well as representatives of public and private institutions. The main purpose of the Forum is to discuss the annual Corruption Assessment Report of the Center for the Study of Democracy.
The Transparency of European Funds in Romania
The project aims to:
– Make the EU funding process more transparent;
– Make the management institution responsible for the funding process more accountable;
– Raise the level of citizens’ involvement in the EU funding process.
Partners in the Group are: Media Monitoring Agency, Romanian Training Institute, Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism, Partners for Local Development Foundation, the Association for the Promotion and Protection of Freedom of Speech, OSI, Pro Democracy Association
Limitation of corruption and conflict of interest in the area of state incentives for foreign investments
The project aimed at increasing transparency of relations between the public administration and the foreign corporate investors via conflict of interests monitoring.
The organization became an active player within different administrative processes related to corporate investments in different parts of the country. Strategies towards big corporate business were developed, monitoring of decisions on state incentives for foreign investors was in place.
An important achievement was the Declaration of Understanding concluded with Hunday Motor Manufacturing, company that was preparing a big investment in Moravia.
The coalition of NGOs advocated the declaration that was co-signed by the representatives of the regional authorities and the Czech Invest agency and Ministry of Trade and Industry. The issue got extensive media coverage.
Read more about the Environmental Law Service initiatives on anti-corruption here (English).
Promoting Transparency and Accountability in Southern Kosovo
The project aimed to promote effective local government and increase citizen participation in decision-making processes. INPO monitored local government institutions in southern Kosovo, published and distributed monitoring reports, promoted public access to information, and facilitated communication between citizens and elected officials at all government levels.
Advocacy Campaign for Freedom of Access to Information Act (FOIA)
OAD was an active member of the advocacy initiative for an act on free access to information. OAD participated in drafting fundamental principles of the act, its wording, and helped to push the draft bill through at negotiations with representatives of state and self-governing authorities, the government and the Parliament.
Transparent County Councils!?
The project aims to: 1. assess and improve the current state of affairs regarding performance reporting practices of Romanian county level political decision makers; 2. enhance policy-learning among local decision makers in performance reporting and the publishing of assessment results; 3. showcase best practice in performance reporting and directly target political decision makers with assessment results and recommendations on how to improve their performance reports; 4. raise public awareness on performance reporting practices of political decision makers.
Advocacy, Implementation and Evaluation of the National Integrity System, with Particular Focus on the Privatizations of Strategical Enterprises in BH
The aim of the project was the adoption of the document “Improvement of the National Integrity System-Proposal for Anti-corruption Strategy in Bosnia and Herzegovina“ supported by the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which has authority to provide measures of this document and monitoring full scale of improvement mentioned measures. The focused particularly on the privatizations of strategical enterprises in Bosnia and Herzegovina and another form of private investment, monitoring public company in strategically areas, comprehension with civil partnership organizations and media. All mentioned partnership organization must have access to current process in their community that would bring transparent process of privatization in accordance with the law and world’s best practice.
PROJECT ACTIVITIES: Improvement of the National Integrity System – Proposal for Anti-corruption Strategy in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Analysis legislation in field of privatization and alignment with international standards and best practice
Monitoring and reporting individual cases of privatization
Cooperation and networking with partnership organizations
Preparing recommendations using best practice
Reform of the Prosecution Office of the Republic of Bulgaria
The aim of the project was to increase the effectiveness of the institutional cooperation in the fight against corruption, to ease the transfer of know-how in the field as well as to increase the institutional capacity and authority of the National Prosecution Office. The outputs of the project are: 1. realization of several conferences and educational workshops for the National Prosecution Office experts with the participation of experts from the civil society sector as well as representatives of the prosecution offices of different EU countries; 2. realization of a sociological survey regarding the public perception over the work of the prosecution office as well as a training seminars for the PR department of the institution; 3. publications of the results and recommendations of the project.
The Majoritarian Project: Informed Citizens and Accountable Government
TI Georgia’s project “Informed Citizens and Accountable Government”” strove to foster communication between majoritarian parliamentarians and their constituencies and promote public awareness of and input into the legislative process. To achieve these goals, TI Georgia, in cooperation with majoritarian MPs and their district office (bureau) representatives, conducted public meetings in three-month cycles in 57 districts in Georgia. At these meetings citizens received information about parliamentary developments over the last three months and its future plans. They also had the opportunity to inform their majoritarian MPs about their main concerns at the local level and share with him/her their opinions about Parliament’s work. As part of the project, TI Georgia also assessed majoritarian bureaus and administrative barriers to their work and conducted trainings for bureau staff to increase their competence.”
National Integrity System
The goal of the project was to assess the executive, legislative, and independent institutions.