Reducing corruption: lessons from Venezuela
Organization : World Bank
Imprint : Washington, World Bank, 2000
Collation :
Series : PREM Notes No. 39
A recent World Bank programme in Campo Elias, Venezuela, used an innovative and effective approach to build participatory institutional frameworks and to apply best practices in public policy making. As a result, corruption has fallen and services are delivered more efficiently. The programme, which involved the World Bank Institute, the municipal government, and civil society, started with a survey of customer perceptions, which concluded that the two main factors affecting perceptions of corruption were: inefficient, excessively complex, and unpredictable administrative procedures and lack of public information and accountability. The results of the survey were then presented and discussed at a workshop, which helped identify barriers to reform as well as available resources for curbing corruption. On this basis, internal monitoring techniques were introduced, including public budget hearings, a computerised public works monitoring system, and local workshops. The author concludes on the importance of participatory methodology to increase transparency, credibility and capacity to address municipal problems.
- Access to information, Accountability, Anti-corruption strategies, Legal framework, Monitoring / control, Civil society, Corruption, Diagnostic tools / surveys, Educational management, Local government, Finance, Budgets, Transparency
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Americas and the Caribbean
Venezuela