In this chapter, Reinikka demonstrates that increasing public access to information has reduced inefficiency and corruption in Uganda. The survey from which her conclusions are drawn shows that budget allocations matter little when institutions are...

Corruption, particularly political or "grand corruption", distorts the entire decision-making process connected with public investment projects. The degree of distorsions is higher with weaker auditing institutions. The evidence presented shows that...

The relationship between decentralization of government activities and the extent of rent extraction by private parties is an important element in the recent debate on institutional design. The theoretical literature makes ambiguous predictions about...

Corruption ranks, together with effective democratic representation, as the most important problem facing local governments. The challenge facing local governments is to develop innovative ways of building effective, accountable, and transparent...

Building strong institutions is a central challenge of development and is key to controlling corruption. Among public institutions, the Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs) play a critical role, as they help promote sound financial management and thus...

Data that can be used to inform policy decisions are typically scarce in low-income countries, where standard policy prescriptions are less likely to apply. But if strategically designed, a survey can help induce policy change by pointing directly to...

Current initiatives in accounting education, while focusing on the importance of accounting instruction and teaching students how to learn, emphasise continuous lifelong learning and outcome-based assessment. The public interest in forensic...

This report centers on a multi-disciplinary World Bank mission to Ethiopia in 1997, at the request of the Government of Ethiopia, to examine ways to support the Government's program to improve economic governance and to combat corruption. The mission...

This paper summarizes some of the recent initiatives to enhance public accountability in India. These are divided into two categories: initiatives from the government and those that emanated primarily from civil society. Notable among the government...

This book outlines the strategy of the World Bank to guide its work with Europe and Central Asia (ECA) clients in education. In the early stages of the transition, it was felt that education could be safely ignored, because the region faced...