Accountability

Accountability can be defined as "A is accountable to B when A is obliged to inform B about A's (past or future) actions and decisions, to justify them, and to suffer punishment in the case of eventual misconduct". There are many types of accountability as well.

Social Accountability:
Social Accountability relies on civic engagements in which ordinary citizens and/or civil society organizations who participate directly or indirectly in exacting accountability. There are three main arguments underlying the importance of social accountability:
- Governance
- Increased development effectiveness
- Empowerment

Social Accountability mechanisms refer to a broad range of actions (beyond voting) that citizens, communities, and civil society organizations can use to hold government officials and bureaucrats accountable. These activities include citizen anticipation in policymaking, budget tracking, public expenditure, citizen monitoring of public service delivery, citizen advisory boards, lobbying and advocacy campaigns.

Political Accountability:
Political accountability is the accountability of the government, civil servants, and politicians to the public and to legislative bodies such as congress or parliament.

Administrative Accountability:
Administrative Accountability can be defined as the internal rules and norms as well as some independent mechanisms to hold civil servants within the administration of government accountable.

- The behaviors of civil servants within departments or ministries need to be bound by rules and regulations.
- Civil servants should be subordinates in a hierarchy and accountable to superiors.
- There needs to be independent 'watchdog' units to scrutinize and hold departments accountable. The legitimacy of these commissions is built upon their independence, as it avoids any conflicts of interest. Apart from internal checks, some 'watchdog' units accept complaints from citizens, bridging government and society to hold civil servants accountable to citizens, but not merely governmental departments.

Judicial/Legal Accountability:
Court action and judicial review are two mechanisms by which the public may address violations of law and the constitution. Moreover, court actions also fill the gap of accountability between the executive and legislature institutions. In the event that the executive branch fails or is reluctant to exercise legitimate decision made by legislature, or vice versa, the public can appeal through the court.

Constituency Relations:
Within this perspective, a particular agency or the government is accountable if voices from agencies, groups, or institutions, which is outside the public sector and representing citizens' interests in a particular constituency or field, are heard. Moreover, the government is obliged to empower members of agencies with political rights to run for elections and be elected; or, appoint them into the public sector as a way to hold the government representative and ensure voices from all constituencies are included in policy-making process.

Reform Forum is working towards greater accountability in all these sectors in Nepal. Our organization has organized programs in the past and is starting new initiatives for the future to bring about greater accountability in government in particular and society in general.