The Global Integrity Impact Challenge is seeking proposals for projects that use Global Integrity’s diagnostic tools to fight corruption. The best proposals get a US$1,000 prize and a chance to pitch the Partnership for Transparency Fund (PTF) for funding to implement their ideas. This post lays out everything you need to know to submit a proposal.
Download (and forward!) a one page PDF flyer here.
Overview
In mid-February, we released the Global Integrity Report: 2008, a culmination of months of research and journalistic work conducted around the globe. While our unique set of anti-corruption indicators and journalistic reporting have gained a reputation for being both innovative and highly actionable, we want to go further. At the end of the day, how does this information improve the lives of citizens?
To answer these questions, we have created the Global Integrity Impact Challenge. This new initiative is aimed at encouraging local groups to use our research to develop action plans that create direct change. The Global Integrity Report: 2008 contains data and reporting from 58 countries. Through this Challenge, we are encouraging local groups in any of those countries to develop new tactics to promote anti-corruption reforms and government accountability by using our data and reporting as a starting point for innovative, new projects.
We’re looking to promote direct linkages between the problem of corruption, Global Integrity’s diagnostic tools, [your proposed project here] and direct change on the ground.
The Challenge is a call for the best proposals for projects promoting anti-corruption and accountability reforms that are based on insights from the Global Integrity Report: 2008. A jury will review the proposals and select six to ten finalists. An online public vote will select three winners. Each winner will receive a US$1,000 prize from Global Integrity. The application deadline is April 5th, 2009.
Winners will also be introduced to our friends at the Partnership for Transparency Fund, which provides larger grants to civil society organizations around the world working on these issues. PTF has generously offered to engage in good faith discussions with the three winners to explore possibilities for project funding to implement the winning proposals. PTF grants typically range from US$20,000 to US$25,000; more information about PTF’s work can be found at http://www.ptfund.org.
Global Integrity staff and the community of applicants will continue to be a source of advice and suggestions for any implemented proposals, official winners or otherwise.
“Ideal” Proposals
We welcome any uses of the Global Integrity Report to create change, but for the purposes of this Challenge, we have to be selective. Our “ideal” application is one whose action plan presents a clear, evidence-based approach demonstrating how specific, identifiable insights from the Global Integrity Report can be applied to on-the-ground reform efforts. In practice, this usually means improving the anti-corruption mechanisms or practices assessed in our Integrity Indicators scorecards and Reporter’s Notebooks.
For example, an anti-corruption advocacy group could study the scorecards in the Global Integrity Report for their country and notice that transparency and public availability of government audit reports in their country are noticeably poorer than that of neighboring countries. The current government has suggested that they want to open more information to the public, suggesting an opportunity for collaboration. The group could propose, as part of their Challenge entry, to work with government to improve public access to audit reports by exploring the practices used in neighboring countries. The project’s success would be measured by charting public access to audit reports before and after the project. This is only one example; innovation will be rewarded by our jury!
Your plan should have a specific objective. An aim to “fight corruption” is too broad; “seeking better implementation of conflicts of interest regulations in procurement” is a more specific and actionable goal. The plan should also have benchmark objectives to indicate progress and success. The plan should promote multi-stakeholder engagement, particularly with the public sector, where appropriate.
Eligibility
All applicants must meet the following criteria to be considered:
The project has a defined start and end, working towards specific and measurable results.
The project interacts with the government or public sector, where appropriate, with the aim of improving government performance on a specific anti-corruption/transparency/accountability issue, a list defined by Global Integrity’s Integrity Indicators.
We are looking for applications from independent civil society groups. Coalitions or ad-hoc groups are allowed. Local chapters of international groups are allowed (ex: a Transparency International chapter). No individual entries. No international or multilateral groups (i.e. the World Bank). No government agencies (i.e. national anti-corruption commissions or aid donors).
The organization sponsoring the project should be independent from government. Groups with a majority of funding coming from government are not eligible.
Eligibility Checklist: You will need to answer YES to all of these.
1. Does your project have a defined start and end, working towards measurable results?
2. Is the applicant organization independent of the government (less than 50% government funding)?
3. Does your project address specific anti-corruption/transparency/accountability practices (see an Integrity Indicators scorecard for list)?
4. Does your project use Global Integrity data and/or reporting as a diagnostic tool or other essential support for your project?
5. Does your project interact with or attempt to change the government or public sector?
We are happy to answer questions on eligibility (see below).
How to Apply
Phase One) Applications will be accepted until April 5th, 2009. We will ask you to describe your proposed project via this online form:
http://tinyurl.com/impactchallenge
The application questions require short answers to the questions below. You should write the answers in a document editor before filling in the online form.
1. [250 words max] Briefly describe your proposed project. Describe the specific goal of your project, and how you aim to create this impact.
2. [100 words max] Detail specific benchmarks you would meet to measure progress toward your goal.
3. [100 words max] What kind of public sector participation is necessary for this project to succeed? Have you approached these stakeholders? How receptive is government to collaboration on your project?
4. [100 words max] Briefly describe your organization. Where are you located? What is your mission? What is your approximate annual budget? What are your major sources of funding?
5. [250 words max] What resources or experience does your organization have that makes this project likely to succeed?
6. [100 words max] Describe how your project uses Global Integrity data or reporting.
7. [Optional – 250 words max] Have you used Global Integrity data or reporting before to create policy change or raise awareness? If so, please describe. What was the result of that work?
Phase Two) After the applications close, our jury will select finalists. Once we announce the results, we will publish all of the finalist proposals, and public online voting will open (we’ll provide more details at that time). The online vote will allowing Global Integrity’s readers (and your supporters) to pick the three winners from the group of semi-finalists. This would be a good time to make some noise locally about how important your project is.
Phase Three) Winners will receive US$1,000 as prize money and will be introduced to the Partnership for Transparency Fund to discuss the potential implementation of your proposal.
Questions?
If you have questions that are not addressed here, leave a comment on this page. Your friendly Global Integrity staffers Jonathan Eyler-Werve and Norah Mallaney will be here to help.
— Jonathan Eyler-Werve & Global Integrity
I would think that GI should also encourage journalists to start working on systematic practical programs to combat corruptions in their countries.
This becomes more apparent when considering that the journalists may have contributed the crux of the material that went into the GI Annual Report, whether directly as researchers and note keepers or indirectly through the provision of a considerable amount of the sources relied upon by the GI researchers and reporters. Journalists tend to be the pioneers in exposing corruption in many societies, where corruption is rampant and often risk their lives, as the machinery of corruption is so well entrenched and empowered with the instruments of government at the full disposal (including unlimited and uncontrolled access to public funds, not to mention the control of the media, law enforcement and military apparatus of the government) of this machine of social destruction and its leading icons. In fact, in such societies, one would expect that civil society organizations, even if existing, are almost powerless and constrained severely from seeking to translate any drawn up agendas, which they may have in their planned activities against corruption, into physical actions that eventually lead to concrete results. The latter would be at the minimum manifested by the dismissal of known heretofore untouchable corrupt officials and more preferably the indictment and submission of the latter to the mercy of a liberated judiciary bound by a strict equitable due process in the execution of its mandate.
In addition, even civil society would have to rely on the support of the press to reveal and publicize their activities and to harness the essential public support that advocacy and watchdog civil society organizations need to achieve any measure of success in their pursuits for real and noticeable social and government reforms. This public support would be indispensible in any effort to challenge the entwined cobwebs of corruption, which have been built up over decades of encouraged misapplication of good governance systems (including lip service to demcoratic practices, the intentional objectives of which have been diverted beyond purposeful recognition) and non-transparent and uncontrolled misuse of public funds by careless and narrow-minded selfish public officials.
Fighting corruption, especially in most developing countries, would best be backed by a robust education process that impacts a sizable element of the citizenry. The components of this process could be, but not necessarily limited to: a) increasing grass roots public awareness of the elements of the social contract between government and the governed; b) the role of the public in directing the approaches to government and the mechanisms and resources available to the people, as individuals or as groups, in exercising this civil function; c) provision of easy access to the relevant laws regulating public service and a continuous campaign to instruct the public on the yardsticks for measuring and overseeing the performance of government officials; d) public awareness of the remedial actions open to the public, as civil society organizations individuals singly or organized as citizen’s groups, to challenge any observed irresponsible actions by government officials, individually or collectively, regardless of their level of seniority and authority. Thus, the role of the journalist in this effort by GI to elaborate on the current activities beyond the research and reporting process needs to be reassessed and perhaps given further continuity by some measure of involvement in the follow up field activities that are geared to lead to additional practical ramifications in the fight against corruption, albeit through the GI generated tools.