Details for the next International Anti-Corruption Conference, a biennial event, have just been released. It looks like Global Integrity will be taking a trip to Thailand in November 2010!
Last year’s International Anti-Corruption Conference in Athens focused on the need to create a mechanism to evaluate the effectiveness of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption. (Global Integrity’s Jonathan Werve was there serving on metrics panel discussion.) Next week, the official UN project evaluation summit will consider adopting a review mechanism as recommended by the anti-corruption community. While many countries have signed the UNCAC agreement, very few have fully implemented its long list of conditions due to limited resources and/or limited political will.
In our work around the globe, UNCAC has often come up as a potential first step towards institutionalizing anti-corruption reforms. In our most recent dialogue workshop in the Solomon Islands, signing UNCAC was one of five recommendations mutually agreed upon by the participants. Global Integrity has found that when embarking on the UNCAC agenda, just like all other anti-corruption efforts, prioritization decisions must first be based on resources, political will and citizen demand.
Related to this, the theme of the upcoming International Anti-Corruption Conference is “Restoring trust: Global action for transparency”:
“To restore peoples’ trust and rebuild the credibility of institutions, governments must move beyond expressions of political will to concrete action; the private sector must put a check on bribery and fulfil their obligations as corporate citizens; and civil society must demand accountability.
Above all, there is an urgent need for all actors to work together towards a transparent and accountable global governance agenda.”
We are looking forward to hearing experiences from a variety of anti-corruption practitioners when we all gather in Bangkok in 2010.
— Norah Mallaney
