This document discusses international experiences with using information and communication technologies (ICT) to increase government transparency. It provides examples of ICT initiatives in several countries that have helped make more public expenditure data available and accessible to citizens. These include initiatives in Moldova that published aggregate budget data online, created a centralized excel file of all public expenditures, and developed indices to allow equity analysis of education spending. The document concludes that as governments provide more raw data to citizens, it empowers civil society to analyze the information, hold the government accountable, and demand changes in policy based on data-driven insights.

1. ICT for Transparency –
International Experience
Kristin Sinclair, Governance
Operations Officer, World Bank

2. The way to make
government responsible
is to hold it accountable.
And the way to make
government accountable
is to make it transparent
so that the American
people know exactly
what decisions are being
made, how they´re being
made, and whether their
interests are being well
served.
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3. Public expenditures on education
3

4. Newspaper and radio campaigns and
posters in schools
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5. The power of information
Share of funds reaching
Year
the school
1995 24%
2001 80%
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6. Showing public expenditures in
Australia…
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7. …and helping citizens to contact their MP

8. Citizen Reporting in Great Britain
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9. Performance monitoring
of schools in Philippines

10. Coordinating volunteers in Russia

11. Performance monitoring in
Moldova:
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12. 12

13. Lots of data is available - but how to
interpret the data?
Special means
Budgets vs.
vs. special
execution?
funds?
Will I end up “double-
Local budget vs.
counting”
state budget
expenditures if I add
local to central
government
spending?
Base component
vs. special means? What about “state social
insurance fund” and
“mandatory health
insurance fund”
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14. To do analytical work with
available data you need:
• An intimate knowledge of Moldova’s budget
classification
• An accountant’s understanding of how the
public sector spends
• Patience to re-type word files into excel
• And, even then, you are very limited in what
you can look at because only aggregate data
are available
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15. BOOST - All public expenditures
in one excel file
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16. 16

17. Per pupil spending in education
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18. Deprivation index
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19. Equity of education spending
Per pupil spending vs. deprivation index
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20. Next steps
1. Citizens and civil society demand more data and
information on how their government functions
2. Government shifts away from presenting pre-packaged
reports toward giving its citizens the tools and the data
necessary to hold it accountable
3. Citizens and civil society develop additional tools based on
data that is now publicly available
4. Citizens and civil society demand changes in policy based
on an analysis of available data
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