address the specific bottlenecks at that location. To improve efficiency and responsiveness, reduce Recent work has highlighted the importance of corruption, enhance citizen trust and understanding and actively engaging within the engagement, the underlying local governance local context of governance and service delivery context, local incentives and accountability, need challenges to actually improve services to the to be understood and addressed directly. poor. A number of tools have been used to help assess local governance and service delivery Evidence suggests that formal and informal challenges, monitor local performance, and build institutions at the local level are key and citizen-government-service provider connectivity. complementary to central top-down institutions Multi-stakeholder face-to-face surveys at the in shaping service delivery processes and local level can potentially support policy outcomes (Mcloughlin and Batley 2012; Brixi et al. development and implementation, especially 2015). In addition to informing managers and when data is shared widely with civil society and policy makers as the basis for accountability local leaders as well as policymakers. Other within the public sector, relevant information enhancements include civil society involvement about local service delivery performance can also in instrument development, use of cost-effective spur action outside by citizens, CSOs, donors, and ICT to engage with citizens, and integrating other stakeholders, when combined with top- survey tools and results with government down state-led responsiveness and changes in the systems. political incentives within the state (Fox 2015; Devarajan et al. 2011). 1 Thisknowledge Traditional indicators of government brief has been effectiveness are often presented as aggregated- prepared by Jumana level values (Recanatini 2012). The emerging Alaref, Hana Brixi, Moving from national, average service trend is to obtain data that can be disaggregated Kimberly Johns, and performance data to specific, local, actionable data and used to design effective reform policies Francesca is essential to empower citizens. Governments and tailored to the local needs, while also being Recanatini in the development partners have focused for some time comparable over time for monitoring purposes. Public Service on central government systems, and country-wide Many of these tools have proven to be effective in Delivery Global performance systems. While important, actual identifying common service delivery challenges of Solutions Group. improvements in service delivery take place not access and quality of services, together with their Simon O’Meally nation-wide, but clinic by clinic, school by school. observable governance correlates in local settings, provided valuable While system-wide information can provide such as corruption, providers’ incentives, contributions and valuable averages, trends and benchmarks, transparency, public administration procedures, comments to an monitoring performance and understanding informational accountability norms, among earlier draft. constraints needs to happen at each location, to others. Figure 1. Change in Mean Scores by Dimension, PAPI Scores, Viet Nam 2011-2014 A number of tools exist to measure service delivery performance at the national or central level, such as Service Delivery Indicators (SDIs), Quantitative Service Delivery Indicators (QSDS), and Public Expenditure Tracking Surveys (PETS), among others. However, a number of micro-level tools have also been developed to assess the linkages between local governance, access, and quality of service delivery. Satisfaction surveys gather data on citizen perceptions of public services. Other surveys collect experience-based information (versus opinions) to help increase objectivity. The Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) is a time-series national governance and public administration performance monitoring tool launched in Viet Nam. The Index is exclusively based on citizens’ experiences with public service delivery and the underlying local governance approach directly increases social accountability, factors across six dimensions: participation at the local service provider public accountability and level, vertical accountability, transparency, control of responsiveness, through media coverage of the results corruption, public administrative procedures, and and civil society advocacy. public service delivery. Since its inception in 2009, GAC surveys can be tailored to sector-specific social PAPI has captured and reflected the experiences of service delivery challenges. The Kyrgyzstan over 60 thousand citizens, and monitored changes in Corruption and Poverty Survey used the GAC citizens’ experiences through yearly implementation diagnostic corruption module, adding questions on (figure 1). household consumption that allowed calculation of The Governance and Anti-Corruption (GAC) the impact of corruption on different income groups. Diagnostic surveys differ from PAPI by using a multi- The questions focused on the household experiences stakeholder approach -- targeting citizens, public with different service agencies, including informal officials, and business people -- to triangulate payments, and allowed the dynamics of corruption to responses. This approach generates comprehensive be studied, where and how it manifests, and the evidence on governance and institutional bottlenecks household-level economic impact. in personnel and resource management, access to Experience from the implementation of these services, and the efficacy of existing citizen feedback existing tools has shown that collecting quantitative mechanisms. Survey results then feed into concrete survey data alone may not provide sufficient context action plans to improve public services. This for the findings or generate momentum for follow-up participatory survey approach allows mapping the action. A number of tools have therefore used mixed quality of government institutions and potential areas methods to compliment survey data with group for reforms, while actively developing policy capacity discussions or facilitated meetings. The GAC in the process, and activating stakeholders and forging framework, for example, includes post-survey focus networks. This approach has also been employed group discussions to adapt the instrument and analyze elsewhere with Citizen Report Cards, where a survey results. Citizen Scorecards employ a direct, beneficiary satisfaction survey is often combined with facilitated interface between providers, governmental objective indicators to benchmark facilities and/or officials, and citizens to discuss results and draft action schools against each other (Ringold et al. 2012). The plans to improve services. Figure 2. Perceptions of Corruption by Municipality in Tunisia citizens view the obligations and responsibilities of various stakeholders, the extent to which they use personal connections to obtain services, whom they turn to for help, and whom they view as responsible. The tool also examines the role of non-state institutions and actors in service delivery and governance -- citizens often turn to non-state actors to help access public services -- by including a social tie module, enabling these political economy issues to inform service improvement design and implementation. The LGPI citizen module can be complemented by surveys targeting service providers and civil servants, and enable mapping the incentive structures across the service delivery chain, such as the GAC and SDI surveys. Another tool is the Bottom-up Governance of Service Delivery Diagnostic (BGDD), recently developed and Source: LGPI data piloted in India. Similar to LGPI, the BGDD uses a mixed survey method, including household surveys, key informant interviews and focus group discussions to: (i) benchmark citizens’ access, experience and A new phase of micro-level tools are now being perceptions; and, (ii) unpack correlations and developed to assess how governance factors engage explanatory variables to identify potential policy with the local context to improve service performance. reforms. The BGDD – derived from existing evidence These governance factors can include administrative on governance and service delivery – innovates by (1) institutions such as public finance management or focusing on interaction of informal/traditional and performance management in the public sector, formal/modern institutions in delivery, and how relations between state and non-state actors, norms informal institutions can be more decisive than formal and incentives at the local level, and citizen trust and institutions in explaining many service delivery engagement. These new tools also incorporate active processes and outcomes, and (2) going beyond client discussion and follow-up action planning. quantitative benchmarking to identify why services are The Local Governance Performance Index (LGPI) is a delivered as they are, which helps design policy new tool that examines citizens’ experiences across responses. The tool tries to encompass the different public services and the root causes of poor relationship between formal and informal sources of performance. Similar to PAPI, it focuses on sub- authority; citizens’ perceptions and expectations (i.e. national variation through regionally representative the social contract); accountability and oversight sampling (figure 2), which is useful for policy makers in mechanisms; and, the dynamics of inclusion/exclusion monitoring policy implementation and benchmarking in service delivery. progress by locality, and for local leaders and citizens Surveys may be complemented with innovative ICT in prompting action toward performance tools that enhance reach and effectiveness at lower improvement. The LGPI measures citizens’ attitudes costs, and enable real-time feedback, effectively and experience with their local governments, which becoming a monitoring mechanism to service underline their trust, as well as citizen participation. delivery and field staff. For example, the Citizen The tool includes a state-citizen module on how Feedback Model implemented in Punjab, Pakistan, targets identified beneficiaries using SMS messages to log their experience with specific public services. 2 Please note that we use the term “next generation of tools” Collected data is instantaneously reported to live on a select number of tools that are considered fairly recent in dashboards for management review and follow-up their application and exhibit high potential in presenting new approaches that attempt to address some of the present gaps. action is communicated to the public to increase their trust and willingness to engage. may ask for support to fund or administer surveys, and Initial experience from implementing these tools for assurances of results. Furthermore, coalitions indicates they can effectively assess the quality of involving government reformers together with other service delivery, institutions, and accountability stakeholders at the local and national levels may be mechanisms at local levels. This information can be necessary to launch such surveys, make their findings useful both internally (public sector monitoring and publicly available, and turn them into tools for incentive systems) and externally (citizen engagement), responsiveness and accountability in service delivery. and can also provide a quantifiable baseline that can be monitored through repeated measurements over time. Previous studies have shown information provision alone is not a sufficient catalyst for citizen action or Citizen and CSO involvement in the development and service improvements – real change requires a use of these tools can increase their effectiveness. responsive government (Fox 2015; Recanatini 2013). Engaging external partners from the outset helps foster These tools, therefore, may be most effective when dialogue, builds local capacity (learning by doing), and mainstreamed into government performance enhances ownership of the results, as was seen during management or M&E systems and used to inform many GAC surveys in LAC and AFR. This increased ongoing government reform efforts. Such initiatives engagement can become part of the process to require high levels of political will to hold public generate motivation and momentum for reforms. servants to account and a clear strategy for Despite the initial successes profiled here, however, overcoming political economy obstacles. Where questions remain on when, and how, to effectively governments have made credible commitments for employ these new tools for strengthening state reform, however, these new tools can be an effective responsiveness and accountability in delivering services way to understand the local context, identify potential to citizens. Given the time and resources required to reforms, and engage and activate stakeholders in the administer micro-level surveys, many governments process of improving service delivery. http://go.worldbank.org/QFWZEIB1C0