Democracy Matters
As the involvement of parliaments in the ex–post stage of law making remains under-theorised, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy has just released a new publication, providing an analysis of the main rules, practices and trends on PLS in Europe, focusing on the experience of seven national parliaments: Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland and the […]
Working with parliaments and parliamentarians on combating corruption rarely works. Here are some possible new ways that could be more successful.
A healthy civil society, strong trades unions and business organisations can all play a part in helping to deliver the Global Goals – locally, nationally and internationally. As we enter the “Decade of Delivery”, Governments have a responsibility to lead this effort but parliamentarians, civil society and, most importantly, citizens themselves have a great opportunity to hold those in power to account.
What lies at the core of the parliamentary ‘dilemma’ on anti-corruption?
Parliaments can develop four focused work streams to reduce corruption: enacting legislation, establishing codes of conduct, conducting effective oversight, and forming relationships with indepdendent oversight institutions.
In April 2019, WFD launched a new and innovative activity and outcome monitoring system called the Evidence and Impact Hub. We can report very good uptake and a large amount of usable data in our 8th month after launching it.
International Human Rights Day on Tuesday 10 December is an occasion to underline that human rights are core components of democracy as a concept and as a practice, writes our senior human rights adviser Dina Melhem.
Our director of research and evaluation, Graeme Ramshaw, outlines how WFD is trying to walk the walk when it comes to prioritising cross-organisational learning and drawing lessons from and reflecting on our programming.
Institutions of governance have a fundamental role in bringing an end to gender-based violence, writes WFD’s senior gender and politics adviser Shannon O’Connell: but to achieve transformative change, those working in formal political and public institutions need to ask challenging, probing questions.
WFD’s Chief Executive reflects on the importance of strong institutions and good leadership in strenthening democracy in the decades since 1989 and today.
Governance and oversight of the democracy- and governance-support sector relies heavily on reporting, specifically reporting in a narrative format. However, that type of reporting, which for some parts of the sector have come to be largely synonymous with “monitoring”, is only useful for certain purposes and is limiting for a variety of reasons. How is WFD tackling the challenge?
WFD’s Senior Governance Advisor, Franklin de Vrieze, explains the importance of assessing the implementation, impact and unintended effects of legislation for the protection and promotion of human rights in Indonesia. “Public expectations of parliaments’ legislative success have evolved substantially, from getting laws on the statute book to ensuring that laws are brought into effect and […]
