Yuguelito and participatory budgeting: When the rules are kept out of sight

Can you imagine having an idea to improve your neighborhood and having public funds available to make it happen? In the Yuguelito community, they didn't just imagine it; they pursued it. After a collective mapping and needs prioritization process facilitated by Accountability Lab, a project was born: Todos juntos por un Yuguelito seguro. It was a Sendero Seguro combining paving, streetlights, security cameras, and neighborhood alarms. This project was a thorough proposal with undeniable community support. While exploring ways to bring it to life, we came across Participatory Budgeting as a potential avenue. This mechanism is meant to give everyone [...]

2026-04-23T15:37:16+00:0023rd April 2026|

Lo que la comunidad pidió, y lo que el sistema (no) respondió

[Lee la primera parte de esta historia: Yuguelito: Vivienda, Autogestión y Rendición de Cuentas] La primera parte de esta historia terminó con una promesa implícita: más de 250 encuestas completadas, un equipo de once Agentes Comunitarios de Campo, con el Yuguelito en el centro de todo, y la certeza de que lo que vendría después tendría que estar a la altura de lo que la comunidad se había tomado el tiempo de decir. Este es el relato de lo que pasó después. Lo que la comunidad dijo 255 voces. Una respuesta al proceso de recolección de datos que representa más [...]

2026-04-16T21:42:03+00:0016th April 2026|

What a community asked for, what the system rejected – and everything in between

[Read the first part of this story: Yuguelito: Housing, Self-Governance & Accountability] The first part of this story ended with an implicit promise: over 250 completed surveys, a team of eleven Community Frontline Agents with Yuguelito at the center, and the certainty that what came next would have to live up to what the community had taken the time to say. This is the story of what happened after. What the community said A total of 255 voices were captured—representing over 12% of the settlement’s population, or, put another way, roughly half of the ~500 families who call Yuguelito home. [...]

2026-04-16T10:59:42+00:0016th April 2026|

Interview with Josh Lerner, Co-Executive Director, People Powered

In my consultations on global democracy over the past year, people repeatedly pointed to mistrust in institutions, a disconnect between elites and citizens, and the sense that democracy doesn’t deliver as key drivers of democratic erosion. Participation is often presented as the magic bullet on the assumption that more participation naturally builds trust. To dig into when participation actually builds trust and when it fails to do so, I sat down with Josh Lerner, co-director of People Powered, who is the natural person to ask about participatory democracy. How do you define participation? There are lots of definitions, and they [...]

2026-03-16T15:16:59+00:0012th March 2026|

Civic Charge: Celebrating leadership rooted in people, place, and purpose

Civic Charge is Accountability Lab’s global learning programme that brings together changemakers strengthening accountability within their communities. Unlike fellowships built around deliverables, Civic Charge is designed as a learning accelerator – a space for reflection, skills-building, and peer connection, where leaders can step back from the urgency of doing and invest in how they are growing. Over the past two years, Programs & Learning Manager, Jaco Roets, has guided this journey with a steady, thoughtful approach – building a community where ideas are tested, values are practiced, and leadership is strengthened through honesty, care, and shared experience. Each session moves [...]

2025-12-01T09:51:37+00:0026th November 2025|

Donors must hold the line on anti-corruption: Perspectives from a former USAID senior advisor

As the US Agency for International Development's (USAID) Senior Anti-Corruption Advisor – and later Deputy of its Anti-Corruption Task Force – Accountability Lab Non-Resident Senior Fellow Jennifer Anderson Lewis had the privilege of helped shape and witnessed firsthand what happens when a major donor makes anti-corruption a strategic priority. It began with a frank admission: like all donors, USAID was not truly prepared to meet the scale and complexity of modern corruption—a transnational, systemic threat undermining development outcomes, democratic institutions, and global stability. As a bilateral Agency primarily structured to work at the country level, we had limited tools to [...]

2025-09-12T13:18:27+00:0012th September 2025|

Launching a partnership matching service for nonprofits

While a lot of us have talked about the potential, value, and - in some cases - need for more mergers and acquisitions in the non-profit space, recent events have made it clear: now is the time. Immediately after recent US aid cuts, our team circulated a survey to civil society and international development organizations - and the resulting data, from more than 700 organizations, suggests that nearly 60% of organizations may close within the next 6 months. Given the recent stop work orders, contract and grant cancellations, and cascading effects of international civil society support shifts, a large number [...]

2025-04-10T11:45:20+00:0027th March 2025|

Annet Namugosa: Building accountability, expanding opportunities, and lessons from Civic Charge

For Annet Namugosa, the path to youth advocacy and expanding legal access wasn't a sudden decision—it was shaped by a lifetime of witnessing injustice and a deep-seated drive to create change. "First and foremost, I am a lawyer. That’s the foundation of my journey," says Annet. "But I stepped away from active legal practice to focus on something bigger—innovating for social inclusion, equitable development, and ensuring that young people have a voice." Her early experiences shaped this path. She watched her father struggle to provide an education for his children, seeing it as more than just a means of survival—it [...]

2025-03-07T08:43:06+00:007th March 2025|

Driving inclusive change in East Africa: Accountapreneurs’ collaborative approach to civic engagement

William Tolbert Nyabungu is a Community Development Worker with over 15 years of experience in civic engagement and social inclusion. He founded the Promoters of Social Inclusion (PSI) Foundation (Kenya). The PSI Foundation is collaborating with Noreen Asekenye, the founder of the Tell a Story Foundation. William and Noreen are Accountapreneurs who emerged from Accountability Lab's Incubator program—Noreen from the 2021 cohort and William from the 2022 cohort. Together, they are working on a project in Kenya focused on social transformation with an interest in civic education and awareness among the youth in Kenya.  Advancing inclusive education Established in 2018, the Tell [...]

2024-11-26T14:51:39+00:0026th November 2024|

Prioritizing Community: Building impact on shifting political sands in Mali

With two coups in the last four years and the political instability that comes with it, Mali is not the easiest place to put down good governance roots. Unless those roots are placed with the one constant: people. We sat down with Accountability Lab Mali Country Director Doussouba Konate and Deputy Country Director Habibou Diaou to talk about how a community-led approach pays dividends in a transitional context. “We live, these days, in an exceptional situation in which we’ve had transitional governments led by the military. And that's not an ideal environment for an organization that's pushing for better governance,” [...]

2024-09-25T07:47:15+00:0023rd September 2024|
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