ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE 3rd SECTOR - TRANSPARENCY IN GERMANY AND THE ROLE OF NEW ICT

Stefanie Dobbertin, Berlin

Series of International Conferences Friedrich Ebert Foundation Lisbon

Civil Society Organizations: Transparency and Responsibility

Lisbon, 5th May 2009

...early approaches

instruments to institutionalise transparency in Germany

organizational mission related financial

effectiveness of existing instruments - „transparency culture“?

criticial factors of success for „self - regulated“ ICT systems to establish transparency in the third sector

Stefanie Dobbertin, Accountability in the third sector - Challenges of institutionalisation of transparency with special focus on GuideStar Germany, Berlin 2005 (published in german)

Third Sector in Germany

more than 400.000 public benefit organizations and local initiatives

main legal forms: registered associations and foundations

corporatist model - subsidiarity as central principle

large and old organizations highly involved in the welfare state services

direct (grants) & indirect (tax-exemption) public funding

Fiscal Regulation Instruments

TEXTpublic benefit NGO

„public benefit status“ bytax authorities

public register of foundations

public register of associations

federal legislations of collecting charitable

donation

Self-Regulation Initiatives

-Ethical guidelines by the German

evaluative initiatives non-evaluative initiatives

Certification & Accreditation - (DZI)

Codes of Conduct -German Donation Committee,

German Fundraising Association, VENRO

Watchdogs - Rating Agencies

online databases - GuideStar Germany

Criteria of accreditation/ certification by DZI

Codes of Conduct German Donation Committee

- prerequisite for application: public benefit status of NPO

1. True and clear fundraising

2. Transparent accounting

3. Allocation of resources: economical & purpose related

4. Internal controlling

5. No commisson for fundraisers

evaluated transparency on standards

- prerequisite for membership: public benefit status of NPO

I. True and clear fundraising

2. Reasonable fundraising techniques

3. Allocation of resources: economical & purpose related

4. Accounting compliance with law

5. Transparent statements on fundraising & administration costs no evaluation - lobby for members

Database: GuideStar

German model started 2005

mission: making civil society visible

using standardized reporting framework

financial statements, tax- statement, annual reports of activities /volunteers

federal strategy: beta database up to 1000 NPO from Berlin

Challenges of Implementation Process

unlike USA/ UK not linked to government registry

reluctant transparency culture in Germany of sharing financial data

quantity and quality of volunteer data of NPO

accelarating development of other web 2.0 - communties, databases

German ways towards transparency

„blind trust“ vs. „informed trust“

combination of fiscal control and self-regulation(public-benefit-status as prerequisite for application/membership)

mixture of direct, accredited and non-evaluative transparency

still no legal requirements of transparent reportingstill no comparable format

Role of new ICT

WEB2.0

PEER-TO-PEER

social communities

MICRO-PHILANTHROPY

Transparency/ Accountability?

Micro-Philanthropy: social Online communities...

http://www.helpedia.de/

more than 1.500 charitable organizations

Trust your Peer: social online communities...

http://www.betterplace.org/

ICT: Globalisation of charitable donation market

new forms of online fundraising - global(mirco) project funding

dealing with a large number of interactions efficiently

easy access for donors (living-room-donating) - new stakeholders

no longterm relations between donors and NPO

visable through information: mainly smaller local NPO benefit

Which organization is reasonable?

Enabling transparency through ICT?

NPO should exploit new ICT to its full potential in providing information to achieve goals and stakeholders (direct transparency)

the sector should be enabled to be part of the solution creating transparency & accountability

combination of fiscal regulation & self-regulation

self-regulation by cooperation of non evaluative databases and social online communities

STEFANIE DOBBERTIN, BERLIN ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE 3rd SECTOR - TRANSPARENCY IN GERMANY AND

THE ROLE OF NEW ICT

Thank you for your attention!

Obrigado muito para sua atenção!