Our democracies are under attack—not only from outside, but also from within.
With this call to vigilance, Spain’s President Pedro Sánchez opened the 2025 Open Government Partnership (OGP) Global Summit in Vitoria-Gasteiz, where more than 2,000 reformers from over 70 countries gathered to defend democratic values amid rising authoritarianism, polarization, and public mistrust.
Fiscal Openness at the Frontlines of Democratic Renewal
As we moved through formal sessions and informal exchanges at the Summit, it became increasingly clear to us that the struggle for democratic renewal runs through fiscal openness. Governments confront declining trust and mounting service delivery pressure, and open budgets give citizens a concrete way to understand where money goes, influence decisions, and hold institutions to account. This is why fiscal openness continues to dominate OGP action plans, with 793 co-created commitments submitted by 130 members.
Source: OGP Data Dashboard
We, at the International Budget Partnership (IBP), have long understood this. OGP was built on a unique governance model that brings governments and civil society together. Its goals are ambitious: promote transparency, fight corruption, strengthen accountability, and empower citizens. Since serving on the inaugural OGP Steering Committee at the Partnership’s founding in 2011, alongside governments and civil society organizations such as the Instituto de Estudos Socioeconômicos (INESC) from Brazil, Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) from India and Twaweza from Tanzania, IBP has always believed that open government is only meaningful when public resources are transparent and people have the ability to influence how they are managed.
The world has changed dramatically in the last 14 years, but the case for fiscal openness has only grown stronger. Even as some global actors, like the United States, retreat from multilateralism or question the value of democratic norms, a growing coalition of governments and civil society groups continues to back the principles at the heart of the Vitoria-Gasteiz Declaration:
Inclusive, transparent, and accountable governance, underpinned by public sector integrity, is necessary for restoring democratic resilience, rebuilding trust, and delivering effective, equitable outcomes for all.
From the Open Budget Survey to Open Government Commitments
There is no open government without open budgets, and no democratic accountability without citizens in the budget process. Research consistently shows how open budget practices are linked to better policy outcomes and more effective development. As governments seek stronger fiscal openness reforms, the Open Budget Survey (OBS) remains a crucial tool for guiding progress.
Conducted by IBP every two years since 2006, the OBS is the world’s longest running and only independent measure of budget transparency, public participation and oversight at the central government level. Selected OBS indicators form part of the criteria for OGP eligibility, and both governments and civil society frequently use OBS findings to determine which budget documents are missing, where participation channels need to be strengthened, and how oversight institutions can be more effective.
This connection between evidence and reform is increasingly visible across countries. OBS insights are not only diagnosing gaps; they are directly shaping ambitious OGP commitments. The following examples of outcomes from our capacity development and advocacy support efforts in 30 target countries illustrate how fiscal transparency and participation improve when governments and civil society work together.
- In Malawi, the NGO Coalition on Child Rights, a long-time partner of IBP, has worked closely with the national government to shape the 2025–2028 OGP Action Plan. A major new commitment focuses on strengthening oversight, transparency, and legal frameworks for domestic borrowing to ensure responsible debt use and public accountability—an area closely aligned with IBP’s new Debt Accountability Module being piloted as part of the 2025 OBS cycle. The evidence produced will support the implementation of the OGP action plan.
- In Armenia, the impact of co-creation was equally clear. During an IBP-led workshop on budget advocacy in 2022, civil society organizations reviewed draft OGP commitments that later became part of the 2022-2024 National Action Plan. One of these commitments seeks to strengthen participatory processes within state institutions—automating, simplifying, and standardizing budget formulation to make it more accessible to the public, and ultimately enabling greater civil society participation in budgeting. Another focuses on introducing participatory budgeting at the local level.
Snapshots from IBP activities attended by government and civil society stakeholders in Armenia, June 2022. This work is funded by the European Union.
Three years later, the results of this collaboration are visible. As highlighted by OGP, participatory budgeting is now being used by Armenian municipalities to strengthen citizen trust. In communities like Abovyan, Armavir, Ashtarak, and Jermuk, residents are directly shaping local priorities, from school upgrades to street repairs, through structured, transparent, and inclusive budget processes. These reforms have not only improved service delivery but have also increased public confidence in local government, demonstrating how co-created commitments can translate into meaningful change.
We can see similar synergies between IBP, its partners and OGP in other countries like Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire.
Advancing a Stronger IBP-OGP Collaboration
The IBP delegation and partners at the OGP summit.
IBP and OGP have worked side by side for years to expand fiscal openness and strengthen public participation in budgeting. At the Global Summit in Vitoria-Gasteiz, IBP joined conversations with civil society partners from Malawi and Cameroon, both showcasing powerful fiscal openness reforms grounded in multi-stakeholder approaches. Cameroon, along with IBP partners in Rwanda and The Gambia, has also voiced strong calls for their countries to join OGP, signaling growing momentum toward institutionalizing open government practices.
IBP also took part in targeted discussions, including a session focused on strengthening open government practices in Côte d’Ivoire. We also explored the possibility of convening a joint dialogue in the Middle East and North Africa region, which we believe will be an important step toward expanding fiscal openness in places where space for participation remains limited.
These efforts highlight the need for IBP and OGP to work even more closely to help countries embed fiscal openness and participation into lasting reforms. Working together with greater alignment and resolve will be critical to advancing open and accountable governance in the years ahead.
This story was produced with the financial support of the European Union
