A Users' Guide to Measuring Local Governance

Table 41:
Indicators and questions relative to the Liberia pilot project for the sub-category
“Sub-National Civil Society Organizations”, category “Sub-National Civil Society,
Public Information and Media”
INDICATORS QUESTIONS SCORE
1 Are anti-corruption/
good governance CSOs at
the sub-national level
legally protected?
2 Are good governance/
anti-corruption CSOs at
the sub-national level able
to operate freely?
3 Are civil society activists
at the sub-national level
safe when working on
corruption issues?
1a: In law, citizens have a right to form civil society organizations (CSOs) focused on
anti-corruption or good governance at the sub-national level.
1b: In law, anti-corruption/good governance CSOs at the sub-national level are free to
accept funding from any foreign or domestic sources.
1c: In law, anti-corruption/good governance CSOs at the sub-national level are required
to disclose their sources of funding.
2a: In practice, the government does not create barriers to the organization of new
anti-corruption/good governance CSOs at the sub-national level.
2b: In practice, anti-corruption/good governance CSOs at the sub-national level actively
engage in the political and policymaking process.
2c: In practice, no anti-corruption/good governance CSOs at the sub-national level have
been shut down by the government for their work on corruption-related issues during
the study period.
3a: In practice, in the past year, no civil society activists at the sub-national level
working on corruption issues have been imprisoned.
3b: In practice, in the past year, no civil society activists working on corruption issues at
the sub-national level have been physically harmed.
3c: In practice, in the past year, no civil society activists working on corruption issues at
the sub-national level have been killed.
Yes/no
Yes/no
100 – 75 – 50 –
25 – 0
100 – 75 – 50 –
25 – 0
100 – 75 – 50 –
25 – 0
Yes/no
Yes/no
Yes/no
Yes/no
4 Can citizens organize
into trade unions at the
sub-national level?
4a: In law, citizens have a right to organize into trade unions at the sub-national level. Yes/no
4b: In practice, citizens are able to organize into trade unions at the sub-national level. 100 – 75 – 50 –
25 – 0
whether certain legal codes, fundamental rights,
government institutions, and regulations exist.
These “de jure” indicators are scored with a simple
“yes” or “no” with “yes” receiving a 100 score and
“no” receiving a zero. “In practice” indicators
address de facto issues such as implementation,
effectiveness enforcement, and citizen access. As
these usually require a more nuanced assessment,
these “in practice” indicators are scored along an
ordinal scale of zero to 100 with possible scores at
0, 25, 50, 75 and 100. Well-defined criteria are set to
score indicators.
The above table provides an example taken from
the Liberia pilot project and showing the indicators
and questions for the sub-category “Sub-
National Civil Society Organizations”.
For the purpose of producing the scorecards for
each sub-national unit, a simple aggregation
method is used. Original indicator and subindicator
values are assigned by the lead
researcher (those scores are adjusted following
the peer review process; see more below). Each
indicator score is then averaged within its parent
subcategory, which produces a subcategory score.
The subcategory score is in turn averaged with the
other subcategory scores in a parent category.
Category scores are then averaged to produce a
county score.
142 UNDP Oslo Governance Centre