Can technology support MERL like it supports social accountability?

Guest post from Daniel Burwood, Evidence & Impact Manager, Integrity Action

Integrity Action is a UK-based non-profit that supports citizens to monitor the delivery of vital projects and services where they live – and to solve the problems they find. We’ve recently published a learning paper that can be found on the MERL Tech resource list: Tech! What is it good for? The role of technology in social accountability initiatives that focus on youth

While this paper’s connection to the “tech” side of MERL Tech is obvious, you might be wondering how it fits with the ”MERL”. As Integrity Action’s Evidence & Impact Manager, I would usually be at pains to explain that most monitoring activities that occur in our programmes are not actually part of our MERL – for important reasons that I’ll come back to. However, many principles are the same.

Our citizen-centred accountability model, which you can hear explained in a 90 second video on our website, involves supporting community members in a seven-step journey:

1. Engaging relevant stakeholders
2. Finding out what is promised by accessing relevant information on the service
3. Conducting regular monitoring visits to the service
4. Gathering data on the quality of the service
5. Working with stakeholders to find solutions to the problems identified
6. Organising campaigns if problems cannot be resolved easily
7. Keeping the community informed about the process

The parallels between this process and that of any good programme’s MERL (specifically, its monitoring activities) are hopefully clear. How, why, and by whom the activities are undertaken may differ significantly, but the ways in which technology can play a complementary role are comparable.

The value – and risks – of technology in social accountability initiatives

A summary of our paper can be seen in the one-page infographic above (designed by Nzilani Simu) where we visualize how technology can add value to the journey:

• Facilitating community communication
• Boosting participation
• Simplifying data collection
• Enabling easier analysis
• Strengthening data quality
• Increasing legitimacy
• Allowing identification and presentation of patterns
• Improving historical documentation
• Publishing accessible data
• Sharing information

Most of these points link to more than one step of the community monitors’ journey, and all are qualities I would like to see in our programmes’ MERL!

Of course, the paper also stresses something we all hopefully know: technology is only a conduit and there are limitations to what it can achieve. However, the list above highlights that – if these limitations have clear and sufficient mitigations, and additional activities are set up to accompany the process – technology can provide great added value.

It’s an important “if”. Without it, technology has the potential to harm the process(es) that it aims to support. The ways in which it does this will differ between processes of social accountability and MERL, as indeed they would between processes of MERL in different programme settings, but a few good practices are common between all:

• Ensure that limitations of scope, in both the technology and the process, are identified and clearly communicated to avoid creating false expectations

• Ensure that there are mechanisms (which may not be technological) by which information is shared between all those who have a valid interest in it, and put in the time needed to build relationships of trust

• Be clear about who you are targeting with specific tools, and think carefully about ways in which you might be increasing digital divides and intensifying social exclusion

And what about youth?

The sharp-eyed reader will have noticed the full name of our paper, “…accountability initiatives that focus on youth”. Is that all of Integrity Action’s initiatives? No. Does it affect the role of technology? Yes and no.

An interesting note from our paper is that young people can be particularly attracted by the use of technology, thus boosting participation as mentioned above. This may be something to think about in MERL, just as it is in other areas. In precisely what activities participation is boosted, and whether technology is used only to increase numbers or to add any other form of value, is a question whose answer is as broad as programme design.

The differences between MERL and community-led monitoring

I said above that most community monitoring activities taking place in our programmes are not part of our MERL. Let me explain. Certainly, the process that our community monitors are engaged in is one of periodically collecting, analysing, and using information with the intention of maximising positive impact. But the services they are monitoring are not Integrity Action’s, and nor are the outcomes they provide.

Perhaps the process we establish is therefore part of the local service’s participatory MERL? It’s a nice-sounding idea, and in some settings our aim is indeed to seek integration into those existing (or non-existing) systems – our model is one of constructive engagement, not a mystery-shopper platform. That’s why, if you look at any of the data reported through our system, the individual community members are named alongside the services they’re monitoring. But these monitors have not volunteered to merely become unpaid data providers for their local authorities.

The decisions on what data to collect, determining when something is/isn’t a problem that needs resolving, and whether a resolution is satisfactory – these are owned by the monitors and their communities, not the service providers. Is it then the community’s MERL system? Not exactly, because the responsibility for acting on data to deliver outcomes still lies with the authorities.

These distinctions do impact upon what technology is appropriate, and how it is best designed and supported by non-tech processes, but should not reduce the ways in which value can be added. At Integrity Action, we are always trying to think about how better to increase value through both our technology and non-tech processes, and would love to hear any ideas you have using the comment section below or @Act4Integrity