Presentation on CSC and CRC.pdf - Transparency and ...

CITIZEN REPORT CARDS 

& 

COMMUNITY SCORE CARDS 

Explaining differences & Exploring Congruence 

Public Affairs Foundation | Bangalore | India 

CRC Training for Grantees of Results for Development , 2nd - 8th February 2012, Tanzania

The Key Questions… 

Are the CRC & CSC one and the same? 

Does one substitute for the other? 

What are the relative strengths & 

weaknesses of the two approaches? 

Can they complement each other? 

Can this blend work out in the proposed 

project? 


CITIZEN REPORT CARDS 

The Key Components 

Identifying focal institution/consortium 

Identifying issues through fgds (Providers & Users) 

Designing the survey instrument 

Framing a scientific sample 

Conduct of survey 

Coding, analysis & interpretation 

<strong>Presentation</strong> of findings 

Advocacy & partnerships for service 

improvements 


The Four Components of the 

Community Scorecard Process 

Community Scorecard 

Process 

Input 

Tracking 

Scorecard 

Performance 

Scorecard 

Self- 

Evaluation 

Scorecard 

Interface 

Meeting 


Difference between Community Score 

Cards and Citizen Report Cards 

Citizen Report Card 

• Survey instrument - data 

collected through 

questionnaires 

• Unit – household/individual 

• Meant for macro level 

• Emphasis on monitoring - 

demand side data on 

performance and actual 

scores/report 

• Implementation time longer 

(3-6 months) 

• Requires strong technical skills 


• Participatory process – data 

through focus group 

discussions 

• Unit – community 

• Meant for local level 

• Emphasis on immediate 

feedback and accountability, 

less on actual data 

• Implementation time short 

(3-6 weeks) 

• Requires strong facilitation skills 


Community Scorecards and 

Citizen Report Cards – Key Strengths 


• Scientific rigor ensures 

unbiased and representative 

information 

•Sampling ensures 

generalization of larger 

population trends 

•Facilitates unbundling of tasks 

to synergise inputs from 

different stakeholders 

•Baseline data ensures power of 

benchmarking and comparisons 

across services/sectors, 

population strata, geographical 

strata, demographic strata etc. 


• Facilitates active and direct 

participation from communities 

•Qualitatively richer data – 

captures local nuances better 

•Minimal technical skills 

required 

•Facilitates immediate local 

actions on operational issues 

•Integrates available supply side 

data into demand side 

feedback 

•Emphasis on community 

empowerment 


Community Scorecards and 

Citizen Report Cards :Areas of concern 


• Assumes basic skills of survey 

and advocacy within the 

implementing group 

• Survey costs can limit 

repeated applications 

• Technical steps quite critical 

for credibility 

• Reforms and changes take 

time 

• Weak community interfaces 


• Quality of facilitation 

extremely critical 

• Input tracking dependent on 

availability of supply-side data 

• Interface meetings can get 

confrontational 

• Difficult to aggregate 

individual scorecards 

• Sample sizes can bias feedback 


Applicability in the Project Context 


Independent representative assessments 

across project locations 

Can facilitate prioritization of issues 

Can give snapshots of “vulnerability” 

Links advocacy measures at operational and 

policy levels 

Power of comparison can bring in a pressure 

for reform/change 


Applicability in the Project Context 

Community Score Card 

 

 

 

 

Highly participatory tool for localized actions 

Can pilot powerful examples of community 

empowerment and engagement 

Can facilitate immediate and visible changes at the 

“cutting edges” 

Focus on supply-side expenditure related analysis 

can highlight issues of leakages and graft. 


Integrating CRC & CSC – 

Some tentative thoughts 

• CRC on selected locations (within the countries) 

sets in place baseline benchmarks on mutually 

agreed indicators/themes 

• These benchmarks are then used at the selected 

local projects to develop CSCs 

• The CSCs can then become the trigger points for 

pilot community-driven reform programs 

• A repeat benchmarking exercise can highlight key 

improvements in the CSC-intervened areas. 


Integrating CRC & CSC – 

Some tentative thoughts 

• The tools to be used as independent stand-alone 

initiatives – one, data/information driven 

informed advocacy tool and the other, 

community participation-led process aiming at 

community empowerment 

• The initiatives can be reviewed to identify 

context specific learnings

Presentation on CSC and CRC.pdf - Transparency and ...

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