Building Rule of Law - from Buzzword to Reality This article illustrates examples from a number of countries of how private sector and civil society engagement improved government accountability, and suggests an implementation scorecard. It's thesis is that :" A functional legal system is not only key in building economic foundations, it is also crucial in safeguarding democratic values. However, in many developing countries legal systems are marred by inconsistencies, and newly written laws frequently fail to properly address the issues they should. This gap between policy design and policy implementation is largely due to weakness in the rule of law – a governing structure dependent on the consistent and systematic applications of legal rules.".

Public Voice and Accountability: The Growing Influence of Civil Society In Africa Abstract: Civil society organizations in Africa are fundamentally concerned about Economic Justice, Political Justice, Social Justice and Civic Justice. While each of these areas are interconnected civil society organizations are increasingly framing their demands on the basis of a rights based approach and using various human rights instruments as the basis of their advocacy both with their own governments as well as with an increasingly powerful international order where many decisions are made about Africa's future.

The Role of Civic Engagement and Social Accountability in the Governance Equation There is a fundamental misunderstanding regarding the role of civic engagement in development. Oftentimes, engagement is perceived as existing in the absence of a robust state. In addition, it is also often held that the presence of a strong state reduces the space for and scope of civic engagement. However, the existence of a healthy and active civil society does not preclude the existence of a robust state, and vice versa.

The Way Forward:Lessons Learned and Suggestions from Committees of Ghana's third Parliament Ghana’s parliamentary committees have been working to improve their performance since early 1994, soon after the restoration of Parliament as an institution.Inputs have been provided by many different African institutions (from the Centre for Economic and Policy Analysis in Accra to the Institute for Policy Alternatives in Tamale) and from many external agencies (from the World Bank Institute in Washington to IDASA in South Africa).This report provides a solid review of the points to which the committees have progressed and draws those lessons together to offer insights to the committees of the next Parliament.It also touches on  further steps to work for self-improvement. The past four years of parliamentary work in the 2001-2004 Parliament have provided rich learning experiences for committee members.