transparency

North Macedonia: Public Finance Review. Ensuring Stability and Boosting Resilience.

Fazekas, M.; Regös, N.; Tóth, B.; Ibrahimi, K.; and Zdravko Veljanov (2024) Improving the Efficiency of Public Procurement. In World Bank (2024) North Macedonia: Public Finance Review. Ensuring Stability and Boosting Resilience. Chapter 6.A. World Bank, Washington, DC.

This report proposes designing such a strategy in light of macroeconomic risks. It analyzes North Macedonia’s major macroeconomic and fiscal weaknesses, risks, and debt sustainability. It discusses tax policy and compliance challenges. Regarding government effectiveness, thereport highlights the need to enhance public …

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The political economy of open contracting reforms in low‐ and middle‐income countries

Adam, I., Dávid‐Barrett, E., & Fazekas, M. (2024). The political economy of open contracting reforms in low‐ and middle‐income countries. Governance, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1111/gove.12897

Transparency reforms make government contracting more open and amenable to public scrutiny, helping to improve public spending efficiency. But they are also politically sensitive, complex and highly technical, which makes them especially difficult to implement if state capacity is weak. Our research on nine low- and middle-income countries in Africa and Asia systematically assesses progress in improving …

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Integrity Dividends: Procurement in the Water and Sanitation Sector in Latin America and the Caribbean

Adam, I.,  Fazekas, M., Hernandez Sanchez, A., Horn, P. and Regös, N. (2023). Integrity Dividends: Procurement in the Water and Sanitation Sector in Latin America and the Caribbean. Technical Note No 2608. Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, DC. http://dx.doi.org/10.18235/0004688

Public procurement represents a large portion of government expenditure, more so in developing economies. Inefficiencies in public expenditures thus place a heavy burden on society. The Water and Sanitation (W&S) sector is especially vulnerable to public procurement inefficiencies due to the capital-intensive …

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Designing political integrity risk indicators: a how-to guide in 11 steps

Poltoratskaya, V., Fazekas, M. and Tóth, B. (2021). Designing political integrity risk indicators: a how-to guide in 11 steps. Transparency International.

The need for the development of specific indicators of corruption – direct or indirect – has grown over the last decade. This can be attributed in part to the increasing recognition of the significant role corruption plays in adverse governance outcomes, such as poor health and environmental degradation. The demand for indicators has also emerged out of frustration with …

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DIGIWHIST policy recommendations: Towards More Transparent and Efficient Contracting in the European Union

Mara Mendes, Mihály Fazekas (2017): Towards More Transparent and Efficient Contracting – Public Procurement in the European Union. DIGIWHIST publications. March 2017. 

URL: https://opentender.eu/blog/2017-03-towards-more-transparency/

Approximately 15% of the EU’s Gross Domestic Product is spent every year on procuring goods and services, and some estimates indicate that corruption increases the cost of government contracts by 20 – 25%. It is even more worrying that corruption in public procurement compromises widely supported public goals, such as building safe highways, high quality school …

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