Community of practice on water and open government

Tacking today’s water challenges requires more than improving infrastructures and stepping up investments. It must also include addressing the fragmented resource management, the capacity and technological gaps of service providers, inequalities in service provisions, and corruption.

Adopting open government reforms will enable governments and civil society to address these limitations and strengthen their institutional capacity. It will also help facilitate coordination between stakeholders, and bridge information gaps to promote fairer, more reliable, and more efficient water and sanitation service delivery.

Integrating the open government principles will help create an enabling environment needed to empower citizens, civil society, and other groups to meaningfully contribute to the decision-making processes in the sector and take collective action to achieve sustainable and resilient outcomes.

Water Open Government

To accelerate this process, SIWI partnered with Fundación Avina, the Water Integrity Network (WIN), and the World Resources Institute (WRI)  in 2017 to form a Community of Practice (CoP) on Water and Open Government – or Water Open Government, within the Open Government Partnership.

The key objective of this forum is to strengthen linkages between water and open government reformers and mobilize actions that help realize the human right to water and sanitation. The forum addresses many of the root causes of water inequality, including corruption, poor quality, uneven access, and limited public participation.

The Community of Practice on Water and Open Government facilitates knowledge sharing and the development of innovative approaches across sectors. In doing so, the forum leverages transparency, inclusive participation, and accountable decision-making to improve water and sanitation services. The CoP thereby offers an opportunity to bridge between open government and water sector silos and communities.