LONDON (AlertNet) - After seven years of research and debate, the first self-regulated accountability mechanism for the humanitarian sector became official in May.

In order to improve accountability, transparency and performance, humanitarian aid organisations are invited to join the Humanitarian Accountability Partnership International, or HAP International, so long as they are willing to adopt accountability standards, as many have done already, and be held responsible by other members of HAP International for carrying them out.

"We feel that the humanitarian sector is mature enough to move towards meaningful self-regulation," the director of the programme, Agnès Callamard, told AlertNet.

"Members of HAP International will commit to be monitored, to self-monitor, and to report on how they are implementing accountability standards."

The self-monitoring aspect of HAP International distinguishes it from every other humanitarian accountability project.

"Monitoring is a key dimension of quality and accountability. Unless you monitor and report on how you implement policies or standards, you are bound not to be accountable," Callamard said.

Indeed, agencies that adopt standards are in no way accountable to beneficiaries or claimants of assistance. "Unless you're a very committed individual or agency, adopting standards is often just lip service," Callamard added.

ORIGINS OF ACCOUNTABILITY

Debate over accountability reached fever pitch in recent years, after a multi-donor assessment initiated by the Danish Agency for Development Assistance (DANIDA) found shocking discrepancies in the quality of humanitarian assistance delivered in response to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda:

"The performance of NGOs in providing humanitarian assistance was mixed," the report said.

"A number behaved professionally and compassionately and delivered high-quality care and services. But other NGOs performed in an unprofessional and irresponsible manner that resulted not only in duplication and wasted resources but, in a few cases, in unnecessary loss of life."

Perhaps not surprisingly, the report sparked debate on the accountability of humanitarian agencies and gave rise to several initiatives.

These included the Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action (ALNAP), hosted by Britain's Official Development Institute, and the Humanitarian Ombudsman Project.

In 2000, the Ombudsman Project was re-launched as the Humanitarian Accountability Project (HAP) and moved to Geneva, leading this year to the creation of HAP International.

The humanitarian sector had already taken the first step of establishing codes and standards of practice, such as the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies' Code of Conduct and, later, the Sphere Project's Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response, but there was no way to monitor or enforce such policies.

The Ombudsman Project undertook to establish a process by which agencies could be held accountable to a minimum standard.

However, representatives from humanitarian organisations baulked at the idea that the project would police NGOs, mainly because there was no consensus on a common set of standards. "There was a fear that the Ombudsman Project would be a watchdog," said Callamard.

With funding from government donors, including DANIDA and the British government's Department for international Development (DFID), CARE International, Oxfam GB and other agencies, HAP established pilot programmes in the field to identify and to test a variety of accountability mechanisms on behalf of beneficiaries of humanitarian aid.

Three years later, it produced two findings based on field trials in Sierra Leone, Afghanistan and Cambodia, and research in India and Kenya.

First, HAP concluded that accountability mechanisms needed to be integrated into existing programmes and operations. It found that setting up parallel accountability mechanisms, by which teams would monitor and investigate cases, was neither cost effective nor sustainable.

In short, the watchdog approach would not work, in the long run, to change an organisation's behaviour.

Second, HAP found that although the humanitarian sector had moved towards better policies and standards, adherence to standards was not examined because agencies did not invest adequately in monitoring. At an inter-agency level, collective standards were not monitored either.

THE ACCOUNTABILITY CLUB

As a result, HAP introduced HAP International as the club for agencies willing to adopt standards, to monitor themselves and to report openly on their progress and findings."

"This is a critical next step in the evolution of humanitarian accountability," said Nan Buzard, project manager of the Sphere Project.

"There's a need for initiatives that promote consistent adherence and a monitoring of that adherence and transparent recognition of gaps and grievance failures that might be part of an agency's work. What HAP does that's so important is it talks about agencies doing it in front of one another, not just to their own staffs, which is useful but may not be sufficient."

HAP International will be an inclusive, rather than exclusive, club and will encourage any agency to join and to proceed at its own pace.

"It's clear that agencies are not starting at the same level, as far as accountability is concerned, so instead of requesting agencies to reach the same outcome in the same number of months, we've asked them to develop their own work plans," Callamard said.

Monitoring, therefore, will be done according to the work plan each agency will develop for itself. HAP International does not prescribe standards but work plans must meet minimum requirements, which include consultation and participation with beneficiaries, as well as commitments to listen and respond to beneficiaries' complaints.

"We want create something that allows almost everyone to win, we're not trying to set it up so that some agencies will fail," Callamard said. "The idea is to build a collective commitment to a certain level of account and transparency. Of course, there may be cases where the sanctions instrument would have to be use."

"You must have some type of bench marking, otherwise your organisation will remain ineffective. Sanctioning is something that no one wants, but it remains there, just in case."

Even so, Callamard said, sanctioning would be a last resort. "Before an agency is sanctioned there will be several warnings. If after two years, an agency has made no progress whatsoever, then the other members might ask, 'Are you sure you want to pursue this?'"

MEMBERSHIP HAS ITS PRIVILEGES

As with any club, HAP International will provide benefits to its members.

It will provide services in the form of the technical and strategic support to help members meet the requirements of their own work plans.

Callamard said that if the HAP International secretariat could not meet all of the members' requirements for capacity building, agencies would also be able to benefit from each other, by building new partnerships.

"It's a strong possibility that when the work plans are submitted and discussed, some agencies will ask 'can we work with you on this? Can we send a team to follow you in Iraq, for example'."

Finally, HAP International will lend credibility to members, by allowing them to demonstrate their commitments to accountability and good practice. "It is assumed that they will use membership to HAP International as a way to get funding," Callamard said.

"It's not something we're actively promoting, but we expect this to be a consequence as we establish our own credibility."