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Abstract
While prior studies have suggested that legal strategies offer promising tools for social accountability, the existing literature has not yet identified the underlying mechanisms that link legal strategies to accountability improvements. In this theory-building paper, we argue that there are four mechanisms by which legal strategies can enhance accountability. First, the courts can help those affected by policy failures to overcome the collective action problem. Second, courts can provide civil society with access to information about rights violations, malfeasance, and poor policy performance. Third, legal strategies can set in motion court-backed reforms that redress immediate rights violations and strengthen state capacity for more accountable governance. Fourth, court recognition can increase the symbolic and discursive resources of claimants, making their demands for accountability more effective. We illustrate these mechanisms through a comparative analysis of two policy arenas in Colombia, environment and healthcare – two areas in which civil society engagement with the judiciary opened up new routes for social accountability. By bridging the previously disconnected literatures on legal mobilisation and social accountability, this paper creates an analytical framework to understand the menu of options that citizens face about where and how to seek accountability from the state.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful for feedback provided by Sandra Botero, Daniel Brinks, Jonathan Fox, Archon Fung, Janice Gallagher, and Rachel Stern. Catharine Christie, Andrés Lovón, Nancy Mateo, Shannon Magni, Ashley Ortiz, and Emily Steck provided invaluable research assistance. A methodological narrative, newspaper articles cited in the paper, and key policy and legal documents cited in the paper can be found on the Journal of Development Studies website as supplemental material.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Supplementary Materials
Supplementary Materials are available for this article which can be accessed via the online version of this journal available at https://doi.org/10.1080/00220388.2019.1690134
Notes
1. See Fox (Fox, Citation2015) for a discussion.
2. The focus of political-accountability efforts is typically politicians or bureaucrats. However, political accountability can also focus on non-state actors, such as private companies or NGOs that are responsible for service delivery, or if their actions violate the rights of others.
3. Citizens can also participate in the judiciary by serving as jurors, which is not related to social accountability.
4. Article 80 of the 1991 Constitution.
5. Interview with Former Director, EAAB, 3 August 2016.
6. http://oab2.ambientebogota.gov.co/es/sobre-el-observatorio (Last accessed 11 June 2019.)
7. Multiple Interviews.
8. Interviews with Marta Luques, Coordinator of Citizen Participation, Contraloría General de la República, 2 August 2016 and Jorge Achury, Red de Veedurías, 21 July 2016.
9. Interviews with seven community leaders in Mesitas de Colegio, Cundinamarca, 24 July 2016.
10. Interview with Nelly Villamizar, Magistrate, Tribunal Administrativo de Cundinamarca, 5 August 2016.
11. Ibid.
12. Interview with Mónica Sanz, Activist, 26 July 2016 and Medardo Galindo, Fundación Humedal de la Conejera, 19 July 2016.
13. Interview with Marco Antonio Velilla Moreno, Magistrate, Consejo del Estado, 28 July 2016.
14. Interview with Nelly Villamizar, Magistrate, Tribunal Administrativo de Cundinamarca, 5 August 2016.
15. Participant Observation of Río Bogotá Judicial Oversight Committee, 2 August 2016.
16. Interviews on 19 July 2021, 25, 26, 2016 and August 3, 3016.
17. Interviews with Nestor Franco, Director, CAR, 1 August 2016; Anibal Acosta, Director, Fondos para Inversiones Ambientales en Bogotá, CAR, 2 August 2016.
18. Interview with Nestor Franco, Director, CAR; 1 August 2016, Interview with Anonymous Bureaucrat, EAAB, 27 July 2016.
19. Interview with Jorge Castillo, Procurador Judicial, Procuraduría General de la Nación, 29 July 2016, Interview with Marta Luque, Coordinator of Citizen Participation, Contraloría General de la República, 2 August 2016.
20. Ibid.
21. The system also includes public-sector insurance companies and service providers.
22. Interview with Enrique Peñaloza, Former Bogotá Secretary of Health, 15 September 2009.
23. Interviews with José Vicente Pachón, Bogotá Comité de Participación Ciudadana en Salud, 22 July 2010; José Villamil, Veedor Nacional de Salud, 22 October 2009; Luz Dary Carmona, Former Executive Director, Movimiento Nacional por la Salud, 21 April 2010.
24. Interview with María Luisa Latorre, Coordinator, Así Vamos en Salud, 15 September 2009.
25. Interview with Conrado Gómez, Superintendent of Health, 2 August 2010.
26. Interviews with Senator Dilian Toro Torres, 27 July 2010; Senator Jorge Ballesteros, 27 July 2010.
27. Interviews with José Fernando Cardona, Former Bogotá Secretary of Health, 20 October 2009; Osvaldo Sierra, Advisor, Grupo de Apoyo Territorial, Ministerio de Protección Social, 22 June 2010; José Vicente Pachón, Bogotá Comité de Participación Ciudadana en Salud, 22 July 2010.
28. Interview with Helena González, Former Chief of Participation, Bogotá Secretariat of Health, 22 October 2009.
29. Between 2006–2008, 63 per cent of all diagnostic exams and 75 per cent of all surgeries that health-system users sought through tutelas already were covered by the POS (Defensoría del Pueblo, Citation2009, pp. 64–77).
30. Interviews with Senator Roy Barreras, 4 August 2010; Conrado Gómez, Superintendent of Health, 2 August 2010; José Villamil, Veedor Nacional de Salud, 22 October 2009.
31. Interview with Jhon Rojas Cabrera, Defensor Delegada para la Salud, la Seguridad Social, y la Discapacidad, Defensoría del Pueblo, 21 June 2017.
32. The 21 tutelas included cases related to the inappropriate transfers of administrative costs to patients, failures to make access effective by ignoring transportation needs, restrictions on access to care such as denial of a cochlear implant and care for catastrophic conditions, freedom to choose among service providers, and the process for determining a service’s inclusion in the POS (Corte Constitucional, Citation2008, supra note 44, section 2).
33. Middle- and upper-class Colombians are more likely to file tutelas than lower-class Colombians, although problems of access and poor quality services are greater for the poor (Rodríguez-Garavito, Citation2014, pp. 263–264).
34. For an overview of the CSR: http://viva.org.co/lobbying/comision-de-salud/118-boletin-de-prensa-no-1-comision-de-seguimiento-a-la-sentencia-t-760 (last accessed 1 October 2019.) For documents produced by the CSR: http://viva.org.co/lobbying/comision-de-salud (last accessed 14 August 2017).
35. On the benefits of collaborative oversight arenas in advancing compliance with structural cases, and how these arenas combine the comparative advantages of both the courts and civil society, see Botero (Citation2018).
36. For a list of all autos related to Sentence T-760, see: http://www.corteconstitucional.gov.co/relatoria/tematico.php?todos=%25&sql=salud&campo=%2Fautos&pg=0&vs=0 Last accessed 12 June 2019.
37. See Auto 245 of 2010: http://www.corteconstitucional.gov.co/relatoria/autos/2010/A245-10.htm Last accessed 13 June 2019.
38. Interview with Mariana González Lizarazo, Advisor, Defensoría Delegada para la Salud, la Seguridad Social, y la Discapacidad, Defensoría del Pueblo, 21 June 2017.
39. Interview with Hilario Pardo Ariza, Advisor, Defensoría Delegada para la Salud, la Seguridad Social, y la Discapacidad, Defensoría del Pueblo, 21 June 2017.