Global Integrity’s current executive director and board chair recently shared the sad news that the board has taken the decision to wind down operations this calendar year, citing financial constraints. Both Amy and Ania had reached out to me in late summer about the challenges facing the organization. While I had no silver bullets to offer in terms of a rescue, I was deeply sympathetic to the stress they faced and the desire to leave no stone unturned exploring viable paths forward. They, along with the current team and several key allies and partners, clearly did their best to avoid closure but ultimately decided that was the most responsible course of action given the circumstances.
As a co-founder of the organization, I’ve unsurprisingly received a non-trivial volume of messages from friends, professional acquaintances, and ex-colleagues sharing what can best be described as condolences. I very much appreciate those messages. While I’m sad about what’s happening, I’m less devastated than some people anticipated, for several reasons.
First, we built Global Integrity to solve a specific problem in the world (the lack of reliable, actionable data about governance and corruption dynamics in countries), not to build an NGO in perpetuity. The organization was always a means to an end, not the end itself. I feel terrible for the current staff who will be out of a job. I feel badly that the governance and anti-corruption community continues to underinvest in quality data and that, in 2023, the flawed Corruptions Perceptions Index continues to be the default source of “truth” for most actors in the space. I do not, however, mourn the loss of the organization itself. NGOs have no value; it’s the work they produce and the expertise of their people where you find the equity.
Second, there are too many mediocre, zombie-like NGOs roaming this planet. We need more mergers and acquisitions between high-performing organizations to reach some semblance of that mythical “scale,” not more organizations. While it’s crummy Global Integrity is shutting down, it might be a least-bad outcome in a sector (governance/anti-corruption) that is possibly going to cannibalize itself in the coming years as core funders withdraw and the total funding pie shrinks.
Third, and related to the point above, the implicit story line explaining Global Integrity’s shuttering is that shrinking funding for the work is the root cause. This is hard to argue – if there were more dollars in the organizational coffers, I wouldn’t be writing this post! But at the same time, pointing the finger at fickle funders is, in my opinion, a somewhat silly exercise because most donors to NGOs have always been and will likely always remain fickle. That’s the cost of entry to the philanthropy and NGO space, whether you like it or not. Pleading for donors to behave better and invest in sectors indefinitely, while perhaps correct on its merits, is tactically distracting because it will never come to pass. Better to focus on the possible rather than tilt at windmills.
Fourth, and linked to “behaving better,” my hunch is that part of the real cause of Global Integrity’s demise is the broader community’s failure to invest the time, funding, and intellectual capital into proving, more convincingly, that citizen engagement, anti-corruption efforts, and governance reforms lead to material changes in key development outcomes. That’s why there isn’t more money in the sector, in my opinion. I know I sound like a broken record about this. But having spent the past 4+ years advising donors, it’s still a hard sell for someone like me (who doesn’t need to be convinced of the intrinsic value of the work) to pitch mainstream anti-corruption/governance opportunities to donors who want to improve girls’ education, access to clean water, health outcomes, or environmental protection. The evidence base remains far too mixed, and the success stories remain anecdotal rather than replicable.
The above rants aside, this news still stinks, big time. I also think it’s important to say publicly: I have no magical leadership skills that would have necessarily helped avoid this outcome. The decision to close isn’t a failure of leadership or commitment by the current team and board. It’s instead a symptom of much larger disruptions rippling across the sector, perhaps a first domino to fall.
I have incredibly fond memories of the nearly ten years I led the organization. We had a great ethos and spirit that continues to this day; it was always a great place to work, and my colleagues were wonderful people. We didn’t take ourselves too seriously, had fun, and did some awesome things along the way like creating the OpenGov Hub, building software-as-a-service that enabled us to gather data at scale, and pioneering ways to measure governance and anti-corruption at the subnational level. I also made myriad mistakes: not investing in the right talent at the right time, dooming a promising revenue generating business line (Foglamp) by being too scared to invest in full-time dedicated staff, and relying almost exclusively on private philanthropy while ignoring other sources of NGO financing such as corporates and high net worth individuals. I’m awfully proud of what we accomplished but, yes, there are a few things I’d do differently if I could go back in time!
As I wrote at the time I left the organization in 2014, Global Integrity was never my “baby,” so please don’t shed tears for my non-child (the two real kids would look askance!). It’s absolutely a sad and frustrating outcome. But life and the work will move on, and there are several amazing organizations in the governance and anti-corruption space that will pick up pieces of the proverbial mantle and continue to kick butt. To them and to Global Integrity, a tip of my hat and a genuine “thank you” for the legacy you’ve created.
