Leadership and Accountability in International NGOs

1. Auflage 2022
ISBN: 978-3-319-64881-1
Verlag: Springer-Verlag GmbH

Buch, Englisch, 224 Seiten, Book, Format (B × H): 155 mm x 235 mm

Reihe: Palgrave Studies in Governance, Leadership and Responsibility

This book highlights the views of accountability of INGO leaders and assesses the challenges they face in implementing organizational accountability. The author draws on over 150 interviews with executives about accountability and uses empirical evidence to propose an Accountability Puzzle that shows how definitions, audiences, practices, and signals about accountability are interconnected and interdependent; INGO accountability is incomplete without all the pieces assembled. Nevertheless, more accountability is not always the answer and can hinder leaders' responsiveness to stakeholder demands. This book will make an important contribution to NGO literature by offering a greater understanding of that accountability means for those in charge of these transnational organizations.

Zielgruppe

Research

Autoren/Hrsg.

Raggo, Paloma

Fachgebiete

• Wirtschaftswissenschaften Betriebswirtschaft Unternehmensorganisation, Corporate Responsibility Unternehmenskultur, Corporate Governance
• Wirtschaftswissenschaften Betriebswirtschaft Management Strategisches Management
• Wirtschaftswissenschaften Wirtschaftssektoren & Branchen Non-Profit-Organisationen, Verbände

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Part I - Leadership and INGO Accountability Chapter 1: Leadership in INGOsExecutive leaders of INGOs have received little attention in the recent NGO literature particularlyrelated to accountability. Given their central role in brokering accountability relationshipstheir organization engages in, why such disinterest? This chapter introduces the reader to the roleof leadership in INGOs and argues for an actor-centered perspective to help understand the manycomplex challenges related to international NGO accountability. It explains why and how leadersmatter in the study of International NGOs. This chapter also presents the roadmap for the book. Chapter 2: Constructing the Accountability PuzzleWho decides to what, to whom, and how INGOs and their leaders should be accountable andwhy? This chapter presents the organizing framework of the book. It argues that accountabilityscholars have fostered insular academic debates and promoted an incomplete picture of what beingaccountable internationally is. In this chapter, I review the main theoretical approaches to accountability.To acknowledge that accountability is both a relational and context-driven organizationalideal, I introduce each of the four pieces of the INGO accountability puzzle: definition, audience,practices, and signals. I explain how increasing pressures for greater accountability haveexposed INGO leaders to an "accountability dissonance disorder", i.e. the persistent attempt torely on practices mismatched to the accountability signals for their intended audiences. Part II - Solving the Accountability Puzzle Piece by Piece Chapter 3: Definitions, Audiences, Practices, and SignalsHow do leaders of INGOs define accountability? To whom do they feel accountable? Andhow do these leaders implement accountability in their organizations? This chapter explores eachof these questions in details using data from 152 open-ended interviews. Rather than imposingpre-conceived notions of what accountability is from the academic literature, this chapter reconstructsthe accountability puzzle using the views of those who aim to achieve it in their daily activities.In this chapter, I show how INGO leaders do not frame accountability in terms of trade-offsbetween principled ideal and resource-driven incentives. Instead, they take a complementary, anuanced and more strategic approach to INGO accountability. Chapter 4: When Does Context Matters? Organizational Differences and SimilaritiesThis chapter asks whether or not leaders of INGOs think about the accountability in similarways across the various contexts in which their organizations operate. Are Human Rights leaderssimilar to Environmental leaders? Do leaders managing financially effective organizations thinkdifferently about accountability? Does size matter in any meaningful way? Using secondary datafor each of the 152 INGOs, I explore the variation of leadership views across different sectors, financialhealth of the organization, budget size, and activity focus. This chapter makes the case fora context-driven approach to accountability, one in which all four pieces of the puzzles are understoodin relation with the organizational constraints leaders face. Chapter 5: Accountability ChallengesIs more accountability necessarily better? How are INGOs' executive leaders overcoming theaccountability challenges they face? In this chapter, I discuss the prevalent assumption that moreaccountability is necessarily better. By exploring the leaders' critiques of what hinders their responsiveness tostakeholder demands, I argue that more accountability is not necessarily better asit exacerbates the problem of accountability dissonance discussed in chapter 2. I identify threeproblematic areas.

Über Autor(innen)

Paloma Raggo is Assistant Professor of Philanthropy and Nonprofit Leadership in the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, Canada.