AB: The Open Budget Survey 2010

This document is part of the recommended reading for the methodological course: Budget Support.

Over the past decade several developments have led to a growing emphasis worldwide on creating open budget systems. Citizens have increasingly asserted that they should know how their governments are using public funds and other resources of their countries. Experts have increasingly concluded that making budgets transparent and building adequate checks and balances into the budget process can enhance the credibility and prioritization of policy decisions, limit corrupt and wasteful spending, and facilitate access to international financial markets. Budget transparency has become central to a number of international development discourses, ranging from the financing of climate change mitigation, to countrylevel actions to meet international development commitments like the Millennium Development Goals, to accounting for the revenues from the sale of natural resources, and to examining the amount of international aid given to developing countries and how it is spent.