program logic models
TRANSCRIPT
Kuhonga Program Logic and Pre-evaluation
Produced by Lewis Kirvan and Nathan Wangusi
ContentsIntroduction.................................................................................................................................................2
Need............................................................................................................................................................3
Opportunity.................................................................................................................................................5
Client-Centered Service Delivery Model......................................................................................................6
Program Theory and Logic...........................................................................................................................7
Inputs, Activities and Outputs.................................................................................................................7
Theory of Causation...............................................................................................................................19
Potential Benchmarks and Evaluation Metrics..........................................................................................24
Implementation and Sequencing...............................................................................................................25
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................27
Appendix A: Technical Components..........................................................................................................28
Ushahidi.................................................................................................................................................28
SwiftRiver..............................................................................................................................................29
Frontline SMS........................................................................................................................................30
Database Stack......................................................................................................................................30
Social Media Aggregation......................................................................................................................30
Appendix B: Full Version of Logic Models..................................................................................................31
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Introduction
Kuhonga is a non-profit tech start-up that incorporated in January of 2012. The
organization is the brainchild of Nathan Wangusi an environmental engineering Ph.D. candidate
at the University of Florida. Nathan is also a Kenyan expatriate. It utilizes Ushahidi’s
crowdsourcing capabilities as its core engine.
Two things contributed to Nathan’s founding of Kuhonga. In 2009 after living in the
United States for several years Nathan returned to the Kenya. Nathan was forced to pay three
bribes before he left the airport. Needless to say the endemic nature of the corruption in Kenya
was shocking even to one of its native sons. During the same trip Nathan also met with the
founders of a new crowd-sourcing application, Ushahidi, which had been developed for the
2007 election cycle in Kenya. Ushahidi is a web and phone based application that is designed to
allow real time mapping of crowd sourced data. The application has been used to improved
efficiency in emergency relief situations including the recent Japanese tsunamii and the
Mumbai bombing attack.ii
Kuhonga’s essential insight is that data crowd-sourcing can also be used to tackle the
slow-motion crisis of endemic corruption. Social media has proven integral to revolutions in the
Middle East and social movements like the Occupy movement in the United States. Kuhonga
hopes to extend the success of social media by using its capabilities to tackle a different sort of
problem. Rather than facilitating a short term social need, such as organizational support for a
social movement or a disaster response team, Kuhonga hopes that a simple and efficient means
of reporting corruption will lead to more permanent social change.
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The purpose of this white-paper is to provide a description of the Kuhonga’s planned
program logic as one part of a broader program of pre-evaluation process that will develop and
assess Kuhonga’s program logic, theory of causality and plausibility. These considerations along
with budget projections and strategic planning are being undertaken to aid the difficult process
implementation planning. The first two sections of this paper will briefly explore corruption in
Kenya as a social problem. They will also address the moment of opportunity that currently
exists. The third and fourth sections will address Kuhonga’s proposed customer service model
and present a working model of Kuhonga’s program logic along with its theory of causality. The
Fifth section discusses potential evaluation metrics for different elements. Section six briefly
addresses implementation and sequencing challenges in light of our current proposed program
model. An appendix discussing possible technical components is also included as appendix A.
Most elements of Kuhonga’s technical development are already fairly well established while
others need additional internal development, for the purposes of this paper these technical
challenges will be largely ignored.
Need
Much has been written about the root causes of poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa. Scholars
point to factors as diverse as the lingering effects of colonialism,iii the tropical disease
environment,iv ongoing public health crises, lack of transportation infrastructure and problems
with education. Accordingly donor groups have directed funds towards remedying these
problems. Along with direct poverty assistance, public health, transportation infrastructure and
education spending have all been big winners in the fight for donor funds. Corruption and
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governance are often addressed by non-profits but only infrequently are they addressed as a
separate social problem. Instead groups working in different sectors struggle individually to
deal with the problems that corruption imposes on their organizations. Kuhonga’s guiding
principle is that the issue of corruption is a “first problem” and that it should be addressed as a
separate social issue. We believe that before other problems can be permanently solved civil
society needs to turn away from and extractive corrupted model and towards an inclusive
public service model.v
Corruption and bribery, because of their pervasive nature, because they undermine
trust in institutions, and because they are regressive make dealing other social problems
substantially more difficult. Although individual programs are capable of success, in an
environment where corruption is the norm, successful programs are unlikely to thrive and
spread without constant infusions of cash and personnel. The average Kenyan makes only $737
dollars a year.vi Meanwhile, Transparency International has estimated that the average Kenyan
pays as many as 16 bribes per month.vii Kenyans report encountering bribery in more than 50%
of their interactions with institutions.viii For some institutions encountering bribery is a virtual
certainty. More than 75% of Kenyan’s report encountering bribes when dealing with the
immigration department.ix Given this constant extractive demand on Kenya’s population even
the best organized and most efficient organizations will often fail to thrive and succeed.
There is renewed recognition of the role that institutions play in creating economic
success.x However success in achieving institutional reform has been limited. Put in the simplest
terms good institutions enable private forces to succeed—while bad institutions stand in the
way of their success. Historically donors such as the World Bank and the IMF have had some
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success in putting good rules in place.xi However they have consistently failed to create
institutions that effectively serve the needs of private individuals. At Kuhonga we believe this
failure is at its base a failure to give voice to private individuals—it is a failure to create a
democratic decision-making structure. In Kenya repeated failures to improve institutions has
frequently resulted in a larger and more corrupt public sector. The public sector utilizes its
centralized lines of authority in order to maintain power through corruption and patronage
while ignoring the needs of the majority of citizens. But, before these institutions can be
successfully reformed there must be a mechanism to expose corruption and to give voice to
individuals. Exposing and interrupting the problems of corruption in a way that changes
behavior is an incredibly difficult task. At Kuhonga we think that the place to start is with
empowering citizens and decision makers to directly affect the problem themselves.
Opportunity
Kenyan culture recognizes that corruption is a central problem. As Eric Wainaina’s song
proclaims Kenya is “Nchi Ya Kitu Kidogo” (The country of the petty corruption). According to
Transparency International’s 2011 East Africa Bribery index, 80% of Kenyans believe that Kenya
is either extremely corrupt (40%) or corrupt (40%). Some sectors require bribes in as many as
50% of all their interactions with citizens yet only 7% of bribes are reported to any official.
Perhaps most disturbing is Kenyan’s belief that reporting bribes will be pointless. 40% of those
who don’t report bribes identified a belief that reporting bribes will not result in any action
being taken as there principle reason for failing to report bribery incidents.xii
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At Kuhonga we believe that technological change offers a great opportunity to cut
through the intractable problem of corruption. New technologies have been instrumental in
organizing and providing momentum for recent social movements. The Arab Spring and
subsequent uprisings, which began as a response to endemic corruption amongst police officers
in Tunisia, xiii provide a paradigmatic example of how technology creates the potential for
incredibly fast growth and organization of new social movements. Mobile phone penetration in
Kenya has reached above 75% of the population.xiv Internet penetration, including mobile
internet penetration, now reaches 44.12% of the population.xv The percentage of Kenyan’s with
internet access has nearly doubled in a one year period as a large number of individuals have
begun to utilize internet enabled phone. This trend is very likely to continue as internet enabled
phones become more widely available and more inexpensive.
This rapid technological expansion and Kenyans’ widespread cultural recognition that
corruption is a major problem represent a major opportunity for change. Kuhonga hopes to
take advantage of this technological opportunity to create a private framework for corruption
reporting that is effective, transparent, safe, and trustworthy.
Client-Centered Service Delivery Model
We at Kuhonga believe that the non-profit sector can play a more interventionist role in
the ongoing struggle against corruption. Kuhonga’s model is not primarily that of issue
advocacy. Rather than focusing primarily on awareness or education Kuhonga’s model is
focused on delivering useful and timely data to its clients and to the public. As noted above,
there is no lack of awareness of the issue of corruption in Kenya. What is lacking is a way to
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collect and centralize the ongoing conversation about corruption. Kuhonga believes that
providing a trustworthy outlet for corruption reporting could focus the large amounts of
frustrated energy caused by corruption and transform it into meaningful outputs. Figure 1
captures the basic structure of our client service model in one page. The corpus of our data will
come from motivated citizens and non-governmental organizations. Our primary clients will be
motivated citizen whistleblowers. Developing these clients is the most challenging aspect of our
project. Our next set of clients includes various non-governmental entities, both not-for-profit
and for profit. We hope to be able to provide these clients with direct anti-corruption
consulting services and meaningful corruption marketplace reports that improve their decision
making capabilities. Finally our third set of potential clients includes government entities.
Although government entities are to a large degree responsible for the environment of
corruption in Kenya, the Kenyan government is not monolithic and various forces within the
government work to reduce corruption. In particular we may be able to provide information
and support for both the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) and the Office of Public
Prosecutions.
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Program Theory and Logic
The following several pages present schematic representations of the various
components that we think are necessary for Kuhonga to succeed. This section also presents a
theory of causation and potential behavioral model for citizen reporting. The purpose of these
models is not to lock the program into any particular structure; rather it is a means of
expressing the program’s theory so that we can assess the plausibility of various components
and whether, given adequate resources, the programs logic can successfully drive change in the
ways that we predict. Performing a thorough assessment of program logic will also help us to
identify priorities, to develop a full plan for implementation sequencing, and to identify target
benchmarks and evaluation metrics. This effort is part of an attempt incorporate the capability
for effective self-evaluation and self-improvement into Kuhonga’s organizational D.N.A.
Inputs, Activities and Outputs
As you can see the overall program model is not incredibly complex. The program will
aggregate various existing inputs, including existing corruption reporting channels such as the
news media, and will attempt to develop and additional input: user reports. These channels of
data will be verified for accuracy and have identity information removed. In order to protect
the privacy of citizen whistleblower, other indirectly identifying information will be removed or
masked before reports are published in any non-aggregate form.
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FIG. 1 Kuhonga Logic model
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Besides privacy controls for whistleblowers we will also have to develop a judgment
analytic of some sort that protects the identity of people who ask for bribes. To prevent
reprisals and vigilantism the default rule will be removal of all identifying information for both
whistleblower and briber. It may be appropriate to retain the identifying information of some
bribers for inclusion in specific reports targeted to NGO’s or government anti-corruption
agencies. Kuhonga is not in any way an attempt to target the individuals who ask for bribes. For
the most part the behavior of these individuals is the result of systemic pressure and not
individualized corruption. For some high level public officials, as well as for some who occupy
positions of trust in NGO’s, it may be appropriate to turn this presumption on its head. To the
extent that high level corruption incidents are reported to Kuhonga, those reports will be
handled differently than low level corruption incidents.
FIG. 2 Verification and Privacy Controls
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The sequencing of specific privacy controls will also depend on how the program
develops. Depending on reporting volume and data quality we may find that it is appropriate to
replace identifying information with non-identifying user tags for specific users or reports. At a
minimum reports will be flagged with time, place, location, categorical sector data, transaction-
type data and an intensity filter that measures the monetary amount bribes.1
FIG. 3. Analytics and Meta-analysis
These predicates will be used to populate a relational database2 that can be queried
using Swiftriver as an analytic platform. The transition from temporary crisis mapping analytics
to stable long term market monitoring might demand additional data mining tools that could be
1 A variety of other pieces of data could prove helpful. Demographic data from users that submit data could be helpful in understanding how and why people are chosen for bribes. Details such as the official rank and title of people who ask for bribes could also prove useful in modeling bribing behavior. 2 Not sure which RDBM software to use, there are plenty to choose from though (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_relational_database_management_systems)
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developed within Kuhonga or procured from third parties.3 Kuhonga may also need to develop
additional application programming interfaces to make the data it produces more accessible to
the variety of users that we seek to serve.
Kuhonga will use these activities to produce three primary outputs. First it will serve as a
public database and research resource for those that are attempting to understand corruption.
The data Kuhonga produces will be substantially different than survey data or other types of
social science data normally used to study corruption. Because of this it will be important for
Kuhonga to attempt to determine how its data equates to reality. It will be necessary to
develop accurate estimates of reporting rates, to attempt to understand the demographics of
our reporters and how those demographics affect the data that we produce. We will also make
attempts, through our an inclusive marketing approach, to ameliorate these possible flaws by
allowing users to submit reports with a variety of technologies from SMS to app based
reporting. Even given these limitation the data that we collect could provide value to
economists and other social scientists attempting to model the structure of corruption
economies.
The second major output that may become part of Kuhonga’s operation is more akin to
traditional law enforcement mechanism. Kuhonga could come to serve as a clearinghouse for a
broad range of corruption acts. Given the range of activities that fall under the umbrella of
corruption, it is probable that Kuhonga will receive large amounts of information on criminal
activity with varying degrees of potential seriousness. Kuhonga would need to develop the
3 Ideally we need a data mapping tool that allows us to track incidents, relationships and properties with minimum hardcoding. This would require a flexible data platform of some type. Palanti’s Gotham platform would be a great option http://www.palantir.com/platforms/.
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capability to sort and prioritize between various acts of corruption, to distinguish between
those activities that are in need of immediate action, those that may be important because they
are part of an emerging trend or development and the mass of other incidents that can be
ignored for reporting purposes. Various reports may be relayed to official governmental anti-
corruption authorities, or, where appropriate, to non-governmental partners.4
The third major output that Kuhonga will try to develop is the provision of specific
consulting and market reporting activities for clients. These consulting services could take a
variety of forms. Traditional market analysis might play some role (i.e. some form of quarterly
“corruption report”), however it seems likely that issuing more traditional sector and
geographic reports will not serve the needs of decision makers. Consulting will need to consist
of providing unique tools to allow NGO’s to make better decisions and better track their
resources. Besides providing reporting and tracking, other services such as data sharing will also
be provided. We think that the most important use for our data will come from its ability to aid
in the decision making process. For this service to work we will have to provide clients with very
specific toolboxes that will allow them to quickly find and understand useful data.
Imagine a health services provider that is attempting to decide whether to invest
significant funds to develop an existing medical clinic. The health services provide might query a
database to find any and all corruption incidents that mention the clinic. A simple query could
provide detailed data on the level of corruption at a given clinic over time and the ability to
compare this data with data from other similar clinics.
4 We haven’t yet come to an internal consensus as to what type or relationship with existing media sources we should develop. Certainly our aggregate data will be made available to media outlets. It is less clear when, if ever, it would be appropriate to use data to tip-off the media to potential stories or even to provide background.
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FIG. 4 Non-Governmental Consulting Model
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Give an extremely high level of corruption the health services NGO might reconsider
investing its resources in this clinic and might instead choose to develop a new clinic from the
ground up. Or, the NGO might decide that given current levels of corruption it would be worth
investing some amount of money in an anti-corruption program or training. In this circumstance
Kuhonga would also allow the same NGO to more easily evaluate the success of its
anticorruption programming all at little or no cost. Development of consulting services will also
be one of the best ways for Kuhonga to get comprehensive sector data.
Although our initial target would be public sector bribery, it is easy to see how our
database could grow to include other sorts of important corruption information. Kuhonga’s
data might be useful in information more accurately estimating costs in other sectors where
bribery is common. If sufficient incident reports existed on two major construction firms, for
instance, knowledge of a corruption differential between these two firms could be a deciding
factor in the contracting process. This kind of increasing certainty could potentially make
investment easier and more certain. Increasing transparency will also begin to provide an
incentive for existing NGO’s to compete for funds on the basis of their ability to avoid loss of
funds to corruption, leading to a procompetitive virtuous cycle that should begin to slowly push
out firms that are unwilling or unable to reduce the funds lost to corruption. Figure 5
demonstrates how data sharing will take place.
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FIG. 5 Data Sharing
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Besides providing direct consulting services Kuhonga could also produce more
generalized market reports that could be used to help investors and others determine how best
to spend charitable resources. These market reports will produce additional competitive
pressure on non-profit firms. Non-profits already compete for funds based on their ability to
provide a larger percentage of donations ‘to the cause’ and a smaller percentage to overhead.xvi
International non-profits might begin to compete on their ability to avoid corruption. This sort
of competition will have a twofold effect. Firms will be able to argue both that they are more
efficient at delivering resources and also that by participating less in corruption they are
contributing to other ameliorative effects that follow from a more transparent and honest
marketplace.
The success of this model depends to a large degree on our ability to change the
behavior of individuals. As mentioned above this will likely be the biggest and earliest challenge
Kuhonga will have to surmount and it will occupy much of the initial expense and energy
required to turn Kuhonga into a functioning operation. In some ways Kuhonga is like other
networks in that it can benefit from positive externalities. Kuhonga’s success is tied to its ability
to attract a network of people that use it.5 The more people that use Kuhonga the better it will
operate and the more useful it will become for each user.
Kuhonga is also unique ways that make developing its network more challenging. Unlike
most other networks our model requires anonymity. This severely limits the range of options
for rewards that we can give to our whistleblowers. Figure 6 presents some of the limited 5 In business and economics these network externalities are often referred to as demand-side economies of scale. The essential insight is that some types of programs and business become more valuable as they grow their user base. Phone service and the Internet are good examples. See e.g. Katz, Michael and Carl Shapiro, Network Externalities, Competition, and Compatibility, The American Economic Review Vol. 75. No 3 pp. 424-440.
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motivators that we can utilize to encourage bribery reporting. Because of these limitations we
will need to develop a proactive marketing approach to promoting Kuhonga’s use. This
approach will require a detailed analysis that is beyond the scope of this paper. The
fundamental approach will involve developing Kuhonga as a trustworthy and ubiquitous brand
through a mostly traditional marketing approach. Securing an easily identifiable SMS reporting
number will also be an important part of this strategy.
Other network effects, outside of our own marketing approach, could work to
Kuhonga’s advantage. Kuhonga will be able to scale with the adoption of social networking in
Kenya. Although it will be initially important to provide access to Kuhonga’s reporting services
via SMS. Rapidly increasing mobile internet adoption will allow us to utilize existing social
networks and socially connective applications (such as twitter). Widespread adoption of these
means of communication will give birth to new economies and alternatives to the current top-
down bureaucratic power centers that dominate Kenyan public life.xvii Kuhonga may be able to
piggyback on the success of other social networks such as Twitter and Facebook by using them
as both a means to reach people and a separate source of corruption data.
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FIG. 6 Citizen Logic Model
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Theory of Causation
Besides the outputs mentioned above Kuhonga hopes that it will contribute to
fundamental behavioral change. If Kuhonga can achieve widespread adoption the presence of
frequent reporting may begin to directly change behavior patterns. Evidence from psychology
and criminology suggest that social learning can play a role in the development of criminal
behavioral patterns.xviii Kuhonga’s model is designed to shortcut existing environmental factors
by increasing the perceived self-efficacy of individuals, by inculcating a sense of collective
agency and by increasing the social pressure on people that ask for bribes. These socio-cultural
changes have the potential to interrupt the current extractive and bureaucratic model of public
institutions in Kenya.
Much has been written about extractive economic and political institutions in the
context of African colonialism and the reproduction of these institutions in the post-colonial
period. xix Oligarchic, extractive institutions have proven incredibly stubborn and difficult to
eliminate in a top down fashion. Technocratic attempts to reform institutions in weak and
extractive states have inevitably failed.6 Kuhonga is designed to interrupt extractive state
economies by empowering citizens. Increasing the efficacy and cohesiveness of bottom up
pressure is, we think, the most effective strategy for institutional reform.
The ability of coordinated action by citizens to effect radical political change is not in
question. It is also clear that political revolutions like those that recently took place in the Mid-
6 See e.g. Acemoglu, Daron, Simon Johnson, Pablo Querubin, James A. Robinson. WHEN DOES POLICY REFORM WORK? THE CASE OF CENTRAL BANK, Working Paper 14033 National Bureau of Economic Research. Available at http://www.nber.org/papers/w14033.pdf.
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East and North Africa are not ideal. Frequently bad institutions survive revolutions, resulting in
the substitution of one set of elites for another. Revolutions also unleash the potential for
catastrophic violence. We think that technological change offers a third way between
maintenance of the status quo and outright revolution. Changes in behavior and expectations
can begin to exert upward pressure on institutions and slowly begin to reduce their ability to
self-replicate. Although this sort of change may not be sufficient to reform political institutions
it will tend to create the type of conditions that are conducive to fundamental change and
reform. FIG. 8 presents this theory in graphical form.
The combined force of horizontal pressure among institutions—aided by increased
transparency and better information for decision-makers—and increased upward vertical
pressure should create the potential for real change. Besides these structural changes Kuhonga
has the potential reduce corruption by increasing the certainty and celerity of punishment.7 The
Kenyan Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) has its own anonymous whistleblower feature.
They have implemented what is essentially an anonymous whistleblower dropbox, similar to
those in place at many large corporations. In total the EACC receives around 300 monthly
reports of which it chooses to act on less than 50%.8 Although this represents an improvement
over previous anti-corruption efforts, structural limitations on the ability of most citizens to
report mean that the EACC is not likely to begin receiving significant reports anytime in the near
future.
7 Criminal deterrence theory focuses on the certainty, severity and celerity of punishment. 8 Detailed monthly reports for the EACC’s reporting and investigation activities are available at (http://www.eacc.go.ke/default.asp?pageid=95)
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Bribe Takers These underpaid low level bureaucratic operators depend on their ability to ask for and receive bribes. Since they depend on those above them for their positions in the first place they are not
able to exert upward pressure on those above them to ask for improvements in work conditions. Rather they depend on their small areas of power to leverage bribes from other members of
society. Public sector officials end up preying on the private sector rather than helping them to succeed
Reduced ability to ask for bribes redirects the pressure of bribe takers upward
Change the behavior patterns of citizens
Upoward pressure Reduce the opportunity for bribe takers to ask for bribes
Reduced power and efficacy for big men as their patrons become less loyal. Reduces power of elected officials and big men to extract resources using infrastructure of state power.
Big Men These positions are doled out on the basis of loyalty not performance. Big Men are
able to maintain power only so long as they are obedient. They frequently facilitate the large scale acts of corruption that make the headlines. They may for
instance be responsible for bidding for government contracts and then sharing the sums paid by the government. Even They in turn depend on webs of loyal patrons
to facilitate their continued power. They need complicity from both private and public sector little big men.
CitizenryMost Citizens face significant barriers when seeking basic services. Getting an education, seeking healthcare or starting a business all require paying for the effects of the above system. The system is inefficient because the
consumers of services do not have transparent pricing and because the costs of the government are very regressive. This increases distrust in the government and reinforces a reliance on familial or ethnic bonds.
Elected Officials Officials at the top wield massive power. They operate the
levers of government to favor their own interests. By exercising control over officials below them the top uses the
bottom to control state resources. Consider the $3000 parliamentary chairs made in Kenyan Prisons.
FIG. 8 Theory of Change
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Kuhonga may selectively forward reports of bribery to the EACC rapid response team.
The decision to forward reports will require human decision-making and investigation, however
there will certainly be a role for analytics to play in identifying potentially forward-able reports.
Other divisions of Kenya’s government may offer similar opportunities to selectively utilize
government prosecution and investigation resources. The current government has made a
commitment to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions9 and has recently committed to
doubling its staff.xx There may also be room to work with local governments as well as media
outlets in a similar vein.
Although interactions with Kenyan government agencies, depending on the political
situation, may not be an option Kuhonga’s approach to them will be inclusive. Creating real
consequences for corrupt officials at the top and in the middle will certainly tend to reduce the
incidence of corruption over time. The resolution of reported corruption incidents could also be
one potential evaluation metric. Since it represents a full cycle, from report to final
consequence; it provides a more catholic metric of the Kuhonga’s ongoing success than other
potential measures.
9 This organization is the equivalent of the DOJ criminal division in the United States.
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FIG. 9 Governmental Reporting Model
Potential Benchmarks and Evaluation Metrics
Having examined the Kuhonga’s program model and theory of change it is necessary to
briefly consider potential success metrics and implementation challenges in light of our current
model. The most obvious metric of early success will be some simple measure of report
volume. This measure will allow us to judge the efficacy of our marketing strategy and will allow
us to track our influence geographically and in different reporting medium. Along with these
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considerations we will want to begin recording other qualitative measures such as the
percentage of entered reports that are subsequently verified. During the initial implementation
period it will be necessary constantly tweak and double check our data filters to insure their
validity. Developing a volume of past data on the data verification rates will also be a first step
towards insuring data quality over time.
As we begin to implement other facets of the program will need to develop appropriate
measures of success. Once we begin offering consulting services we will want to find some
measure of data utilization. Measuring the volume of database queries would give us some idea
of the overall use of our consulting services. However it seems likely that their will need to be
other measures. It may be appropriate to institute client survey’s very early on in order to
develop tools with impact.
Some measure of report resolution or utilization might offer a more holistic appraisal of
program efficacy. Creating a follow up or report back feature would allow us to measure the
number of reports that are resolved in some manner. This feature will almost certainly become
a part of any consulting services that we offer but could also potentially be integrated into the
citizen reporting feature.
Finally, over the long term, several international standard corruption indexes are
produced regularly.10 These indexes can provide a holistic measure of the Kenya’s progress over
10 The Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index, Available at http://www.transparency.org/news/pressrelease/media_advisory_launch_corruption_perceptions_index_2012. Is one example. the Worldbank’s governance database, available at http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.asp, also includes useful data.
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time. When Kuhonga reaches a stable level of influence it would be possible to begin to
evaluate overall corruption using internal data, however this would likely take some time.
Implementation and Sequencing
Having fully described Kuhonga’s program structure and theory of change, it is now
possible to begin the incredibly difficult task of organizing and planning program
implementation and sequencing. Although a full treatment of these issues is beyond the scope
of this paper it will be helpful to catalogue some of the various implementation and sequencing
issues that may arise.
Implementation planning is currently compounded by our lack of reliable funding
sources. Thus it seems clear that our first task (besides additional planning and development) is
to find a stable source of funding. Assuming that we can surmount that particularly formidable
barrier the following few paragraphs approximate our implementation priorities.
The first wave of funding should be used to perfect and test our existing technical
components against the program model that we have developed to insure that the technical
components are working and scalable. Fortunately all of the technical components necessary to
begin accepting reports are open source. Server space will eventually be required but is not
prohibitively expensive. The most daunting aspects of this first wave of implementation is in
coordinating between various developers and insuring interoperability. Fortunately Ushahidi
and Swiftriver’s development teams are constantly innovating and creating new capabilities
many of which will be helpful to Kuhonga’s deployment. A second possible impediment may
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arise when we attempt to secure a stable SMS number from the Kenyan Communications
Commission. Ironically it may be difficult to secure an SMS code without being forced to pay
some form of bribe. However we believe that we should be able to work with Safaricom to
secure free or low cost text messaging services. It may also be possible to utilize their phone
based money transferring service M-Pesa as a means to incentivize bribery reporting.11
Once these components are in place and scalable our second priority will be to begin
increasing the volume of data that we receive. Increasing utilization of Kuhonga will require
major investment of time, energy and money. Developing a culturally relevant strategy that
maximizes our reach will be Kuhonga’s biggest challenge. We already know that some means of
communication tend to be highly effective in the Kenyan market. If we were able to use local
musicians, a group that in Kenya is already devoted to stopping corruption, we could stretch
our impact with minimum cost.
Our final priority would be to secure nongovernmental partnerships. These partnerships
will provide additional data. They will also help to make us more visible and thus more likely to
receive funding. Program sustainability will be an ongoing challenge, as it is for many not-for-
profit startups. Developing strong links to a variety of sectors may help us to surmount these
sorts of funding challenges by allowing us to reach out to many funding sources.
Conclusion
11 It might be possible to create a system of incentives that does not result in large amounts of phony bribe reporting. For instance using some form of lottery reward system could lead to increased utilization of Kuhonga’s services as an interim promotion. Each verified report could become part of an anticorruption lotto, the more verified reports you submit the greater the chance that you win the anticorruption lotto. This kind of incentive system could motivate people without seriously increasing the number of phony or bogus reports.
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This program description and pre-evaluation is part of an ongoing effort to improve
Kuhonga’s program logic and implementation strategy. The social problem that Kuhonga hopes
to combat has been a persistent feature of Kenyan government institutions for many years. The
capacity of Kuhonga to significantly impact this problem depends on a large number of
contingencies. Despite these uncertainties mass adoption of new technologies and widespread
cultural recognition of the harms caused by bribery and corruption present an opportunity for
change and adaptation. Kuhonga’s mission is to facilitate these changes and provide a
meaningful platform for citizen’s to engage with and stand up to the corruption in their midst.
Appendix A: Technical Components
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Ushahidi
Ushahidi is an open source platform for democratizing information, increasing transparency and
lowering the barriers for individuals to share their stories. The Ushahidi platform was developed
to respond to natural disasters by allowing rapid implementation of a citizen based reporting
system. Kuhonga is a deployment of the Ushahidi platform adapted to the slow motion disaster
of government corruption and forced bribery. Our deployment of Ushahidi will allow individuals
to report corruption incidents via email, through our website, through twitter or, by text
message. We will also utilize the capabilities of Ushahidi’s analytic component Swift River, to
protect the identities of citizens who report corruption incidents. The Ushahidi platform has
been used for projects focusing on local governance, environmental monitoring, public health
mapping, human rights monitoring, citizen-based election observation, nonviolent protest, gas-
price monitoring, disaster response and crisis mapping in various parts of the world.
Internet penetration via computers in Kenya is light (less than ten percent) but nearly
fifty percent of Kenyans have access to mobile phone internet access. Kuhonga will attempt to
develop this element of Ushahidi’s capability further to allow for the massive amounts of data
that we could potentially generate, and the potentially longer time frame over which Kuhonga
will be operational.
29
Figure 1. Kuhonga's Beta Ushahidi Deployment.
SwiftRiver
Kuhonga will use the superior data analytics capabilities of SwiftRiver, another free and open
source partner of Ushahidi, to verify the validity of reports and to mine data from reports.
SwiftRiver enables the filtering and verification of real-time data from channels like Twitter,
SMS, Email and RSS feeds. SwiftRiver is capable of filtering natural language reports to mine the
data from the various streams and make sense of it based on keywords and semantic structure.
This eliminates the need to use forms or reporting codes. SwiftRiver specializes in:
Gathering Intelligence from the Web: Curating real-time information on topics such as corruption and briberyBrand Monitoring: Managing social media campaigns by setting up streams that search for mentions of Kuhonga online.Analysis and Insight: Helps discover relationships and trends in various data streamsAddition of Context to Content: Adds context by auto-categorizing and flaggin data from Twitter, SMS, Email and RSS feeds
30
Crowdsourcing and verification: Collects information from known and trusted sources through the use of simple verification algorithms.
Frontline SMS
Frontline SMS is a free open source data collection client which will allow us to collect SMS
data. Unlike other mobile data collection programs, which require forms, Frontline SMS accepts
natural language input from JAVA enabled handsets. This allows bribery incidents to be
reported by those with no training vastly increasing our potential to crowdsource corruption
reporting.
Database Stack
We will eventually need some kind of database server and software. There are a large number
of free and open source options but will most likely go with some form of LAMP stack.
Social Media Aggregation
Ushahidi allows for aggregation of existing social media. Easy cross platform integration of
existing social media conversations increases Kuhonga’s scalability significantly. Any user of
Twitter can report directly by simply tweeting with the hashtag #kuhonga. Similar functionality
is possible with Facebook. As social media impact grows Kuhonga can grow commensurately
with no additional inputs required.
31
Appendix B: Full Version of Logic Models
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User Reports
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Verification and Privacy Controls
34
Analytics & Research
35
Governmental Partnerships Model
36
Non-governmental Consulting Model
37
Citizen Motivational Model
38
Media Strategy
39
Appendix C: Endnotes and Sources
40
i
Article Available at (http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/news/2011-04-11-japan-social-media_N.htm ) Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
ii Article available at (http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/07/online-crisis-management) Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
iii Acemoglu, Daron and James A. Robinson, Why Nations Fail, Crown Publishing (2012)
iv Diamnond, Jared. (2005 ed.) Guns, Germs and Steel: the Fate of Human Socieities. Norton.
v We aren’t alone in thinking that institutional development is a central problem that cuts across all sectors of a nations development. See The World Bank. (2000). “Reforming Public Institutions and Strengthening Governance.” Available at http://www1.worldbank.org/publicsector/Reforming.pdf. Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
vi Country Data available at (http://data.un.org/CountryProfile.aspx?crName=kenya ) Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
vii Transparency International report available at: http://www.ethicsworld.org/publicsectorgovernance/PDF%20links/KenyanSurveyAug22.pdf Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
viii Transparency International report available at: http://www.ethicsworld.org/publicsectorgovernance/PDF%20links/KenyanSurveyAug22.pdf Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
ix Transparency International report available at: http://www.ethicsworld.org/publicsectorgovernance/PDF%20links/KenyanSurveyAug22.pdf . Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
x Acemoglu, Darn and James A. Robinson. (2012). Why Nations Fail. Crown Publishing.
xi The World Bank (2000) “Reforming Public Institutions and Strengthening Governance.” Available at (http://www1.worldbank.org/publicsector/Reforming.pdf) at page xiv. Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
xii 2011 East African Bribery Index Report Available at http://www.tikenya.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=73&Itemid=67 . Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
xiii An interactive timeline of the Arab Spring is available at (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2011/mar/22/middle-east-protest-interactive-timeline .) The first event in the timeline is the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in response to
corrupt police officers seizing his vegetable cart. Last Retrieved 12/1/2003.
xiv Kenyan Communication Report available at: http://www.cck.go.ke/resc/downloads/SECTOR_STATISTICS_REPORT_Q2_2011-12.pdf. Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
xv Kenyan Communication Report available at: http://www.cck.go.ke/resc/downloads/SECTOR_STATISTICS_REPORT_Q2_2011-12.pdf Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
xvi See e.g. The Harvard Business Review’s online series on charitable efficiency. (http://blogs.hbr.org/pallotta/2009/06/beware-of-highly-efficient-cha.html) Last Retrieved 12/1/2012.
xvii Serrat, O. (2010) Social Network Analysis. Washington, DC: Asian Development Bank. Discussing how power no longer resides exclusively in states or corporations or large institutions. xviii Akers, R.L.; Krohn, M.D.; Lanza-Kaduce, L.; Radosevich, M. (August 1979). Social Learning and Deviant Behavior: A Specific Test of a General Theory. American Sociological Review, 44(4), 636–655
xix Acemaglu, Daron, Simon Johnson, and James A. Robinson. (2008). The Colonial Origins of Comparitive Development : And Empirical Investigation, American Economic Review 91:1369-1401.
xx Story Available at (http://allafrica.com/stories/201209080204.html)
Additional Sources
Akers, R. L. (2000). Criminological theories. Los Angeles: Roxbury Inc.
Katz, Michael and Carl Shapiro. Network Externalities, Competition, and Compatibility, The American Economic Review Vol. 75. No 3 pp. 424-440.
Patton, Michael Quinn. (1997). Utilization-Focused Evaluation. 3rd Edition. Sage Publications, Inc.
Rossi, Lipsey, Freeman. (2004). Evaluation: A Systematic Approach. 7th Edition. Sage Publications, Inc.
Witkin, Belle Ruth and James Altschuld. (1995). Planning and Conducting Needs Assessments: A Practical Guide. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.