The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation in Menlo Park, California, has announced the launch of an inclusive governance strategy focused on overcoming the elite capture of public resources.

Based on an evaluation commissioned in early 2020 of the foundation’s Transparency, Participation, and Accountability (TPA) work from 2015 to 2021, coupled with a set of TPA field scans, and with consideration of the evolving political context, the inclusive governance strategy aims to promote the efforts of underserved populations—especially women and youth—to exercise power to make government more responsive to their needs.

According to the foundation, the primary challenges to overcoming elite capture are that underserved populations lack power, the media ecosystem already has been captured by elites, data and policy analysis often neglect those populations, and the populations lack representation in decision-making bodies. To address the challenges, the foundation will focus on three mutually reinforcing outcomes in the priority countries of Ghana, Kenya, Mexico, and Senegal: to bolster the resilience and resourcing of movements, coalitions, and membership organizations working to increase the power of underserved populations, especially women and youth; enable an independent media that both monitors government and reflects the perspectives of these populations; and enable underserved populations to use government data and information to support their activities and aspirations. In addition, the foundation will support new approaches and test new hypotheses in Burkina Faso and Tanzania.

“We don’t underestimate the challenging context we face. After all, this work was challenging even before the recent global rise in autocracy, populism, and misinformation,” wrote Gender Equity and Governance program director Dana Hovig and program officers David Sasaki, Diakhoumba Gassama, and Ousseynou Ngom in a blog post. “We renew our efforts to support governments that work in service of all people—especially of those who have experienced the most marginalization—and remain confident and grateful for the tireless work of our partners to bring about governance that is more inclusive, responsive, and accountable.”

(Photo credit: Getty Images/insta photos)