Introduction

The debate on civil society and accountable global governance involves two important questions. What role does civil society play in ensuring accountability of global institutions? And to what extent is civil society itself accountable to its own constituencies? This chapter explores these issues in relation to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (hereafter abbreviated to ‘the Global Fund’ or ‘GFATM’).

In pursuing this analysis, civil society is understood to cover a range of collective actors outside of states and formal political parties, and characterised by the voluntary (non-profit) nature of their association. The range of civil society organisations (CSOs) includes social movements, labour unions and other workers' associations, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), community-based organisations (CBOs), clan and kinship networks, professional associations and any other bodies not motivated by profit. However, recent considerations of the social contract between the state and its citizens in the context of globalisation place particular emphasis on NGOs, especially when they take on the role of providing public services in the place of government.

Accountability is understood here along four dimensions: doing what is right in line with the organisation's goals; doing no harm; taking responsibility for the organisation's policies and actions; and correcting mistakes. The first two aspects of accountability require voice or participation (termed ‘consultation’ in Chapter 1 of this book), so that a broad spectrum of interests is considered in decision-making.