New challenge for accountability: Looking for tools that will give it substance

Now that accountability has been successfully woven into the Sustainable Development Goals, discussions have to begin in earnest to find concrete, specific tools that will give it substance, Yves Leterme, secretary-general of International IDEA, shared with Devex.

Goal 16 — to promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels — and Goal 9 — to build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation — provided a turning point in the design of the SDGs, he said.

The former prime minister of Belgium also stressed the importance of reaching a consensus on ways to monitor progress in its entirety, not just in the economic sense.