PublicationsThe U4 Blog

U4 Practice Insight

The role of civil society in anti-corruption legislative advocacy: Cases from Colombia's National Development Plan and Healthcare Reform

Legislative advocacy is a viable alternative for addressing corruption in Colombia; however, it remains underused due to inherent challenges and risks. Transparencia por Colombia leveraged this approach to incorporate anti-corruption measures into the National Development Plan and the National Health Reform. While not all recommendations were adopted, the advocacy strategies and tools led to the approval of the National Anti-Corruption Strategy aimed at addressing corruption across all sectors and levels, as well as rejection of a health reform riddled with corruption risks that jeopardised the right to health of Colombians.

8 July 2025
Download PDFRead short version
The role of civil society in anti-corruption legislative advocacy: Cases from Colombia's National Development Plan and Healthcare Reform

Main points

  • Civil society’s legislative advocacy presents an opportunity to strengthen legislation for the common good – rather than posing a risk to public management.
  • Engaging anti-corruption civil society organisations (CSOs) in the legislative process is essential. It allows legislators and government officials to harness the expertise of these organisations to reinforce the anti-corruption framework and mitigate corruption risks within all type of bills.
  • Anti-corruption CSOs face multiple challenges in legislative advocacy. These include: successfully incorporating their observations and recommendations into bills; aligning their agendas with those of Congress members and public entities; coordinating dialogue between CSOs, legislators, and government officials; building internal capacities for effective advocacy; and fostering collaboration with other CSOs, which is often hindered by a lack of consensus and competition for credit.
  • Successful legislative advocacy requires continuous identification and prioritisation of available windows of opportunity and associated barriers, to develop innovative strategies and tools that best achieve the desired advocacy goals.
  • Strengthening anti-corruption legislative advocacy demands a coordinated effort. Anti-corruption CSOs provide expertise; members of Congress and government official facilitate access and engagement in bill discussions; and the international cooperation community offers financial and technical support.
  • CSOs are encouraged to publish advocacy activities and their interactions with decision makers, as well as define the ‘red lines’ for advocacy actions. Donors should create funding opportunities to support CSOs conducting such activities while government officials should strategically prioritise bills to advance the strengthening of the anti-corruption framework.

Cite this publication


Martínez Rosas, S.; Romero Manchola, D.; Pinzón García, D. 2025. The role of civil society in anti-corruption legislative advocacy: Cases from Colombia's National Development Plan and Healthcare Reform. Bergen: U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute (U4 Practice Insight 2025:1)

Download PDFRead short version
Sandra Ximena Martínez Rosas
Diana Lucia Romero Manchola
Daniela Pinzón García

Disclaimer


All views in this text are the author(s)’, and may differ from the U4 partner agencies’ policies.

This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Photo