Improving the Linkages between Social Accountability and Social and Behavior Change

The Challenge

There is significant evidence on social accountability to advance health system goals. Extensive work has also been undertaken in the area of social and behavior change. However, less common is work that explicitly acknowledges the overlap of these two areas and unites them within specific approaches or strategies to improve health – despite potentially catalytic effects.

The Opportunity

This activity seeks to address this knowledge gap and the under considered of the linkages of social accountability and behavior change within health systems strengthening. The Accelerator aims to identify and support promising opportunities for social accountability and social and behavior change efforts to work together to increase equity and efficiency through universal health coverage (UHC).

Our Work

The activity seeks to address the following questions through a review of global experience and case studies in Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Guinea:

To what extent do social accountability approaches explicitly pull in behavior change strategies, and what are the dynamics and nuances surrounding the ways these two prominent areas tend to operate in isolation of each other?
What might be gained through more targeted efforts to include behavior change strategies within social accountability approaches? What would this look like, particularly in relation to social accountability in support of UHC?
What social accountability approaches have been implemented recently, and by whom? What factors have influenced successes and challenges with these approaches, and to what extent did behavior change (or lack of behavior change) play a role?
To mobilize considerable and diverse voices to engage in social accountability approaches in support of UHC, what individual level and institutional level behaviors need to change and in what ways?
What lessons have been learned around how to foster productive alliances and common goals between citizens and government, including behavior change related lessons?