Workshop 8: Working With Civil Society and the Media
Address to the 2nd Annual Conference and General
Meeting of the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities

Nusa Dua, Bali, Indonesis
November, 2007

"The Movement for Quality Government in Israel and Its Relations with the Press"
by
Miriam Kadmon

The Movement for Quality Government in Israel

 

 

It is a great privilege for me today to be able to address you on behalf of the Movement for Quality Government in Israel. I would like to thank our hosts and the organizers of the 2nd Annual Conference and General Meeting of the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities.

My name is Miriam Kadmon. I volunteer my time with the Movement. I am also a volunteer with the network of Technological and Scientific Educational institutions in Israel. I believe that education is the basis for all disciplines and values.

I would like to begin my talk with an incident involving my late husband, Mr. Haim Kadmon. He was nominated, with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, as the country's first Administrator General and Official Receiver. He initiated negotiations with religious orders and the Government of the Russia (the USSR at the time) for acquiring lands under their ownership for the State. During these negotiations, my late husband received a phone call from an important government Minister asking him to proceed in a certain way. Kadmon did not find this request appropriate and told the Minister so. Whereupon the Minister said to Kadmon, "We shall meet again." This was clearly a threat on the Minister's part. Kadmon answered, "I am not afraid of you, but I am afraid of my grandchildren." This is the spirit behind the Movement for Quality Government in Israel. We are not afraid of people in power but we are really worried about the quality of life for our grandchildren.

Our organization feels fortunate to have participated in the inaugural meeting last year in Beijing. The International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities has taken on an important role in the global effort to combat corruption. It is crucial that the Association recognize and promote the role of civil society associations. Our small but vital organization is proud to do its part. Our Movement represents a growing membership of tens of thousands of Israeli citizens who believe that civil associations can and do help promote better government.

First I would like to give you a short description of the Movement's activities and then I will speak a little about our relations with the Media.


The Movement is a non-profit, non-governmental, non-partisan civil society association with a Board of Directors made up entirely of volunteers.

One of the main themes of our organization is that the individual can make a difference and one of the central lessons of our experience over the past 17 years is that civil society has a positive role to play in the improvement of public life.

Our organization is continuously involved in protesting government malfeasance, and frequently takes the government to Court. Yet our Movement is widely respected both in and out of government as playing a key role in improving public life. Government is full of people who want to do the right thing. Many officials are frustrated when they come across corruption and mismanagement. If everyone were against us, we would not be able to make much progress. However we have found that many officials are, sometimes secretly, pleased with our campaigns to promote transparency and accountability. We often hear of our organization being praised, even at the highest levels, for our activities. Recently we received a rare recognition in writing by one the State's leading prosecutors. I would like to share this with you today. The state prosecutor wrote us as follows (I will read only the last paragraph of her letter):


"Through its Petition to the Supreme Court in this Case, the Movement for Quality Government has contributed to a significant savings of tens of millions of Shekels in public money; and has led public officials to put greater stress on honest reporting and improved government oversight of the distribution of public funds to non-profit institutions. The Movement has thus served to strengthen the rule of law in Israel and deserves to be commended."



Corrupt government is inefficient government and corruption is a hidden tax imposed on the many for the advantage of a small minority. We believe that the Movement's goal is shared by most of the population on this planet: government can do better in the service of its citizens.

Here I would like to present you with a very brief summary of our organization.

The Movement for Quality Government was founded in 1990 by a small group led by its current chairman, Eliad Shraga, as part of a wave of public protest against a major national political crisis that occurred at the time. Shortly after its founding the early membership decided Israel did not need another political party (we have dozens of those) but Israel could use an independent watchdog organization. This was a new concept back then.

Further, we came to the conclusion that real and lasting improvement in the ethical climate of public life required a very broad based approach. Ideally we had to act in 3 areas: 1) Systemic Reform; 2) Exposing and taking legal action against public misconduct and; 3) Education to ethical citizenship and civic involvement.

The primary success of our organization has been in the area described as "exposure and legal action". The establishment of the Movement coincided with a radical change in Israel's Supreme Court that provided an organization like ours with unprecedented leverage to effect change.


A small sampling of these decisions include: establishing the duty of any new government to publish its underlying coalition agreement; the nullification of illegal patronage appointments and the establishment of a standard of competence as an overarching criteria in making public appointments; outlawing of the appointment of ministers who are under indictment; nullification of illegal Knesset decisions to allocate Members of Knesset pension payments and illegal political funding; implementation of the principle that elected municipal officials may be held personally responsible for the misappropriation of funds.

In the past 17 years the Movement has established itself as the most prominent public petitioner in the Israeli Supreme Court. The Movement has had greater legal success than any other organization in the history of the State of Israel. One cannot study constitutional or administrative Law in Israel without learning from decisions handed down in precedent setting MQG cases.

Although it took a while to get off the ground our educational activities have been growing along with our legal ones. So much so that a few years ago it was decided to establish a separate "daughter association" to handle our educational programs: The Academy for Quality Government in Israel. Today the Academy has two major and highly successful programs: 1) Ometz: an interactive internet based high school course in the study and practice of civics. Ometz is the major program of its kind in Israel and has been adopted by hundreds of classes around the country. And 2): Ethical Seminars which are conducted with government employees on both the national and municipal levels.

In our third area of action, systemic reform, we have unfortunately been less active. There have been a few specific instances where we have proposed statutory changes and sometimes have even succeeded in influencing legislation, e.g. the important reform of political party financing which took the right to set the level of party financing out of the hands of the politicians and transferred that power to an independent committee headed by a judge.

The Movement's reputation has been built on a solid foundation of outstanding legal, investigative and educational work. We run academically accredited legal clinics in cooperation with 4 different institutions of higher learning in Israel, including the Hebrew University Law School. Each law student is given actual cases to work on. Cases are often resolved through a letter written by the Movement. In many instances the involvement of the Movement is in itself sufficient to bring about a change in administrative action. Sometimes these matters are referred to the police or office of the State Ombudsman, and occasionally these cases end up in Court.

Our membership has grown steadily and today we are the largest organization of our kind in Israel.

We employ a professional paid staff of over 15 people at our headquarters in Jerusalem, where we operate through seven departments: the Legal Department, the Legal Clinic & Hotline Department, the Research and Budget Watch Department, the Economic Department, the Development Office, the Organization and Recruiting Department, and the Spokesperson and Public Relations Department. The Movement has a Board of Directors and Executive to determine policy and oversee operations.

The Movement receives no government funding and is dependent on donations and membership dues to maintain and improve on its standards of excellence.

Now I would like to spend a few minutes speaking about the Movement's relations with the media. This is an issue of great importance to civil society organizations. In general civil society organizations lack the necessary funds to advertise their message to the public. The Movement is no exception. We have close to a zero budget for advertising. The main method for getting our message across is a form of symbiosis with the media. One doesn't have to pay for making news. We try and make sure that our activities are "news worthy." Fortunately we have been part of a virtuous cycle: our legal success had made the news and now the newsmakers approach us even before we go to court to see what our intentions are.


We issue an average of 1 or 2 press releases a day and we are constantly invited to provide our opinion on radio and television.

Of course all this is based on the existence of a free and fairly independent press. Were the press unwilling or unable to print negative reports on government actions and government officials we would find it almost impossible to get our message across.

In the last few decades the Israeli press has become more independent and more willing to publicize a wide variety of opinions. We have been able to take advantage of this greater openness.

This is not to say that the press is entirely objective . Behind the media are important economic and private interests. These interests protect themselves. For example, we have an idea for a very hard-hitting magazine. One way to finance and publish such a magazine would be to find a partner in the publishing establishment. However we have been unable to get far with any of the major media players. They all thought it was too risky. It is interesting to note that today the press is often less afraid of political actors than it is of major business interests.

The internet may help solve this dilemma. We are entering an age of total freedom to publish in the world's largest marketplace: the internet. The Movement has recently redone its website to try and create not only a place where we can publish our ideas but a space where ideas can be exchanged and where a social network for all those involved in better government can be created. The initial response has been encouraging.

However, we do not believe that the internet will replace the major media interests. There is a very good chance that major publishers will hold on to their position as the primary outlet for news information and opinion. Therefore we will continue to place great emphasis on our press relations department. This year we have initiated a program of student interns in our public relations department. This is good for the students who want to learn about the press and also provides us with extra manpower for this crucial area.

I would like to conclude my remarks with thanks to my fellow distinguished delegates. I am very happy to be with you. It is a wonderful feeling to be among like-minded people from other parts of the world.
Shalom and good luck to us all!