Frequently Asked Questions on Governance Diagnostic
Last Updated: January 28, 2025
Q1. What is a Governance Diagnostic?
Governance Diagnostics (GD) analyze and recommend actions for addressing corruption vulnerabilities and strengthening integrity & governance in IMF member countries.
GDs examine the severity of corruption vulnerabilities in a country across six core state functions. These include fiscal governance, central bank governance and operations, financial sector oversight, market regulation, rule of law, and AML-CFT. Following the analysis, GDs prioritize and sequence recommendations for systematically addressing the vulnerabilities.
A GD is voluntary for both, a member country and the IMF, and is an IMF capacity development activity. Initiated on request from authorities and subject to resource availability, IMF staff discuss the scope and timing of delivering a GD. At times, a call for a GD may arise during IMF lending and surveillance activities. The GD remains a voluntary exercise in such cases.
Genuine cooperation between IMF staff and authorities is essential for a successful GD, requiring the authorities’ commitment to constructively organize missions and provide timely access to all necessary information.
GDs are guided by the IMF’s 2018 Framework on Enhanced Engagement on Governance.
Q2. What are the expectations of a member country following a Diagnostic?
A member country is expected to fully own the reform program and address governance and corruption vulnerabilities identified in a Diagnostic. Authorities are also expected during the production of a Diagnostic to provide access to all necessary legal and administrative documents and facilitate the mission team’s contacts with civil society organizations, the private sector, think tanks, and academia for the purpose of obtaining their perspectives on corruption and governance issues.
To encourage transparency and facilitate extensive support from all key stakeholders on governance reforms, a Governance Diagnostic is expected to be published - although at the prerogative of country authorities.
In additional to on IMF.org, authorities have to date published the report on their own web sites in a number of cases, demonstrating strong ownership and active engagement toward future actions. As good practice, some GD reports have been published as the authorities’ own report, prepared in collaboration with IMF. Prior to undertaking a Diagnostic, the authorities often commit to publishing the GD report and/or the reform plan derived from the Diagnostic.
Q3. How is a Governance Diagnostic used?
Findings of the Diagnostic have informed authorities’ governance and anti-corruption reforms, IMF-supported programs, surveillance in the context of Article IV missions, and capacity development work. The findings have also been featured in subsequent IMF engagement and policy advice to member countries and informed program design. Some Diagnostic recommendations become conditionality in subsequent IMF-supported programs.
Q4. How many countries have requested a Diagnostic?
Since 2018, twenty GD Reports were finalized (as of November 19, 2024). Recent Diagnostics include Sri-Lanka, Mauritania, Cameroon, Zambia, and Benin. Ten Diagnostics are ongoing, and several are under consideration. More details on (published) GD reports can be found here.
Q5. Are views from civil society and other non-governmental stakeholders considered?
GD reports draw heavily on local knowledge and expertise within the country. Throughout the exercise, a GD team engages with a variety of stakeholders, including civil society organizations, the private sector, think tanks and academia to gather their perspectives on the issues covered in the Diagnostic, while also closely consulting with the country’s development partners.
The views from these stakeholders inform the team’s views on key governance and corruption vulnerabilities and help shape the findings and recommendations. This inclusive approach ensures that the Diagnostic is comprehensive and reflective of the local context, enhances transparency, and also fosters a sense of ownership and accountability among all stakeholders involved. In some countries, civil society organizations remain actively involved in the monitoring of implementation of GD recommendations and assessing the impact of reform.