Financial Transparency Coalition

Our friends at RightingFinance have just released the first in a series of toolkits exploring the intersection of human rights and tax policy. Please read the following blog, crossposted from the RightingFinance website for more information.

In spaces where a handful of elites from governments, civil society organizations (CSOs), and the private sector are exclusively invited, great and well- prepared speeches on Africa are heard. Yet experience has shown that often there is a great disconnect between avenues like the 26th African Union Summit and the people of the continent. The

We are big fans of human rights organisations, generally speaking, but we’re going to say some uncomfortable things about some of them here. Yesterday we noted that Rudolf Elmer, the Swiss whistleblower who has been persecuted for years by the Swiss tax haven industry, via the Swiss courts and other arms of Swiss state, collapsed in court during a trial where he is accused of breaking Swiss banking secrecy laws. He has already spent five months in prison and he faces more: read the background here. The Swiss establishment and media has mostly focused on Elmer the...

Experts, advocates, government officials and journalists from all regions of the globe will be gathering next week in Lima, Peru to scale-up strategic efforts to curb illicit financial flows in ways which ensure sufficient, equitable and accountable financing of sustainable development. The timing couldn’t be more auspicious. As governments move into the final stages of negotiating a set of new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to replace the Millennium Development Goals after their expiration date next year, this post-2015 momentum represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape the contours of national government priorities, policies and financing decisions in areas from education to...