The authors describe a specific example of a civil society organisation that has proven to be very successful in ensuring government accountability. In 1994, the Public Affairs Centre, an NGO in Bangalore, southern India, started generating information about the quality of the city’s public services through citizen report cards. These reports are similar to the customer feedback reports that are common in the private sector. Confronted with very low ratings, service providers improved their performance. The Bangalore scorecard has become a model for many other users around the world. (Publication date: August 2007)