Reliability of public services: Ensuring citizens' rights

In any democratic society citizens will have a number of basic rights as well as obligations in relation to their government and its agencies. While measuring users’ satisfaction with public sector goods and services is considered to be an important indicator to evaluate performance of service delivery in OECD countries, few measures have been consensually developed on the extent to which governments design their institutional framework to allow citizens’ rights to be acknowledged and heard. Such a framework helps to ensure the reliability of public services by informing citizens of their rights and by providing them with channels of redress and quality assurance. Statements of citizens’ rights might also promulgate basic service and process standards, e.g. the Citizens’ Charter that existed in the United Kingdom.