More than 50 academic papers were presented June 7-9 at the Transatlantic Conference on Transparency Research, held at Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands.
The presentations addressed access to information and other transaprency-related topics from many angles and covering many countries.
Many papers focus on theory, such as: “Bentham Revisited: Transparency as a `Magic’ Concept, Its Justifications and Its Skeptics” and “On the Disadvantages of Transparency for Government.”
Others are empirical or comparative. A wide variety of topics was addressed, including campaign finance, public-private partnerships and open meetings.
The full list is available on the conference website.
What follows is a sampling of the abstracts of the papers most apparently relevant to freedom of information.
Transparency, Regulation and Economic Performance in Africa, by Samuel Adams and Francis Atsu
Abstract:
The paper examines the effect of regulation on income inequality for26 Sub Sahara African countries over the 1970-2005 period. The study’s results based on GMM estimations show that that transparency, investment, and regulation are positive and significantly correlated with economic growth, while general government final consumption expenditure and the financial depth variables (money and quasi money) are not significantly correlated with economic growth.
An alternative legal take on transparency, by Anoeska Buijze and Henk Addink
The concluding paragraph:
Rather than criticising the users of public access to information legislation for using it for the wrong reasons, and then pleading to make such ‘illegitimate’ use impossible, we should design access to information legislation in a way that takes personal information rights into account. It is not necessary to do this in existing public access to information legislation. Indeed, it is preferable to create a separate general legal basis for the release of information to specific parties, which allows private interests to be taken into account, and can provide safeguards to prevent that the information will get out on the street.
States of Secrecy: the European Union Executive Unbound, by Deirdre Curtin
Abstract
The flip side of ‘transparency’ is (government) secrecy, an understudied phenomenon both in law and in practice, in particular with regard to the European Union. Not only has supranational executive power within the context of the EU grown significantly in recent years, so has its inter-twining with executive power at the national and at the international levels. At the same time, regulation on secrecy has emerged in a different (non-legislative) realm to that on transparency and been the subject of a recent substantial revision, blacking out material from the scope of application of the general presumption of the ‘greatest possible access to documents’ in the context of the EU. What is the relationship between these two sets of rules and practices? Is there (some) democratic and /or judicial control over the manner in which EU executive power classifies and shares classified information or is the EU executive largely unbound in both law and practice? Is parliamentary or judicial oversight, if it exists, supranational or national in nature and governance level?
Democracy and Transparency: Enacting the Freedom of Information Acts around the World, by Yuko Kasuya
Abstract:
Why and how democracy leads to transparency? I study this question by focusing on the enactment timing and the strength of the freedom of information laws (FOIAs) around the world. I argue that the external (i.e. outside of government) pressure for transparency reform works plays an important role while the government turnover and the vulnerability of the chief executive mitigate the effect of external pressure. This claim makes contrast with the existing majority arguments that the elite-level competition determines the FOIA politics. I test my propositions by employing both cross-national statistical analyses and the two sets of “controlled-comparison” case studies (UK vs Germany and inter-temporal comparison of India’s two FOIAs). In a very preliminary manner, empirical examinations render support to my argument.
The Public Interest Test in FOI Legislation, by Maeve McDonagh
Abstract, second paragraph:
Public interest tests constitute one of the most important significant elements of FOI legislation. Such tests provide for the disclosure of information which would otherwise be exempt, where this is in the public interest. The presence in an FOI statute of a public interest test, as well as the approach taken to its formulation, are perhaps the most fundamental indicators of the robustness of an FOI regime. This paper provides an overview of public interest tests in FOI legislation internationally. It examines the approaches taken to the formulation of such tests and seeks to identify their most significant features. It highlights ground-breaking developments in the approach to public interest tests that have taken place in Australia in recent years. The paper concludes by identifying the most important features of an effective public interest test.
Transparency and freedom of information: a complex relation, by Frankie Schram
The paper compares the concept of transparency and the concept of freedom of information and tries to formulate how transparency and the principle of transparency can be better used in the legal system.
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