Posts Tagged ‘open government partnership’
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8 November 2013
U.S. Plans to Create FOI Advisory Group
The United States will create a “FOIA Modernization” advisory group, according to the Oct. 31 preview of its second Open Government Partnership action plan. The government also plans to develop a consolidated online portal for making FOIA requests. In addition, steps will be taken to develop a core federal FOIA regulation, while still allowing for […]
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1 November 2013
OGP Concludes Summit With New Commitments, Goals
By Toby McIntosh Thirty-seven members of the Open Government Partnership offered “brand new commitments” during the Oct. 31 – Nov. 1 London OGP summit. The list was announced near the end of the summit. Also revealed was the addition of Sierra Leone as the 62nd member after passage of a freedom of information law made them […]
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1 November 2013
First Evaluations Spark Reflection on OGP Effort
By Toby McIntosh The official launch Nov. 1 of the reports by independent reviewers about the national action plans of the founding members of the Open Government Partnership provides preliminary answers to several key questions about the OGP experiment Is it making a difference? How is the review process doing? The first eight evaluation reports […]
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31 October 2013
OGP Working Group on ATI Develops Tentative Agenda
An access to information working group was formed Oct. 31 in connection with the Open Government Partnership summit in London. The creation of three subgroups was proposed designed, to correspond to the stages of the OGP process: – To help government comply with the OGP access eligibility criteria and to consider strengthening the OGP access […]
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31 October 2013
OGP Opens Summit With Challenges, New Promises
The Open Government Partnership kicked off its second summit with more than 1,000 delegates gathered in London to share ideas and discuss national commitments. With New Zealand becoming the 61st member, the two-year old multi-stakeholder group was praised by speakers who also set new challenges for a maturing organization. A few OGP countries began to […]
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25 October 2013
London OGP Summit Will Be Coming Out Party for CSOs
By Toby McIntosh 19 months ago in Brazil, at the first Open Government Partnership summit, 150 delegates from civil society organizations (CSOs) finally got together as a group, very late in day on the last day of the conference, tired and somewhat frustrated. “Welcome to a work in progress,” began Warren Krafchik, the new OGP co-chair […]
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24 October 2013
OGP to Form Group on Private Sector Involvement
The Open Government Partnership plans to form a working group to explore ways for the private sector to become more involved, FreedomInfo.org has learned. The ad hoc group will be announced next week at the OGP summit meeting in London Oct. 31- Nov. 1. It will be jointly chaired by: – Oliver Bell, chief technology […]
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24 October 2013
Sierra Leone Aims to Join OGP After Passing FOI Bill
Sierra Leone is hoping to join the Open Government Partnership soon and is pushing through a freedom of information bill in order to qualify for membership, according to informed sources. A bill will pass on Oct. 29, a top overnment official told Freedominfo.org. That timing would coincide with the OGP annual meeting in London Oct. 31-Nov. […]
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23 October 2013
U.S. to Make FOI Reform Major Part of OGP Plan
By Toby McIntosh The U.S. government intends to create a national portal for making freedom of information requests and move toward a single, national FOIA regulation, according to persons briefed this week and government officials. These and other FOIA-related changes would be made part of the second U.S. national action plan as a member of the […]
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17 October 2013
Half of OGP Cohort 2 Submit National Self-Assessments
Twenty Open Government Partnership countries recently submitted their self-assessments of progress on their national action plans, according to a FreedomInfo.org tally. Nineteen countries who faced the same Sept. 30 deadline have told OGP officials that the self-assessments are on the way. Posted on the OGP website (on the individual country pages) are self-assessments from: Chile, Colombia, Croatia, […]
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16 October 2013
Talking About a (Data) Revolution
By Dave Banisar Banisar is Senior Legal Counsel of Article 19. The following article was posted Oct. 16, 2013, on the Article 19 website. At the end of this month, over 50 nations will converge on London for the annual summit of the Open Government Partnership (OGP). The OGP has seen rapid growth since its […]
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7 October 2013
Abe Promotes Secrecy, Sidelining Transparency and OGP
By Jeff Kingston Kingston is Director of Asian Studies, Temple University Japan. Norika Fujiwara, a TV celebrity who serves as goodwill Ambassador for the Japanese Red Cross, recently caused a media sensation when she came out against the government’s proposed secrecy legislation, saying it would adversely affect citizens. Writing on her website last month, she urged […]
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30 September 2013
OGP CSO Coordinator Backs Creating New Standards
Paul Maassen, the Open Government Partnership civil society coordinator, has advocated the creation of open government standards with which to judge national efforts. His comments come in his latest newsletter as he asks, “What can civil society itself do to monitor success at the national level?” Maassen points to efforts by the Access Info Europe […]
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22 September 2013
Survey of Commissioners Reports Views on 3 Topics
Private bodies performing public functions comply poorly with national access to information laws compared to public bodies, according to a survey of information commissioners. The finding comes in a report prepared by the Centre for Freedom of Information, based at the University of Dundee in Scotland, and for information commissioners and presented Sept. 20 at […]
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18 September 2013
New Zealand to Join OGP Later This Year, Keyes Says
New Zealand Prime Minister John Keyes Sept. 19 said his country will join the Open Government Partnership later this year, overcoming previous reluctance. The announcement came after Keyes met in London with UK Prime Minister David Cameron. The UK now is an OGP co-chair and will be hosting the OGP meeting in London in late […]
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17 September 2013
Canadian Commissioner Wants Access in OGP Plan
Canada’s information commissioner Suzanne LeGault has urged Canadian officials to make modernization of the Access to Information Act a commitment in its next Open Government Partnership action plan. LeGault described the national access system pessimistically in a lengthy interview with Global News. “If this trend continues, then the system is really busting,” she said. Among […]
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11 September 2013
FOI Notes: RTK Day, OGP Summit Attendees, Open Gov’t Standards, Procurement, Publications
RTKD 2013: There is now an online form to let everyone know about your events for Right to Know Day 2013, Sept. 28. As they come in, they will be placed on a map on the website. Information Commissioners/RTI oversight bodies to be discussed on RTKD2013. Official hashtag #RTKD2013 OGP: A preliminary list of the […]
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11 September 2013
OGP Forming Working Group on Access to Information
The Open Government Partnership is inviting participation in a thematic working group on access to information. OGP is organizing five “pilot” thematic working groups. The goal is “to support the creation and implementation of more ambitious open government commitments as part of OGP national action plans.” The working groups are each co-led by at least […]
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11 September 2013
OGP Issues First IRM Report; South Africa Gets Criticized
South Africa’s national action plan as a member of the Open Government Partnership has been only partly completed, focused on easy goals and did not adequately involve civil society, according to the report on an independent evaluator. The report is the very first one done under the OGP’s Independent Reporting Mechanism and was prepared by Ralph Mathekga […]
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5 September 2013
OGP Announces Reviewers for 39 National Action Plans
The Open Government Partnership has announced the names of a new group of researchers who will examine the fulfillment of the action plans of 39 countries. While releasing the names on the OGP blog, an OGP official declined to disclose any information besides the names of the selected reviewers to FreedomInfo.org, citing OGP capacity issues […]