Freedom of information and ‘vexatious’ requests — The case of Scottish local government

This paper investigates the cost and incidence of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests within local authorities in Scotland and in particular, the cost and incidence of requests which have been defined as ‘vexatious’ in order to investigate if the negative perceptions surrounding the cost and misuse of the legislation are justified. Additionally, the criteria and guidelines that local authorities are using to define ‘vexatious’ are also examined. The approach taken to the research in this study is a survey of the 32 local authorities in Scotland using freedom of information requests as the data collection method. The findings from the survey revealed that none of the local authorities were keeping records of costs relating to FOI requests. However, 80% were keeping records of numbers of requests. One third of authorities that kept records of ‘vexatious’ requests had experienced such a request. However, the actual number of ‘vexatious’ requests received were extremely low. The findings highlight the difficulties in recording cost data and the general lack of record keeping within organisations. The findings also indicate a very low incidence of ‘vexatious’ requests and suggest that the ‘vexatious’ definition may be applied inappropriately by public authorities

The myth of freedom of information.

The article discusses the myths surrounding the founding of the U.S. and the freedoms of information supposedly conferred by its founders in the drafting and ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Particular focus is given to the efforts of libraries in defending the public\u27s right to know and their attempts to inform and instruct the public on the significance of openness in government. The misuse of a quote by former U.S. President James Madison about freedom of information is explored

Freedom of Information (FOI) as a data collection tool for social scientists

The dataset and code contains the analysis of "Freedom of information (FOI) as a data collection tool for social scientists" which evaluates a method of generating a unique dataset that has been underused - a Freedom of Information (FOI) request.Data was collected using i) Freedom of Information requests, ii) downloaded from government websites: police force characteristics and crime statistics - Home Office; local area demographic characteristics - 2011 Census; labour market characteristics - ONS.The data and code files are in Stata format. Microsoft Excel was also used to prepare the data

How Queensland newspapers reported public sector information reform

This article explores the role of media in Freedom of Information (FOI) policy transfer, using a case study of Queensland’s 2009 FOI reforms. A multi-dimensional analysis was used to discover how newspapers reported changes in Queensland’s public sector information (PSI) policy to identify whether stories on PSI policy were reframed over time. At a quantitative level, the text analytics software Leximancer was used to identify key concepts, issues and trends in 786 relevant articles from national, metropolitan and regional newspapers. At a qualitative level, discourse analysis was used to identify key themes and patterns from the newspaper articles. Both qualitative and quantitative shifts in the media reporting of Right to Information (RTI) and FOI were revealed across three time periods representing the periods before, during and after the reform implementation. The findings offer insights into the role of newspapers in policy diffusion, revealing how Queensland media reports framed the shift in PSI policy from pull model FOI to push model RTI

Open Data in Europe – Mapping User Groups to Future Innovation Impacts

This study sets out to advance our understanding of how re-users are being portrayed in policy documents and in a set of topic reports. Drawing on user innovation theories, implications are discussed for the future innovation scene and its main identified user groups: companies and developers, researchers, journalists and non-governmental organisations. Findings reveal differences between the two types of documents, both in relation to the user groups presented and their role in the value chain. While the policy documents mainly acknowledged user groups belonging to the ICT sector and emphasised economic values, the topic reports presented a much more diverse and heterogeneous view of open data users; revealing that there is no ‘one’ user group and impact’, rather, outcomes such as service innovation were related to all user groups. In particular, possible implications for innovation were related to three areas: 1) which re-user groups are acknowledged in the selected policy documents and topic reports?, 2) where in the data value chain are the different re-users placed and what value are they expected to generate?, 3) how might the current way of portraying re-users in policy documents and topic reports influence the shaping of the emerging open data innovation scene? For conclusion, this paper points to the identified simplistic view of user group’s relation to innovation in the policy documents as a possible hindrance for obtaining a broad innovation scene where heterogeneous innovations can emerge

Gobierno abierto y transparencia: construyendo un marco conceptual

La confusión del término anglosajón open government así como del término transparency han traído consigo ambigüedades y creado falsas expectativas. Además de utilizar ambos conceptos como sinónimos, se han implementado políticas públicas para hacerlos realidad en distintos países latinoamericanos sin tener una dirección precisa o un objetivo claro. Esta investigación busca aportar elementos teóricos que ayuden a delimitar los principales caminos teóricos que se han seguido y proponer un concepto que distinga tanto la transparencia como el gobierno abierto. Para lograrlo se han revisado las principales revistas académicas y artículos de los últimos seis años y se han agrupado en tres corrientes de pensamiento para proponer un concepto sobre gobierno abierto. El objetivo es contribuir a la construcción de una teoría general más sólida, que ayude a entender mejor el gobierno abierto, la transparencia y la rendición de cuentas.La confusión del término anglosajón open government así como del término transparency han traído consigo ambigüedades y creado falsas expectativas. Además de utilizar ambos conceptos como sinónimos, se han implementado políticas públicas para hacerlos realidad en distintos países latinoamericanos sin tener una dirección precisa o un objetivo claro. Esta investigación busca aportar elementos teóricos que ayuden a delimitar los principales caminos teóricos que se han seguido y proponer un concepto que distinga tanto la transparencia como el gobierno abierto. Para lograrlo se han revisado las principales revistas académicas y artículos de los últimos seis años y se han agrupado en tres corrientes de pensamiento para proponer un concepto sobre gobierno abierto. El objetivo es contribuir a la construcción de una teoría general más sólida, que ayude a entender mejor el gobierno abierto, la transparencia y la rendición de cuentas

Walking in Sunshine, or Away From It? Creating a Unified Transparency Index

Abstract: Despite the strengths of the two bodies of literature on Freedom of Information (FOI) and Lobbying Regulation, a main inadequacy is that they fail to meet each other. The reason why both the FOI and lobbying regulation literatures need to be synthesized is that both should be seen as the two sides of the deliberative democracy coin: FOI legislation aims to regulate the actions of state officials, while lobbying laws seek to regulate the actions of private interests attempting to influence such officials. The novelty of this paper is that we thus extend and link the ideas raised in these two bodies of literature, by performing a comparative analysis across 16 jurisdictions in North America, Europe and Asia. Our first main goal is to identify a measure for the effectiveness of FOI legislation throughout the world that can be compared on a normalized scale. Secondly, we combine these scores with those from the extant literature on lobbying regulations, producing what we refer to as an overall ‘sunshine score.’ This score will represent one of the first encompassing transparency measures in the literature, which helps us better conceptualize a unified understanding the relationship between FOI and lobbying rules, as well as the openness of democratic systems throughout the world

Open Government Data in Russia

Peer reviewe

Internal and External Transparency in Public-Private Partnerships—The Case of Barcelona's Water Provision

Despite the efforts devoted to open government, transparency is mainly considered an issue for public organizations. However, various tasks such as public services delivery and management are being increasingly privatized or outsourced to public-private partnerships (PPPs). Our study aims to contribute towards bridging this gap by answering two research questions: (1) What determines internal and external transparency in PPPs? and (2) To what extent does internal transparency contribute to external transparency? We answer these questions through a qualitative case study, consisting of 38 in-depth interviews, on the transparency in water provision and management in the city of Barcelona. We conclude that in the case of PPPs, transparency goes beyond making data available; thus, politicians and managers must build a narrative around the data they provide that guides citizens and partners in their interpretation of the information. Furthermore, our results show that internal transparency influences external transparency