Below is an extract from an op-ed by Al Roberts on openness-you can read the full piece here and his research on FOI here
…Still, we should be concerned about these recent criticisms of democracy. That is especially true for people who care about governmental openness. The years between 1990 and 2008 were good for transparency. For example, over 80 countries adopted access to information laws. But the movement for openness rode on the wave of enthusiasm for democracy that followed the collapse of authoritarian regimes in the 1980s and 1990s. After all, how could new democracies succeed if citizens did not have information about the workings of governmental institutions?Now the tide is running in the other direction. In his latest book, Fukuyama suggests that American democracy has become dysfunctional partly because of excesses in transparency. Too much openness, he worries, has undermined the effectiveness and legitimacy of government. Another recent book also challenges the notion that transparency “is an unmitigated good.” American government, says Jason Grumet, “is more open, more transparent, and less functional than ever before.”
Talk like this gives cover to politicians and civil servants who are already inclined to question the value of transparency policies. In the United Kingdom, for example, the government of Prime Minister David Cameron has threatened to impose new fees for making requests under the Freedom of Information Act that was adopted in 2005. Cameron has complained the law “furs up the arteries of government.” And the Australian government has asked Parliament to eliminate the nation’s office of the Information Commissioner, saying that it will “improve efficiencies” and “further the commitment to smaller government.”
Advocates of openness have to challenge this way of thinking. In fact, transparency policies are not a key cause of democratic malaise. There are more important considerations at work. The pressure on democracies is more intense during economic crises because such crises require a rethinking of conventional wisdom about the role of government in the economy. Hard times also lead to painful arguments about the allocation of economic losses. And social disorder — protests, strikes, even riots — typically flairs up as well.
All of these considerations explain why transparency is actually more important during hard times. Access to information allows the public to participate fully in decisions about the role of government that may have consequences for decades. It enables people to judge whether decisions about bailouts and cutbacks are made fairly. And when things get very rough, it permits people to judge whether police power is exercised with restraint.
We will get through this moment of democratic malaise, as we have before. In the meantime, we should exercise some restraint in making final judgments about the viability of the democratic system. And we should be careful about abandoning policies, like those guaranteeing transparency, that give democracies the capacity to adapt to new conditions and maintain the support of citizens.
Alasdair Roberts is a professor of law at Suffolk University Law School in Boston. His latest book is The End of Protest: How Free-Market Capitalism Learned to Control Dissent (Cornell University Press).
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 15, 2014 A9
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