Proactive Transparency

Examples of failed attempts to introduce transparency in Turkey, Russia and China show that political leaders often have a poor understanding of how society works. A prerequisite for introducing transparency in science was the autonomy of universities; in the public sector, however, institutions have low autonomy, especially in countries with authoritarian systems or those that have had such systems. This chapter therefore focuses on the Eastern European type of bureaucracy, where politics is deeply intertwined with expertise, and then offers a path to a solution. It starts with the Public Information Access Act, which is gaining ground worldwide and gives citizens the legal right to obtain public sector information of interest to them. The act is unquestionably a good start towards transparency, but it is only the first step. A real proactive approach would be a law on transparency (or even an amendment to the constitution) that should encompass all key elements of transparency (procedures, results, and financing) while ensuring information support and archiving. Due to their independence, analytical non-governmental civil society institutions can significantly contribute to proactive transparency efforts. Governments should allocate funding to support these institutions accordingly. The chapter also discusses social networks and the case of Taiwan, where social networks have achieved considerable credibility by introducing approaches similar to those used for scientific publishing.