Webinar on Measuring Implementation of Access to Information Legislation

Sheila S. Coronel, Director, Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism, School of Journalism, Columbia University

Natasa Pirc Musar, Information Commissioner, Slovenia

We are in the midst of an explosion in the measurement of government openness and the accessibility of information to the public. This is due largely to the growing interest worldwide in the usefulness of transparency as a tool for catalyzing reforms and to the emergence since the 1990s of a global right-to-information movement.

Today 90 countries have information access laws, with the majority passing them only since 2000. As legislation was being drafted in quick succession, information activists needed to be able to evaluate and compare them. Some right-to-know groups went on to set their own standards and create their own tools to assess information laws and their implementation. At the same time, donors and anti-corruption groups began focusing on transparency as an indicator of good governance, and created their own measurements.

Since the 1990s, there have been dozens of efforts to measure information access. This webinar will consist of an overview by Sheila Coronel followed by a brief country presentation by Nataša Pirc Musar. Sheila Coronel will examine the various ways in which access to information have been measured, methodologies used, gaps in knowledge, and what has worked in terms of measurement. Nataša Pirc Musar will then present on measurement tools used by the government of Slovenia and the Information Commission.