A Legislative Track at the OGP Global Summit
On behalf of the Open Government Partnership (OGP)’s Legislative Openness Working Group (LOWG), co-chaired by the Congress of Chile and the National Democratic Institute, we are excited to announce that this year’s OGP Global Summit, being held in Mexico City from October 27-29, will include a track dedicated to legislative openness and include partners from the legislative branch.
To promote this track, the Office of the President of Mexico and the President of the Senate of Mexico have sent invitations to parliamentary leadership in all 66 OGP countries inviting members of parliament to the Global Summit. Sessions offered at the Summit by the LOWG and its partners will include a focus on issues like technology’s impact on legislative openness, efforts for parliament-civil society collaboration, experiences in passing access to information legislationCreating and passing legislation is one of the most effective ways of ensuring open government reforms have long-lasting effects on government practices. Technical specifications: Act of creating or r..., the launch of international standards on parliamentary ethics, and other topics.
Parliamentary engagement in the open government community promotes broad, multi-party support for an open government agenda and more sustainable reforms. And greater openness of the legislative process means that citizens have better access to information about laws under consideration and opportunities to engage in the policymaking process. Government points of contact, charged with leading the development and implementation of their national action planAction plans are at the core of a government’s participation in OGP. They are the product of a co-creation process in which government and civil society jointly develop commitments to open governmen..., should consider including parliamentary representatives in their delegation to strengthen commitmentOGP commitments are promises for reform co-created by governments and civil society and submitted as part of an action plan. Commitments typically include a description of the problem, concrete action... to this important element of open government reform.
We strongly encourage members of the open parliamentEnsuring access to legislative information and creating mechanisms for public participation are critical to building an open, trusting relationship with citizens. Technical specifications: Commitments... More community and those interested in the topic, including members of parliament, parliamentary staff and civil society leaders, to attend the OGP Global Summit in Mexico to participate in these important events.
Please visit http://www.ogpsummit.org for more information on how to pre-register by September 28.
One of the key goals of the LOWG over the last two years has been to raise awareness, both of the important role of legislatures in the global open government conversation and parliaments’ own awareness of OGP. We want to enlist the help of civil society partners to get key representatives from legislatures to attend the OGP Global Summit.
Please send us recommendations for MPs or legislative staff that we should invite to this event or email us with suggestions.
In addition, this year’s OGP Global Summit will also provide the venue for discussing international networking and cooperation on open parliament issues through a nascent Open Parliament Network (OPN), which will link parliamentary and civic activists seeking to build more open parliaments and governments. OPN is intended to serve as a parliamentary complement to OGP and to support OGP’s mission by advocating for robust open government reforms, both within OGP countries and more broadly. We will continue to share information about these exciting events in the coming weeks and look forward to welcoming many of you to Mexico City.
In the meantime, please check out events scheduled for this year’s Global Legislative Openness Week from September 7-15. Visit http://www.openparlweek.org to find out more information about how you can participate in those events, and http://www.opengovpartnership.org/groups/legislative to find more information on OGP’s Legislative Openness Working Group.