OGP in the News – Week of January 2, 2017
A series providing a round-up of media attention received by the Open Government PartnershipThe Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a multi-stakeholder initiative focused on improving government transparency, ensuring opportunities for citizen participation in public matters, and strengthen... More throughout the world.
Almost a month after its close, the 2016 OGP Global Summit in Paris remained at the center of this week’s OGP international media coverage.
The widely viewed European Commission platform, Joinup, featured several articles highlighting key Summit events and achievements, including the official launch of the Contracting 5 initiative, Hungary’s withdrawal from the partnership, and the 21 collective actions outlined in the Paris Declaration.
The German legal news platform, JuraForum, along with a number of other specialized news sites, ran an article about the country joining OGP—announced at the Summit—and the need to address the conspicuous lack of transparencyAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, transparency occurs when “government-held information (including on activities and decisions) is open, comprehensive, timely, freely available to the pub... More in many German charitable foundations.
IT was also a prominent theme in this week’s OGP media coverage. Technology and analysis site CIO.com, along with Network World, PC World Australia, and PC World New Zealand, circulated an article summarizing the cabinet exit memo left for incoming United States President Donald Trump by the Office of Science and TechnologyMaintaining the integrity of the scientific process — through open science, training, and rigorous evaluation criteria — is critical to ensure accurate health policy and strong public trust in gov... Director John P Holdren and the U.S. Chief Technology Officer Megan Smith. Among the 10 technology priorities listed in the memo, Action 9—”Promote Open Government through Transparency, Participation, and Collaboration”—spoke primarily of the U.S.’s role in OGP and called for implementation of further open government reforms.
Can there be such a thing as too much transparency? Andy Oram of the technology development company and website, O’Reilly Media, raised this question in an opinion piece republished by several major Chinese publications about the ethics of algorithmic-driven decisions. Citing OGP and its growing membership in his claim that “transparency is the great rallying cry of our time,” the author weighed the pros and cons of the open source movement.
And in France, NextINpact reported that the National Assembly Deputy and President of the Law Commission, Dominique Raimbourg, is toying with an idea broached at an OGP Summit roundtable discussion—that of conducting more online consultations to gauge citizen opinion about new government initiatives. Meanwhile, online daily Localtis.info announced an update to France’s “Digital Republic Law” (also known as the “loi Lemaire”) that requires only administrations of more than 50 employees to publish government data. According to the article, renewed enthusiasm for the Statewide open dataBy opening up data and making it sharable and reusable, governments can enable informed debate, better decision making, and the development of innovative new services. Technical specifications: Polici... initiative was expressed at the OGP Summit and this amendment addresses concerns of officials who feel preoccupied with more pressing issues in their local constituencies.
One of Nigeria’s leading daily publications, The Nation, included a statement by the Diocesan Bishop of Lagos, Reverend Ephraim Adebola Ademowo, hailing President Muhammadu Buhari’s decision to join OGP as a “great move to end system corrupt practices of contract inflation, mismanagement and non-implementation of policies in the public service.”
Finally, in an effort to follow through on commitments made at the 3rd OGP Global Summit and curb corruption in Mexico, Yahoo! Noticias, Terra in the U.S. and in Mexico, and Grupo Fórmula, among other sources, reported that Secretary of Civil Service (SFP) Arely Gomez González signed an agreement requiring public procurement contract information to be incorporated into the government’s electronic information system, CompraNet. Indonesian news agency Antara Jatim covered a similar e-government reform for government contracts enacted in the Indonesian regency of Bojonegoro, which, as stated in the article, is one of 15 pioneers in the OGP Subnational Pilot Program.
And last but not least, people around the world are beginning 2017 with a fresh start…literally. Check out photos of the brave souls plunging into the New Year!
Of course, we can’t catch everything in our news round-ups, so if you see we’ve missed something or think a particular story ought to be featured, please send it to jacqueline.mcgraw@opengovpartnership.org.