What Open Government Can Do For You

MAR 24 2011

by Sebastian Haselbeck in Open Government Leave a comment

More often than not, open government advocates see themselves as being in an uphill battle against giant bureaucratic monsters, as fighting the David versus Goliath fight. Just the same, especially in the “old” bureaucracies of Europe, public administrations see themselves as under attack from the “mob”, who wants to take away their power, have access to all their information and watch whatever they are doing.

Both perceptions are wrong, but bear a grain of truth.

While open government certainly questions old power structures, while pushing for it may seem like a never-ending battle, and while it may seem as there is resistance to change behind every door (there usually is!), change is coming, and it is wanted by the majority on all sides. The question is one of how to achieve more open government, and how to go about it – which includes language. In the end we all want the same thing and we need to figure out how to express and – sell it.

What can open government do for you? That is the question I would like to put out there, because it is a question that not everyone can answer because too few people think about the immediate effects and benefits of open government for both sides – and the average person involved! The debate is usually in a more abstract level, ideological level, or legal level. We need to bring it back down to the application.

Possible answers to my question may be, please add yours below in the comments (I will update the blog post to include them):

Open government can help organizations better understand their clients/constituents and their needs due to increased engagement and information sharing. The easier it is for the citizen to interact with government, and the more streamlined information processing is, the “smarter” an organization becomes. Standardized e-government products, open interfaces and intuitive e-services will facilitate this.

Open government can help citizens understand bureaucratic processes and increase their awareness of / and tolerance for the complexities that cause the processing time of their paperwork. The more government becomes transparent, the easier it will be for citizens to understand its processes and efforts. While that might put pressure on government to perform, it will also generate understanding.

Open government can help your employees be more active, motivated and informed, as intra-institutional walls are being torn down and the organization becomes more transparent and networked. Giving government employees more freedoms and empowering them will turn these institutions into learning organisms that breed innovation and connectedness. Everyone will profit from public employees who know more than what is going on in their cubicle, and who have a sense of mission, common goals and ways to exchange information with colleagues across office boundaries.

Open government can empower citizens to proactively accomplish administrative tasks and decrease the burden of paperwork on all sides. Government that reaches out to citizens using easy to understand and barrier-free web tools and comprehensible information, will feel a boost in productivity and citizen acceptance. Doing away with lines and pulling numbers, employees processing complete and readable forms, citizens being able to track where their requests are at, public executives getting real-time information about how their organization is performing. Government-citizen interaction can reach entirely different levels, if the bureaucracy burden on all sides is dramatically reduced.

Open government can open up the door to micro- and hyperlocal knowledge and participation.

Open government can turn your website into a 24/7 desk clerk and librarian. The more information that is relevant to citizens you make available once, the less resources go into responding to citizen requests, finding and compiling information and mailing. An accessible, searchable web portal with all the information in written form that your organization has and can give out, paired with a channel for open data (machine-readable, real-time, raw data) will pre-emptively make information available for everyone to access. You are still getting an email about a certain document? You can just email back a link to it, immediate reduction in email bandwidth of your organization, which is especially relevant for institutions or communities in areas with slower internet connections.