Technology is profoundly influencing government openness. Rapid technological progress has significantly increased the amount of data generated in societies, including by government organisations. Open government data (OGD) can be used to strengthen public governance by improving the design of public services with a citizen-driven approach, enhancing public sector efficiency and responsiveness, and spurring public sector integrity and accountability. By ensuring OGD availability, accessibility and use by public, private and civic actors, governments can design more evidence-based and inclusive policies, stimulate innovation inside and outside the public sector, motivate data-driven civic engagement, better-inform citizens’ personal decisions and enhance public trust. Making data and evidence available across government departments and ministries contributes to better policy making, greater coordination and empowers businesses and civil society to also contribute.
The OECD Open-Useful-Reusable government data (OURdata) index measures government efforts to promote data availability and accessibility, and to stimulate data use and re-use outside and inside government. France, the United Kingdom and Korea are particularly advanced in promoting OGD, while some other countries still have yet to meet OGD best practices (see OECD, 2017b).
Most countries have “open-by-default” policies, thus scoring relatively highly for data accessibility (0.2 on average in the OECD out of a potential 0.33). Provisions for accessibility also score relatively highly in most countries (0.22 on average). However, the extent of central/federal initiatives to promote data re-use (such as “hackathons” and co-creation events) and inside governments (via training and information sessions for civil servants) varies greatly and is reflected in relatively weaker scores for government support for re-use (0.12 on average). Moreover, few countries monitor the economic and social impact of open data, as well as the impact of open data on public sector performance, with Korea as a notable exception. Most OECD governments regularly consult stakeholders on data needs, but few have developed a central/federal data portal as an exchange, collaboration and crowdsourcing platform where users can provide feedback for continuous improvement. Such consultations may also include representatives of the citizens to whom much data held by governments relates directly or indirectly. This offers the chance for concerns citizens may have about governments holding and “opening” such data (e.g. in relation to privacy) to be aired and addressed. Empowering users and supporting platforms of exchange among businesses, civil society and government organisations is a key next step to promoting re-use and achieving positive impacts.
The Global Open Data Index (GODI) provides a complementary view on the extent to which government data in 15 key areas are open. Government budgets, national statistics, procurement and national laws are generally the most openly available, while water quality, government spending and land ownership information are among the least open.
