by Keitha Booth
In October, 2,000 people from more than 70 countries attended the Open Government Partnership’s Global Summit in Spain’s Basque Autonomous Community. Its theme was “a time of profound global challenges to democracy”.
Leaders from Spain, Cabo Verde, Albania, Norway, and the United Kingdom called for countries to defend democratic values, expand civic space, and deliver more ambitious reforms. King Felipe VI of Spain closed the Summit, and described open government as a cornerstone of democracy and trust in institutions.
The Open Government Partnership (OGP) has 74 national members and over 150 local members. It is now 15 years old and over this time several member countries have experienced or are experiencing democratic instability or change. The current OGP Steering Committee has members from Armenia, Dominican Republic, Estonia, Kenya, Morocco, Norway, the Philippines, Spain, United Kingdom, and the USA.
Transparency International’s Chief Executive, Maira Martini, is a member of its Civil Society Steering Committee.
The OGP has simplified its language over this time. Its core themes are:
- People - placing citizens, rights, and civic space at the centre
- Institutions - strengthening transparency, accountability, and integrity
- Technology & open data - leveraging digital tools for innovation and better governance.
Two New Zealanders attended the Summit - Keitha Booth representing TINZ and Andrew Ecclestone, the NZ Council for Civil Liberties. Unlike Australia, the UK, Canada, Finland, Norway, Sweden, and many other members, New Zealand did not send a government representative.
Many members have anti-corruption work programmes, e.g. integrity strategies, open procurement, whistleblower protection, anti-money laundering and beneficial ownership. Other work includes artificial intelligence, digital government, access to official information, climate change, open justice, mis-and dis-information and addressing resistance to democracy.
The OGP’s model of public participation requires civil society to have a role in shaping and overseeing a government’s open government work. Such partnerships among open government champions both inside and outside of government have become the OGP’s driving force and one of its strongest results.
Yet, in New Zealand, this approach is uncommon and civil society organisations and the NZ government have still to find a solution for achieving this. This issue has been of concern during the development of all of NZ’s open government national action plans.
I found it very valuable to talk with OGP and civil society colleagues about how their governments and civil society conform with the OGP’s participation model. Finland and Brazil are the first members to develop an open government strategy which also includes the open government work being done outside their OGP work. The Chair of Canada’s open government Multi-stakeholder Forum rates this national strategy as more important than a national action plan. Civil society’s help defining the strategy makes it a solution finder, not just a problem poser.
In response to the Summit’s call for countries to defend democratic values, here are three suggestions for New Zealand to consider:
- Establish a NZ cross-party open government committee, using the GOPAC (Global Organisation of Parliamentarians against Corruption) model.
- Identify and implement a NZ-wide public programme promoting wider understanding of the value of democracy for NZ’s economic growth.
- Include in the 5th OGP National Action Plan work to develop a NZ open government strategy which incorporates all open government work being undertaken in New Zealand.
Keitha Booth
Keitha Booth is an Adjunct (Senior Research Fellow) at the School of Government, Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington who specialises in open government.
