Personal Democracy Forum 2008
Session: The Cross-Partisan Movement for Political Transparency and Watchdogging Government from Below
Note by Vanessa Scanfeld:
sunlight foundation - digitize congressional info - get to hands of citizens. help people be watchdogs - provide tools and access.
Why now?
1984 - apple - first mac - made it easy for us to think about how to develop and present information even in early years. now ubiquitous. pew study last week: 46% of all adults are using internet or text messaging for politics. made reduction of information easier. easier to communicate with elected officials. regular people participate in production of information.
Ellen Miller
sunlight foundation - founded at rise of technology and notion that congress has lost almost any sense of trust. watchdogging elected officials becomes easier. fortune 535 - how wealthy they are, or finding out your earmarks are n your backyard, or wiki for congress (congresspedia). Welcome citizen journalists into the fold. What was the most commonly used word in congress: "congress words."
David Stevenson
Visualizations
government data end up in room with arc (from raiders of the lost arc). once collected, never find out where they go or how used.
2008: Indie recovers the arc. Get the information out in the public - scrutiny in a way we never had before. aside from sunlight disinfectant, range of creative things that can happen when data is available. visualization helps understand data. Mashups (of pothole reports in DC). DC releases 216 databases on real time basis. See exact location, when reported, status.
Rami Tabello shows crime patterns in Chicago. Neighborhood Knowledge in LA (UCLA and neighborhood groups). Looks at 7 indicators tracked by various departments but were never brought together. put color coding on each of 7 indicators. all data comes in automatically. can easily see instances of urban decline - don't need to do analysis of data - you can see there's a problem.
Gapminder Foundation - look at simulations - trendalizer software - does stunning animations. Google bought rights to it. Also, wisdom of crowds - big, diverse groups and ask them to make decisions affecting general interest and that group's decisions will be intellectually superior to isolated individual, regardless of how smart or well informed he is. (suroweicki)
1. Release the data. Need to scrape limits access to technologically sophisticated. Some argue that the single most important step egovernment can take is to release data so other orgs can use it. Probably govt should do analysis as well. DC is doing live feeds. Gives you a real management tool. Swivel.
2. Tools to visualize data. Many eyes - IBM site. Allows people to upload data. enable a new social data analysis. easy to use - democratizes visualization. Agencies are concerned about taking such a bold step. Behind the firewall, they are looking at the data and are able to share things, break down boundaries, threaded discussions, communities of interest, etc. Let 1,000 mashups bloom.
District of Columbia - get new perspectives on complex issues by virtue of involving new sets of people and new eyes.
Matt Stoller
Blogger, co-founder of OpenLeft
political transparency
- explicit community norms and implicit community norms that are in conflict. (i.e. nobody wants to admit googling the word orgy, though it is a pretty commonly searched term)
- national security legislation - transpartisan movement for reform - trying to change norms of DC. Ron Paul on right (against war and surveillance state) and those on left are on same side.
- 2002 - auth of war passed
- 2007 - FISA bill passed
- 2008 - (last week) - another bill passed - retro immunity.
in all cases, barely read. not one democrat in position of authority or influence criticized the Dem leaders who pushed this bill through. similar to internal norm about searching "orgy." There are indicators that people know but don't want to talk about.
Observations about what we've tried...
- elect more democrats - and we have - sort of helped. delayed some bad legislation from passing.
- realized corruption is systemic. top fundraisers in both parties have most power. and important to understand.
- internet debate - breaks down lines between policy and elections.
- direct mail - older media - are basically useless for engaging in legislative debates - only report when it's done - blogging tells a story and keeps it going.
movement toward transparency is about forcing decision makers to confront the fact that they are doing things they were elected to prevent.
Mark Tapscott
Examiner Newspaper
Friend of transparency and technology
- USAspending.gov
- Ellen thinks gov't is good; mark thinks it is the enemy. but agree that transparency is central attribute. starting point for cooperation that was critical. what is internet's possibilities do to the fundamental nature of government? don't need centralized gov't or centralized corporations anymore. surprised when people on left are upset about surveillance government - what do you expect if you give it so much power? transpartisan government if we figure out what to do with the internet.
what are the government's obligations in improving political transparency?
- in constitution, says need to make government information available from time to time. given ease, should be able to update it in real time.
Why now?
1984 - apple - first mac - made it easy for us to think about how to develop and present information even in early years. now ubiquitous. pew study last week: 46% of all adults are using internet or text messaging for politics. made reduction of information easier. easier to communicate with elected officials. regular people participate in production of information.
Ellen Miller
sunlight foundation - founded at rise of technology and notion that congress has lost almost any sense of trust. watchdogging elected officials becomes easier. fortune 535 - how wealthy they are, or finding out your earmarks are n your backyard, or wiki for congress (congresspedia). Welcome citizen journalists into the fold. What was the most commonly used word in congress: "congress words."
David Stevenson
Visualizations
government data end up in room with arc (from raiders of the lost arc). once collected, never find out where they go or how used.
2008: Indie recovers the arc. Get the information out in the public - scrutiny in a way we never had before. aside from sunlight disinfectant, range of creative things that can happen when data is available. visualization helps understand data. Mashups (of pothole reports in DC). DC releases 216 databases on real time basis. See exact location, when reported, status.
Rami Tabello shows crime patterns in Chicago. Neighborhood Knowledge in LA (UCLA and neighborhood groups). Looks at 7 indicators tracked by various departments but were never brought together. put color coding on each of 7 indicators. all data comes in automatically. can easily see instances of urban decline - don't need to do analysis of data - you can see there's a problem.
Gapminder Foundation - look at simulations - trendalizer software - does stunning animations. Google bought rights to it. Also, wisdom of crowds - big, diverse groups and ask them to make decisions affecting general interest and that group's decisions will be intellectually superior to isolated individual, regardless of how smart or well informed he is. (suroweicki)
1. Release the data. Need to scrape limits access to technologically sophisticated. Some argue that the single most important step egovernment can take is to release data so other orgs can use it. Probably govt should do analysis as well. DC is doing live feeds. Gives you a real management tool. Swivel.
2. Tools to visualize data. Many eyes - IBM site. Allows people to upload data. enable a new social data analysis. easy to use - democratizes visualization. Agencies are concerned about taking such a bold step. Behind the firewall, they are looking at the data and are able to share things, break down boundaries, threaded discussions, communities of interest, etc. Let 1,000 mashups bloom.
District of Columbia - get new perspectives on complex issues by virtue of involving new sets of people and new eyes.
Matt Stoller
Blogger, co-founder of OpenLeft
political transparency
- explicit community norms and implicit community norms that are in conflict. (i.e. nobody wants to admit googling the word orgy, though it is a pretty commonly searched term)
- national security legislation - transpartisan movement for reform - trying to change norms of DC. Ron Paul on right (against war and surveillance state) and those on left are on same side.
- 2002 - auth of war passed
- 2007 - FISA bill passed
- 2008 - (last week) - another bill passed - retro immunity.
in all cases, barely read. not one democrat in position of authority or influence criticized the Dem leaders who pushed this bill through. similar to internal norm about searching "orgy." There are indicators that people know but don't want to talk about.
Observations about what we've tried...
- elect more democrats - and we have - sort of helped. delayed some bad legislation from passing.
- realized corruption is systemic. top fundraisers in both parties have most power. and important to understand.
- internet debate - breaks down lines between policy and elections.
- direct mail - older media - are basically useless for engaging in legislative debates - only report when it's done - blogging tells a story and keeps it going.
movement toward transparency is about forcing decision makers to confront the fact that they are doing things they were elected to prevent.
Mark Tapscott
Examiner Newspaper
Friend of transparency and technology
- USAspending.gov
- Ellen thinks gov't is good; mark thinks it is the enemy. but agree that transparency is central attribute. starting point for cooperation that was critical. what is internet's possibilities do to the fundamental nature of government? don't need centralized gov't or centralized corporations anymore. surprised when people on left are upset about surveillance government - what do you expect if you give it so much power? transpartisan government if we figure out what to do with the internet.
what are the government's obligations in improving political transparency?
- in constitution, says need to make government information available from time to time. given ease, should be able to update it in real time.
