Research Catalog

Title

Troubling transparency : the history and future of Freedom of Information / edited by David E. Pozen and Michael Schudson.

Publication

New York : Columbia University Press, [2018]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Additional Authors

• Pozen, David E.
• Schudson, Michael

Description

viii, 341 pages; 23 cm

Summary

"Today, transparency is a widely heralded value, and the U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is often held up as one of the transparency movement's canonical achievements. Yet while many view the law as a powerful tool for journalists, activists, and ordinary citizens to pursue the public good, FOIA is beset by massive backlogs, and corporations and the powerful have become adept at using it for their own interests. Close observers of laws like FOIA have begun to question whether these laws interfere with good governance, display a deleterious anti-public-sector bias, or are otherwise inadequate for the twenty-first century's challenges. [This book analyzes] freedom of information policies in the United States and abroad--how they are working, how they are failing, and how they might be improved. Contributors investigate the creation of FOIA; its day-to-day uses and limitations for the news media and for corporate and citizen requesters; its impact on government agencies; its global influence; recent alternatives to the FOIA model raised by the emergence of "open data" and other approaches to transparency; and the theoretical underpinnings of FOIA and the right to know. In addition to examining the mixed legacy and effectiveness of FOIA, contributors debate how best to move forward to improve access to information and government functioning."--

Subjects

• Government information
• USA
• Government information > United States
• United States
• Freedom of Information Act (United States)
• Public records > Law and legislation > United States
• Informationsfreiheit
• USA Freedom of Information Act
• United States Freedom of Information Act

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Introduction: Troubling transparency / David E. Pozen and Michael Schudson -- How administrative opposition shaped the Freedom of Information Act / Sam Lebovic -- Positive rights, negative rights, and the right to know / Frederick Schauer -- FOIA as an administrative law / Mark Fenster -- The other FOIA requesters / Margaret B. Kwoka -- State FOIA laws : more journalist-friendly, or less? / Katherine Fink -- FOIA and investigative reporting : who's asking what, where, and when : and why it matters / James T. Hamilton -- The ecology of transparency reloaded / Seth F. Kreimer -- Monitoring the U.S. executive branch inside and out : the Freedom of Information Act, inspectors general, and the paradoxes of transparency / Nadia Hilliard -- Output transparency vs. input transparency / Cass R. Sustein -- Open data : the future of transparency in the age of big data / Beth Simone Noveck -- Striking the right balance : weighing the public interest in access to agency records under the Freedom of Information Act / Katie Townsend and Adam A. Marshall -- The global influence of the United States on freedom of information / Kyu Ho Youm and Toby Mendel -- Transparency as leverage or transparency as monitoring? : U.S. and Nordic paradigms in Latin America / Gregory Michener -- Structural corruption and the democratic-expansive model of transparency in Mexico / Irma Eréndira Sandoval-Ballesteros.

ISBN

• 9780231184984
• 0231184980
• 9780231184991
• 0231184999
• 0231545800
• 9780231545808
• 9780231545808 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

2017061191

OCLC

• on1019835507
• 1019835507
• SCSB-9261342

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries