Previous Page Next Page 
(c)  2025 Columbia University Press. All Rights reserved.

The Right to Know: Transparency for an Open World resources

Extracted Text (may have errors)

covered in this book, but lessons on implementation apply across the board. South Africa’s Promotion of Access to Information Act (POATIA), for example, has been recognized as the “gold standard” of freedom of information laws but has suffered serious problems of implementation. An NGO survey of South African government agencies found that 54 percent of agencies contacted were unaware of the act, 16 percent were aware of it but not implementing it, and only 30 percent were aware and implementing it.17 Richard Calland then examines whether and when disclosure should be required of private as well as public entities. In addition to the questions of financial disclosures, corporations are facing grow- ing pressures to release other types of information. The “corporate social responsibility” movement is calling on them to improve their environmental and labor practices. Because the activists doubt that either national governments or international organizations will ef- fectively regulate business behavior in these areas, they are conduct- ing campaigns, aimed at consumers and investors, intended to pres- sure corporations into adopting and complying with codes of good conduct. To demonstrate compliance, corporations are pressured to release information on their practices. And because privatization is moving the provision of public goods into private hands, serious questions arise about when business-held information falls under the heading of proprietary secrets, and when the release of that in- formation is essential for public accountability. The transparency rules of intergovernmental organizations such as the World Bank, the IMF, and the World Trade Organiza- tion (WTO) have been among the most hotly contested issues in globalization debates in recent years. Critics have alleged that these institutions work too secretively, denying outside organizations and citizens the ability to weigh in on fundamental decisions about na- tional and international economic and social policies. As Thomas Blanton’s chapter shows, the intergovernmental organizations are caught between different modes of thinking: the diplomatic and central banking sectors whence they came, with heavy traditions of secrecy and confidentiality, and new expectations of openness that transparency proponents argue are more appropriate to their ex- panding roles in the growing global regulatory system. Having looked at transparency practices at the national, regional, corporate, and intergovernmental levels, the book turns to two chap- 12 introduction: the battle over transparency

Help

loading