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EXPLORING OPEN DEVELOPMENT
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collaboratively authored piece
International Cooperation
‘Open access’, ‘open knowledge’ and ‘open data’: these phrases are becoming more common in the world of international development cooperation. But do they add up to something we can call ‘open development’? Or is open development something more? This article draws upon an informal survey carried out through online discussions before the 2012 Open Knowledge Festival, as well as interviews during it, asking a range of people to respond to the question “What does open development mean to you?” Defining Development
“For me, open development means thinking about the word ‘development’ differently. It means that development happens everywhere, all the time, in many different ways, and that we are ALL complicit in the ongoing unfolding of development” says Katherine Reilly, Assistant Professor, School of Communication, Simon Fraser University. International development is itself a contested concept, with a long history of ‘new ideas’ promising to transform the development process. For many people, international development essentially means aid, flowing from rich Northern countries to poorer Southern nations. Yet, although aid remains an important part of the development landscape, with over $130 bn a year spent by OECD countries, the idea of development as just a North to South transfer of resources is one of those outdated views of the world that Hans Rosling’s gap-minder visualisations work hard to dispel. 45