Chapter 3
New Routes to Governance: A Review of Cases in Participation, Transparency, and Accountability Renee Wittemyer, Savita Bailur, Nicole Anand, Kyung-Ryul Park, and Björn-Sören Gigler
The twenty-first century has undoubtedly witnessed a revolution (or, more accurately, many revolutions) in government-citizen interaction. Over the last few decades, the widening gap between public expectations and perceptions of government performance and a rise in political scandals involving l arge-scale corruption have contributed to a decline in the public trust of governments (Nye 1997; Sirker and Cosi 2007). Simultaneously, however, a movement pushing for greater transparency, accountability, and participation in governance, commonly referred to as “open government” (Lathrop and Ruma 2010), “government 2.0” (Nath 2011), or “we-government,” has been gaining momentum.1 Furthermore and in parallel, innovations in information and communication technologies (ICTs) have created new avenues for making data transparent, accessing information, monitoring and reporting services, and organizing and engaging citizens and communities. Community radio, short message service (SMS), voice-based reporting, mobile phone apps, websites and wikis, social media, and interactive mapping are some of the technologies that are thought to play a role in creating these changes (Avila et al. 2010; Bertot, Jaeger, and Grimes 2010; Pina, Torres, and Royo 2009). With the heightened attention on open government and the advent of new ICTs and approaches to using them, public bureaucracies are under pressure to adapt, be more transparent, and improve how they interact with citizens (Kuriyan and Ray 2009). The underlying assumption of this work is that technology will make information transparent, improve and provide greater access to services, and The authors are grateful to reviewers Shirin Madon, professor of information systems, London School of Economics; Marcos Mendiburu, social development specialist, World Bank; William Reuben, NGO and civil society coordinator, World Bank; and Sundeep Sahay, professor of informatics, University of Oslo, Norway; and to Elizabeth Forsyth for editing this chapter. Closing the Feedback Loop • http://dx.doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-0191-4
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