The Transparency Game: Government Information, Access, and Actionability

Vakarelov, O

Rogerson, K

2024-02-06T15:51:45Z

2024-02-06T15:51:45Z

2020-03-01

Democratic governments might be required by law to disseminate information to the people. This is called governmental transparency. What is the burden of transparency? We propose a “pragmatic information theory of communication” that places information accessibility as a foundation of transparency. Using a game model—the Transparency Game—we show that the pragmatic theory is the only one that makes it difficult for governments to appear transparent (transparency de vidi) while not actually being transparent (transparency de facto). There are two important consequences of understanding transparency through the theory: (1) Accessible information must be actionable, and (2) cognitive science plays a vital role in assessing the accessibility of information. These consequences can have implications for public policies that promote transparency.

2210-5433

2210-5441

https://hdl.handle.net/10161/30140

en

Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Philosophy and Technology

10.1007/s13347-019-0340-z

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0

The Transparency Game: Government Information, Access, and Actionability

Journal article

71

92

1

Duke

Sanford School of Public Policy

Institutes and Provost's Academic Units

Initiatives

Duke Science & Society

Duke Center for International Development

Published

33