Since its launch in 2011, many have urged the Open Government Partnership (OGP) to expand beyond narrow definitions of the term “government.” Legislators, mayors, and others argued that OGP’s transformational potential was tied in part to its ability to accommodate different branches and levels of government – not only the executive, as is the case in many member countries. A truly open government includes an accountable executive branch, trusted legislatures, and responsive governance at all levels. This was an ambitious vision, but many argued that OGP’s ability to deliver better democracy and better governance was tied to its continued growth and expansion. 

The OGP Summit in Paris, which took place last month and convened hundreds of open government champions and activists from around the world, clearly indicated that OGP is beginning to deliver on this ambitious agenda. This is particularly true with respect to parliaments, which are now an integral component of OGP in many member countries and are helping deliver real reforms at the country level. While the OGP Summit demonstrated that parliamentary openness is a mainstream issue in the OGP community, 2017 provides an opportunity to deliver even more meaningful legislative openness reforms.

Click here to read more.

Este post fue escrito por la Red Latinoamericana de Transparencia Legislativa.

Latinoamérica muestra un escenario diverso en materia de transparencia legislativa. El promedio de los 13 países evaluados por la tercera edición del Ínidce Latinoamericano de Transparencia Legislativa nos arroja un resultado de 50%, es decir, nos encontramos a mitad de camino. Los países que se ubicaron en los mejores puestos fueron Costa Rica con un 72%, Chile con el 64% y Paraguay con el 62%, mientras que Argentina (39%), República Dominicana (37%) y Venezuela (21%) se ubican en los últimos lugares.

Los estándares que el Índice evalúa fueron consensuados por las distintas organizaciones de la Red Latinoamericana por la Transparencia Legislativa y representan un nivel que consideramos exigible para todos los congresos de la Región. Avanzar en dichos estándares tiene por objetivo fortalecer a los Congresos como el espacio de deliberación democrática por excelencia a través de la apertura del proceso legislativo para efectos de aumentar los niveles de legitimidad del mismo y de sus resultados. Nos imaginamos a los congresos como el espacio donde la ciudadanía y representantes tienen la oportunidad de debatir y tomar acuerdos de forma informada, dictando normas que sean representativas de la voluntad ciudadana respecto de los principales asuntos públicos que ocupan a los países.

Son múltiples las amenazas a la democracia en nuestro continente: el hiperpresidencialismo, la demagogia, la concentración de riqueza y poder e incluso los gobiernos de facto, entre otros. Entendemos que legitimar el proceso de deliberación en los congresos es fortalecer la política democrática. Reconocer como espacios de decisión aquellos que son representativos de la diversidad que habita en nuestros países por sobre el poder concentrado en figuras o grupos específicos. La opacidad y falta de control sobre los congresos y sus miembros son elementos que han mostrado ser dañinos para la legitimidad de los mismos, con esta investigación buscamos dar luces sobre los aspectos en los que es necesario avanzar para revertir dicha situación.

Click here to read more.

As in previous years, Global Legislative Openness Week (GLOW) showcased the fantastic work being done around the world to realize the principles of open parliament. Organized by members of the Open Government Partnership's Legislative Openness Working Group, GLOW featured more than 20 events and activities organized by parliaments and civil society organizations in over 15 countries around the world. This year included a diverse range of activities, such as public events and private meetings, campaigns and advocacy, and hackathons and the development of new digital tools. The diversity of approaches and actors that made Global Legislative Openness Week a success also demonstrates that the global movement for open, responsive legislatures is broad, deep, and growing.

Click here to read more.

Lo siguiente fue escrito por Natalia Albañil, Coordinadora del Programa de Transparencia Legislativa Regional, NDI Colombia. 

En las últimas semanas se llevaron a cabo dos importantes eventos regionales en materia de Parlamento Abierto. El 25 y 26 de mayo en Asunción – Paraguay se realizó el primer encuentro anual de la Red de Parlamento Abierto de ParlAmericas, y el 31 de mayo, 1 y 2 de junio en Montevideo – Uruguay, el Encuentro Regional de la Alianza para el Gobierno Abierto (Open Government Partnership, OGP).

Click here to read more.

This post was written by Cristiano Ferri, Director of the HackerLab in the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies.

We’re pleased to announce the first Global Legislative Hackathon 2016, jointly organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union, National Democratic Institute, Brazilian Chamber of Deputies’ HackerLab and Chilean Chamber of Deputies. The event is part of the World e-Parliament Conference 2016 (WePC).

Everyone from around the world is invited to work on legislative issues and to help ideate, code and co create digital solutions that contribute to better understand legislative work and to engage citizens in lawmaking.

The Hackathon will be held in Valparaiso, Chile from 28 June 2016 (Tuesday) to 30 June 2016 (Thursday). You are not required to be physically present. Registration for the Hackathon is opened from 25 May to 26 June 2016.

For more information and registration, please visit: 

www.wepc2016.org/en/hackathon-wepc2016 (English)

www.wepc2016.org/es/hackaton-wepc2016 (Spanish).

News from the parliamentary monitoring community:

In Afghanistan, the Free & Fair Election Forum of Afghanistan (FEFA) released its six-month report on parliamentary activities. Findings of the report include the number of plenary and committee sessions held, the number of laws approved, positive developments and shortcomings, as well as recommendations for improvement. The report is published during a critical period in Afghanistan, with  the government in the midst of extended political gridlock preventing the enactment of much needed reforms. FEFA also signed a MoU with the Meshrano Jirga, the upper house of parliament, to conduct a similar assessment, with aims to increase public awareness on parliament’s activities and strengthen the level of cooperation between parliament and civil society.

In Costa Rica, the Alliance for Open Assembly, which includes ACCESA, Abriendo Datos, Costa Rica Íntegra, Iplex, Proledi, and Ojo al Voto, partnered with the Fundación Directorio Legislativo to foment major strides toward openness within the Costa Rican legislature. Together they created and signed a commitment seeking to promote openness, transparency, and accountability. The commitment includes a variety of different components, each working to counter the existing lack of trust in Costa Rican institutions. This commitment combined with the drafting of an action plan for legislative opening seek to strengthen and enable “a more democratic democracy.”

In Mexico, for the tenth anniversary of the Collective for Transparency campaign, Fundar launched #ArmonizaTuLey, an initiative to monitor the process of harmonizing state laws with the new federal regulatory framework for transparency and access to information. With the approval of the constitutional reform in 2013 and the General Act in 2014, Mexico has set up a robust framework that safeguards these rights. Fundar reports that while the deadline for adoption of the new regulatory framework is fast approaching, 29 states in Mexico still have not completed this obligation. The Collective for Transparency calls on legislators to fulfill their legal obligation of harmonizing state laws, respect this timeline for action, and engage citizens in this effort.

In Kenya, Mzalendo Trust announced the second People’s Shujaaz Awards to recognize Parliamentarians for championing issues of high public interest in the National Assembly and Senate in 2015. The final selection was made based on the legislators’ demonstration of leadership, factoring in the motions that were put forth, and statements and petitions they represented. The nominees were chosen in consultation with civil society groups under the Parliamentary Initiatives Network. While Mzalendo hopes that the People’s Shujaaz Awards helps to spotlight the positive achievements and key contributions made in Parliament, Mzalendo also issued a list of lessons learned, with recommendations for the legislature to strengthen its image, communicate its work more effectively with citizens, and find new ways for civic engagement using technology and social media.

In the US, the OpenGov Foundation received a $200,000 grant from the Rita Allen Foundation to support the continued development of an open-source platform to digitize Chicago’s legislative process over the next two years. In partnership with Chicago’s City Clerk’s office, the project aims to keep legislation in standardized, accessible formats, and allow citizens to better share feedback with their elected officials.

In India, PRS Legislative Research published two op-eds on legislative reform in major news outlets.  The authors called to question the effectiveness of India’s legislature, highlighting in particular the decrease in legislative productivity caused by disruptions and lapses in conduct by members. With a detailed breakdown of how time was used during parliamentary proceedings, the articles underscores the necessity of urgent reforms to restore both the Parliament’s role as an effective deliberative body, as well as citizens’ faith in Parliament as a representative institution as a whole.

Click here to read more.

This post was written by Maria Hermosilla and Julia Root and originally appeared on The GovLab’s blog. 

On September 24th, The GovLab held its third online global conference on #CrowdLaw. Practitioners from 16 countries discussed the challenges and lessons learned when crowdsourcing legislation and constitutions. The session including lightning talks by practitioners with projects from Austria, Brazil, Chile, Finland, United States, Morocco, Libya and Spain and then a broader group discussion on three themes:

• Outreach strategies
• Designing to overcome barriers; and
• Measuring impact.

The goal of the conference was to deepen our collective understanding of what works, what doesn’t, how to assess impact, and accelerate the implementation of more effective and legitimate participatory lawmaking practices.

The full video is available here. Featured speakers and projects included:

• PODEMOS, SPAIN – Victoria Alsina, visiting researcher at Harvard, is working with 5 leading politicians of the Spanish political party Podemos to research how they are using technology to increase citizen participation in politics from voting every four years to a more day to day basis. She discussed two tools: the Plaza Podemos, that is based on Reddit and is a place of contact and debate for their followers, organized by thematic and territorial circles. It is used regularly by 15,000 people. They also use Appgreefor massive brainstorm sessions and doing quick surveys and for approving proposals. They have had up to 60,000 participants voting on Appgree.

• NEOS, AUSTRIA – Josef Lentsch, Managing Director of Neos Lab and Karl-Arthur Arlamovsky from Austrian political party NEOS discussed the tools they are using to implement their vision of making politics more open and participatory. Thematic groups at a local, regional and national level composed by thousand of volunteer policy advisors draft policy proposals on “Policy Forge”, a customized collaborative drafting platform. Neos has a cockpit composed of tools such as a calendar, customer relation management system, wiki, meeting software, among others.

Click here to read more.