Government Data and the Invisible Hand

16 Pages Posted: 28 May 2008 Last revised: 6 Feb 2009

See all articles by David G. Robinson

David G. Robinson

Upturn; Georgetown University Law Center

Harlan Yu

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy; Princeton University - Department of Computer Science; Stanford University - Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society

William P. Zeller

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy

Edward W. Felten

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy; Princeton University - Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs; Princeton University - Department of Computer Science

Date Written: Fall 2009

Abstract

If the next Presidential administration really wants to embrace the potential of Internet-enabled government transparency, it should follow a counter-intuitive but ultimately compelling strategy: reduce the federal role in presenting important government information to citizens. Today, government bodies consider their own websites to be a higher priority than technical infrastructures that open up their data for others to use. We argue that this understanding is a mistake. It would be preferable for government to understand providing reusable data, rather than providing websites, as the core of its online publishing responsibility.

Rather than struggling, as it currently does, to design sites that meet each end-user need, we argue that the executive branch should focus on creating a simple, reliable and publicly accessible infrastructure that exposes the underlying data. Private actors, either nonprofit or commercial, are better suited to deliver government information to citizens and can constantly create and reshape the tools individuals use to find and leverage public data. The best way to ensure that the government allows private parties to compete on equal terms in the provision of government data is to require that federal websites themselves use the same open systems for accessing the underlying data as they make available to the public at large.

Keywords: internet, web, transparency, presidency, infrastructure, executive branch

JEL Classification: K19, L86, O00, O30, O31, O38, O32

Suggested Citation

Robinson, David G. and Robinson, David G. and Yu, Harlan and Zeller, William P. and Felten, Edward W., Government Data and the Invisible Hand (Fall 2009). Yale Journal of Law & Technology, Vol. 11, p. 160, 2009, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1138083

David G. Robinson (Contact Author)

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Harlan Yu

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy ( email )

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Princeton University - Department of Computer Science ( email )

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William P. Zeller

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy ( email )

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Edward W. Felten

Princeton University - Center for Information Technology Policy ( email )

Sherrerd Hall, Third Floor
Princeton, NJ 08544
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Princeton University - Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs ( email )

Princeton University
Princeton, NJ 08544-1021
United States

Princeton University - Department of Computer Science ( email )

35 Olden Street
Princeton, NJ 08540
United States

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