Download This PaperWikiLeaks: The Illusion of Transparency
International Review of Administrative Sciences, 2012
29 Pages Posted: 3 Apr 2011 Last revised: 5 Jul 2015
Date Written: June 2, 2011
Abstract
It has been said that the 2010 WikiLeaks disclosures marked "the end of secrecy in the old fashioned, cold-war-era sense." This is not true. Advocates of WikiLeaks have overstated the scale and significance of the leaks. They also overlook many ways in which the simple logic of radical transparency - leak, publish, and wait for the inevitable outrage - can be defeated in practice. WikiLeaks only created the illusion of a new era in transparency. In fact the 2010 leaks revealed the obstacles to achievement of increased transparency, even in the digital age.
Keywords: government secrecy, transparency, right to information, national security, diplomacy
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