Open Government: Tools, infrastructure, and Practices

“Opening up government data can be an essential measure to increase transparency and accountability, promote participation, and stimulate innovation in institutions.”

– (Department of Economic and Social Affairs [DESA], 2016, p. 47)

The quickly evolving study, design, and implementation of open government has been accompanied by several common tools, practices, and concepts. This section will explore these commonalities as well as several notable and innovative open government initiatives. By better understanding these complex topics and the current scope of engagement and transformation happening within the federal government and around the world, the hope is that new insight and inspiration can be gained to aid in the design of the open innovation, open government, and planning platforms of the future.

Open government promotes inclusiveness for the improvement of government. Looking at the tools and practices driving open government forward reveals the potential impact of a given tool is amplified by its ability to be inclusive in larger capacities. Part of this inclusion potential comes from a personal interest by a member of the public or government to be involved and the other is on the part of the government and third-party facilitators to ensure the ability to participate is present. For instance, inclusion can come in the form of allowing for the reuse of data, e-tools, software code, etc. through open data standards and open licenses, or inclusion in open government might come in the form of collaborative design, production, and innovation. The theme of inclusion spans all areas of open government in varying forms. Informing the public in a way that is efficient, reliable, timely, and useful is in the interest of government and the public and creates the foundation for more complex forms of government interaction with the public.

Depending on the objectives of an open government initiative, open government is easily scalable to an organization’s objectives. Simple web browser tools can be created with free or open software with minimal technical skills or by watching free video tutorials. On the other end of the spectrum, complex data infrastructure and collaborative platform designs can be resource intensive undertakings.

One of the most significant shifts associated with open government is the ability for government to act more as a facilitator and a force of empowerment to public problem solving, e-participation, and e-decision-making. With government acting as a regulator, moderator, and an agent of legitimacy for open government problem solving by the public, this trend is already blurring the line between government and public actions. In this shift, government acts as a medium through which problems can be solved by the public while the government supplies information, expertise, services, and legitimacy to support the process. This type of public problem solving could take any number of forms like a value based decision like how to allocate funds or a development project to address food supply vulnerabilities.

Open Government Tools

Open government can be untaken with varying levels of public interaction and different tools can aid in achieving the open government goals of an organization or initiative. The United Nation’s 2016 E-Government Survey is a great source for tracing open government and e-government trends from across the globe. Some of the most commonly used e-participation tools and activities, from around the world, are cited as including:

  • Information provision online, including Open Government Data
  • E-campaigning, e-petitioning
  • Co-production and collaborative e-environments
  • Innovation spaces, hackathons, crowdfunding
  • Public policy discourses, including crowdsourcing, online consultation and deliberation, argument mapping
  • E-polling, e-voting (DESA, 2016, p. 62)

The survey also distinguishes between three components to e-participation included in the survey’s E-Participation Index (EPI). The index ranks countries relative to the highest ranking nation’s index score. The three components of the EPI are e-information, e-consultation, and e-decision making:

  • e-information – provision of information on the Internet
  • e-consultation – organizing public consultations online
  • e-decision-making – involving citizens directly in decision processes (DESA, 2016, p. 54)

While the United Nations uses the EPI and its three components listed above to gage levels of public participation present within nations, the research in this article utilizes the International Association of Public Participation’s (IAP2) Public Participation Spectrum to categorize initiatives and tools on a spectrum of five levels of public participation.

The IAP2 spectrum is divided into five levels of public participation to help define and identify the public’s role in any public participation project (International Association of Public Participation [IAP2], 2007). The five levels, in order of increasing levels of public participation, are: inform, consult, involve, collaborate, and empower and is visualized in Figure 3. The public participation goal, the promise to the public, and example techniques for each level of the spectrum are detailed in Figure 4, 5, and 6 below.

Figure 3: IAP2 Spectrum








Figure 7 below utilizes the IAP2 spectrum to categorize and organize open government tools. Often open government tools can be utilized in very different capacities to engage the public. For instance, an open government mobile application could be used to inform the public or facilitate collaborative design. For that reason, tools can occupy multiple categories. This table not only provides a way to identify tools to help accomplish open government goals, it also highlights the relationship of these tools to varying levels of public participation. Tools were color-coded if they could be implemented to achieve multiple levels of public participation within the IAP2 Spectrum. Each color corresponds to the lowest level of the spectrum the tools can be applied to, to be reasonably achieved. Tools that are not color-coded were unique to one category. While some categorizations could be open to debate, one of the uses of this table is to better understand that tools have barriers that are either inherent or through lack of design. As an example, emailing can facilitate public participation through acquiring feedback and exchanging ideas but isn’t a very reasonable medium for public decision making without the aid of other facilitation tools or concepts. On the other hand, a mobile application could be used to achieve any level of public participation but is limited by its own design and the open government infrastructure it is utilizing. For one other example, a public comment section and a collaborative e-environment could be in the exact same medium and format with only the goal of the interaction changing. By categorizing open government tools using the IAP2 Public Participation Spectrum, insights into the potential benefits, uses, and limitations of open government tools are revealed. The IAP2 spectrum also draws attention to how these open government tools correspond to higher levels of public participation. The results for the categorization of open government tools using the IAP2 Spectrum are displayed on the following page, in Figure 7.



Open Government Infrastructure

Modern open government is built on the foundations of government data that is reusable, accessible, machine-readable, reliable, timely, and useful. Data that has these qualities is referred to as being in an “open format” or being “open data” or when produced by the government “open government data” (OGD). By following open data publishing standards and producing OGD, an organization then needs to manage and curate the data and create avenues for the information to be utilized by the public, stakeholders, researchers, and software developers. Enterprise data management systems can help organize, track, publish, and streamline the processing of large databases. OGD portals and APIs act as delivery vehicles for large amounts of data to the public and interested parties. Open data and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards can further be applied to create linked open government data (LOGD)iv. Once OGD is published and made available to the public, both government and non-governmental interests can develop mobile applications, web browser applications, and enhanced government services. Furthermore, building up government social media accounts, developing open software to be integrated into other services, providing resources to software developers, and utilizing big data analytics can all build upon an organizations open government infrastructure. Figure 8 below lists some of these infrastructure components for achieving more complex forms of open government.



The highest level of foreseeable open government infrastructure would be a combination between the concepts of government as a platform (GaaP), the internet of things (IoT), and linked open government data (LOGD). GaaP envisions a government that facilitates public problem solving and decision-making through user-centric or people-driven models of open government. The IoT envisions a world filled with smart devices and sensors that streamline information delivery. While the Semantic Webv addresses how information can be discovered, linked, and utilized. The picture appears to be an almost singularity between electronic data and the physical world. This data network will fuel, among others, innovation, problem solving, decision making, planning, and open government.

A modern equivalent example would be weather data. We combine weather data from around states, nations, and even the world to see larger trends, create models, take precautions, plan accordingly, etc. This information comes from sensors and radar from around the planet combined with satellite data and much of it comes from government and is released to be reused by other interests. The public can now receive weather notifications and quickly digest vast amounts of weather data and weather model calculations through a condensed forecast and the utilization of data visualization tools. These same concepts and practices are expanding into other fields and changing the way policies are formed and chosen. The dropping cost barriers to implementing sensing technologies and developing e-government tools combined with the expanses of modern ICTs is fueling a technology transformation in government. Government is in a unique position to gather data that often lies outside of the private sphere or its capabilities and make it available in an open format for reuse. This is perhaps the most important role of the government in the fostering of open government practices. Much of the utility of OGD can be developed by nongovernmental interests, but the government’s role as a gatherer, curator, and publisher of trusted information that exclusively falls within the domain or authority of government is paramount.

The section that follows is a closer look into the concepts and infrastructure that enables more complex forms of open government and the challenges that accompany them.

OGD: publishing standards, data management, data portals, and APIs. The sheer volume of government data and records being generated and maintained has grown at an extremely rapid pace, in the digital age, and building the structures and practices to produce and curate data archives takes time and resources. The challenge for government organizations to maintain the vast amount of information, records, and digital accounts will only grow as digital government becomes even more integrated into our lives. Enterprise data inventories became a requirement for U.S. federal agencies with the OMB’s 2013 memorandum, Open Data Policy- Managing Information as an Asset. Ensuring the quality, usability, and accountability of OGD is improving but there is still much work to be done. For one example, a review of the OMB’s Project Open Data Dashboard (https://labs.data.gov/dashboard/offices) shows several agencies that have not committed required datasets to their inventories and there are large variations in compliance between federal agencies.

Data must be closely managed through its lifecycle starting with appropriate collection methods and recording important metadata. If not already established, data must also be scrutinized for security concerns, privacy concerns, and other potential impacts. Data must also be formatted to be machine-readable and abiding by widely accepted publishing standards that promote reuse and integration into nongovernmental services and endeavors. Data can then be uploaded to a data management system and should be made available to the public in a way that is timely and useful.

Large scale open government data portals like the United States’ Data.gov, the European Union’s EuroStat, and the United Kingdom’s Data.gov.uk act as delivery vehicles for OGD and tools related to OGD. These large data hubs are valuable assets that are improving government transparency, collaboration within government, and engagement with nongovernmental stakeholders. They are also an important resource for encouraging the reuse of data by providing tools and information for software developers and geospatial modeling.

Criticisms since the implementation of these data portals include data being published in unstructured forms, incomplete or missing data fields, and barriers to the public usefulness of the data (Shadbolt, et al., 2012). Some of the challenges and lessons learned through this process include: implementing metadata standards, enabling compatibility of data with other data sets, government retention of licensing rights to data (especially during public-private partnerships and outsourcing), data ownership or privacy concerns, and the general structure of data sets being of a uniform quality and standard (Shadbolt, et al., 2012).

The barrier that exists between published datasets and the ability for datasets to be useful to the public is an area of open government that is continuously evolving with technology, experience, the sharing of knowledge, new standards, and new government policies. The current format of datasets published to large data portals like data.gov can be very useful to researchers and programmers, but the real utility of these data troves for the public will be created by third-parties. While government agencies are releasing their own applications, maps, and services that utilize these data troves, the potential for third parties to create applications and deliver new interfaces for government services or private enterprises is in an exciting early phase.

With the creation of government Application Program Interfaces (APIs), any person, interest, or stakeholder can build applications with prepackaged government data. APIs have become a staple in fueling the mobile marketplace and application development by allowing developers to easily integrate data and services into new formats and uses. By customizing the use and combination of potential public and private APIs, an unlimited potential exists to fuel: innovation, service delivery, research, the economy, public interaction, and open government. Already there are government agencies that are integrating data and APIs from other agencies into their own services and applications. Even lower levels of government including states, counties, and cities have begun to publish their own APIs and open platforms (DC article).

Linked open government data (LOGD) and the Semantic Web. As open government data delivery tools become more refined and useful, the importance of linking OGD to other data sources and other open government databases has grown. If OGD can be linked to other data sources to be searched, compared, combined, and easier to identify and generally utilized, the potential value and impact of OGD is increased. OGD that is published with the same standards and properties, to create LOGD, can be potentially linked and cross-referenced by spatial, temporal, ontological, and source association properties (Ding, et al., 2010). Concepts for linking data across the internet dates back to the creator of the World Wide Web and Director of the W3C, Tim Berners-Lee (Berners-Lee T. , 2006; Berners-Lee T. , 2001). Building off of the concept of semantic networks developed decades earlier, Berners-Lee (2001, 2006) first articulated the idea of the Semantic Web, or a web of interconnected data and metadata governed by standard practices for describing the relationship between things, posted online, and embedding that information in a common language that is machine readable. In theory, if these practices are widely applied, this would allow all levels of OGD (county, state, national, international) to be searched, compared, integrated, and utilized in conjunction with other forms of open data or between sources of OGD. For example, national level census data for poverty rates could be compared to state level rates and then compared to other countries through United Nations and World Bank data. That data could then be compared to data from nonprofits of NGOs. Data and statistics would be easily projected and combined into interactive graphical displays, maps, charts, etc. All this could be accomplished quickly and with confidence through a government data portal or search tool or even a third party service.

Though most are still working through challenges, various attempts are currently being undertaken to link government, private, NGO, and nonprofit data archives from all around the world into more centralized websites, applications, and services. For comparison, when a Google search is made for a person, location, business, etc., Google pulls information from trusted sources to compile images, maps, contact information, location information, addresses, relative relationships, and a condensed version of this trusted information is combined and displayed near the top of your search results. Information like this can be provided through APIs created by the originators of the content, or the information can be retrieved and referenced based upon data and metadata publishing standards that can be used to pull information from across the internet. Whether through the combination of functional government APIs or the Semantic Web style, machine-readable, data publishing standards, for data to be retrieved directly from web pages, the goal of LOGD is to create a foundation that allows anyone to find, repurpose, cross-reference and engage with OGD. OGD is only as valuable as it is useful and accessible. Linking OGD increases the usefulness and accessibility of data as well as opens up the possibility for new functions and tools to be developed that build upon this infrastructure.

Government APIs and LOGD are important contributors to future innovation, economic activity, government service delivery, public access to information, and open government services by allowing: third parties to utilize government data for the development of other services and decrease barriers to the public’s utilization of OGD. The challenges of maintaining data compatibility, integrity, and quality are improving but will no doubt persist. Barriers to the public utilization of data are being bridged by private and non-governmental interests as well as by governments themselves. We can expect to see more user friendly platforms, formats, applications, and tools being released that harness OGD, LOGD, and government APIs. The potential for these data formats to be implemented for meaningful transparency, collaboration, and public participation is inherent and will likely be strengthened by, among others, mobile applications, GIS tools, and nongovernmental services.

Big data analytics. As the size of government data and databases continue to increase, the potential role of big data analytics also increases. The ability to identify trends and harness key insights hidden within large data sets could fuel service delivery, improve government efficiency, inform decision making, and increase the speed of learning from data and evaluating alternatives (DESA, 2016). The potential role big data analytics could play in government services, decision making, and informing the public is impressive and still being realized. As more sensing technologies come online and data streams are automated at higher rates, the vast amount of data generated will need to be sifted by sophisticated programs to reveal trends and useful insights. There is a role to be played by IT, social science, and policy experts in creating and implementing these potentially powerful and influential systems.

Interactive tools and data. With the increased public access to open government data (OGD) and open government resources, the need for effective methods, standards, and tools has been persistent. A recurring complaint of open government data is that barriers still exist to its use by the general public: incomplete data, non-compatible data, and the lack of data visualization tools. Beyond making data accessible in the form of APIs for developers and raw data for researchers, data must be usable by the public in formats that are user friendly. The utilization of mobile technologies, applications, interactive maps, interactive data, graphical displays, and other interactive tools is still greatly needed to make data usable by the general public. Though, with access to quality government APIs, researchers, entrepreneurs, private-interests, nonprofits, and others have the opportunity to fill some of this gap and deliver a variety of services using OGD.

The Internet of things (IoT). The Internet of Things (IoT) is a big concept with large implications for government, the public, and private interests. In the simplest definition, IoT is the web of interconnected devices and sensors around us that send and receive information. A common term for these types of devices and sensors is “smart devices” but how we perceive smart devices in the current marketplace is only a glimpse of the direction technology is moving. The United Nation’s International Telecommunications Union defines the Internet of Things as: “a global infrastructure for the information society, enabling advanced services by interconnecting (physical and virtual) things based on existing and evolving interoperable information and communication technologies” and defined a “thing” as “an object of the physical world (physical things) or the information world (virtual things), which is capable of being identified and integrated into communication networks” (International Telecommunication Union [ITU], 2012, pp. 1-2). In short, the IoT envisions the near future where smart devices and sensors collect data about the world around us and devices can communicate between themselves and with larger networks and systems.

A study conducted at the end of 2015 by the research and advisory firm Gartner Inc. found that increases in connected devices used in 2016 would be up 30% worldwide compared to 2015 with 6.4 billion connected “things” and forecasted 20.8 billion connected “things” by 2020 (Gartner, 2015). A 2016 study conducted by Huawei, the Chinese technology and manufacturing company, forecasted 100 billion connected devices by 2025 (Huawei, 2015). Forbes has published articles citing the industry will create trillions of dollars in GDP growth (Morgan, 2014). But, envisioning all the potential of the IoT is not easy. Imagine all smart devices and programs being able to be integrated: smart cars, smart appliances, smart bridges, smart roads, smart machinery, smart homes, self-managed buildings, smart factories, smart lights, mobile devices, wearable devices, smart dams, smart electric grids, smart warning systems, and the list goes on and on. A factory could track and manage its own inventories and logistics. A self-driving car can change routes based on traffic and weather conditions. A bridge can alert engineers when it is approaching the need of repair. A wearable or implanted device can notify your doctor of changing health conditions. And yet, these examples are still small ideas as all objects around us become interconnected through the IoT. What if the IoT and big data analytics or predictive analytics were used to monitor the environment with new precision and new policies, and what if alternatives could be identified and implemented within the larger system to mitigate risk? What if public services and processes were optimized to reduce inefficiencies? What about the potential of new warning systems and processes to detect and mitigate threats? Government has the opportunity to connect “things” to this network that lie outside of the private spheres and coordinate and regulate efforts between government bodies, the public, NGOs, and private organizations.

The open government and public policy implications for the integration of this technology are immense. The United Nations 2016 E-Government Survey says the combination of GIS technologies, big data analytics, and the IoT holds “the potential to transform the way public policy is formulated, implemented, and monitored” (DESA, 2016, p. 5). The use of these combined technologies could allow: increased precision in monitoring and reacting to changing conditions, improved and efficient service delivery, government cost saving, the ability to make better informed policy decisions, and the ability to tackle larger problems (DESA, 2016). The implications to the fields of health, environmental science, planning, public administration, political science, economics, IT, and the private sector will continue to grow as more devices or “things” come online.

As the IoT grows and matures, the hope is that big data will be available in an open cloud format and useable by the public and private spheres to innovate, inform, and repurpose, while considering all appropriate rights to privacy. Publicly available data from the IoT, originating in public and private spheres, can eventually create a near singularity between devices that interact machine to machine (M2M) and machine to user (Burrus, 2014). Principles of big data analytics, predictive analytics, and interactive data visualizations can be applied to the IoT to create powerful tools for understanding the world around us, modeling trends, and aiding in decision-making and the formation of policy. The data that will be generated in a more matured version of the IoT will be a valuable asset for innovation, economic activity, and open government. Beyond informing the public with this vast amount of information and the government’s own uses of the information, the innovations that could result from this world of data streams, sensing, M2M interactions, and machine to user interactions from nongovernmental spheres is unfathomable. The concept of the Semantic Web strengthens the vision of the IoT by adding in the ability to attach important metadata and describe relationships and definitions attributed to the data that is published using common standards to be openly usable and accessible across the web. In short, the IoT is the network of information that brings together the physical and virtual worlds while the Semantic Web concept is a standard to increase the usefulness of this information and its interconnection to other forms of information.

Government as a platform (GaaP) and the people-driven model. The transformation trends that are driving open government appear to only be the beginning. The concept of government as a platform, sometimes referred to as GaaP, envisions a new way government services are developed, integrated, connected, and utilized by the public (O’Reilly, 2011). Agencies would develop services using designs, standards, and technologies that can be integrated into public and private systems. The results could create a one-stop destination for government services, information, and interactions, a competitive private market for government service delivery, and the potential repurposing of government tools, services, records, and data by researchers, NGOs, and the private sector. GaaP sees government becoming something closer to the workings of a technology or social media company (O’Reilly, 2011). It would be a platform that engages its users to create content, request services, facilitate problem solving, engage with other users, weigh in or vote on issues, etc. (O’Reilly, 2011). One major component of the GaaP concept is it moves away from an ad hoc system of government services to more of an open development model that allows services to be integrated into other services and for other purposes publicly and privately. The other major component is how GaaP can facilitate interactives with and for the public. New user-centric and people-driven models of government are being integrated around the world and the trend seems to be gaining momentum (DESA, 2016). The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs 2016 E-Government Survey describes this trend concisely in this quote below:

There is a growing trend to transform the very nature of the relationship between the general population and public authorities. This shift is from the current people-centric model, whereby governments know and anticipate people’s and businesses’ needs, towards a people-driven model, whereby citizens and businesses determine their own needs independently from authorities and find solutions in partnership with governments. The vast networking opportunities opened up by new media channels are replacing the traditional ‘upon-request’ participation model (i.e. people are asked to participate when public authorities ask them to do so) with an ‘ondemand’ dimension whereby citizens do not wait for an invitation to contribute, but rather do so independently according to their own needs. This trend is already resulting in some countries in a shift of the role of government from service provider to solution enabler. There is a shift from a “government-to-you” approach to a “government-with-you” approach focusing on collaboration within and outside government. This is associated with an ever increasing demand by recipients of public services to participate in public affairs, and the need to ‘co-produce’ policy and services. Government can also be thought of as an innovation platform that links different stakeholders and partners (p. 51).

The transformational trend of public participation being undertaken ‘ondemand’ mentioned by the survey corresponds to the concept of GaaP and the larger demand for more quality interactions between the public and government expressed in the Open Government Declaration and national policy documents. This trend is also being shaped by private marketplace applications and services and reflected in the expectations of users.

It would be unrealistic and stifling to try and create a single hierarchical platform to facilitate the levels of complex interactions and the reuse of its components that this type of system will need to undertake. Instead, compartmentalized e-tools and programing structures are designed to be easily connected and repurposed into other tools. This allows a single tool to be improved, disabled, or reorganized without compromising the larger platform’s structure or the function of other tools. Furthermore, GaaP components can be developed before the larger open government platform is available using common programing standards during the creation of each tool. These programing approaches have existed for quite some time and are represented in the Linux operating system and the collaborative programming nexus of GitHub. This type of open government infrastructure lends itself well to collaborative design and public participation by allowing components of the system, if not the entire system, to be designed collaboratively while crowdsourcing expertise and services from the public.

Beyond the ideas discussed above, the creation of quality collaborative platforms and tools for innovation, design, coproduction, e-decision-making, and exploring policy alternatives appear to be one of the next big steps for open government infrastructure. Governments should look to best practices undertaken by leading electronic platforms and services, in the private marketplace, while creating the next generation of collaborative open government platforms.

Open Government in Practice

Improving government services with open government and e-government. Open government and e-government are both about improving upon government, and improving upon government services is an area that can bring added benefits to government and the public. E-government initiatives can reduce the cost of administering government services by streamlining and digitizing process. Open government can also act as a feedback mechanism for the improvement of government services to better address the needs of the public and users, which can also increase the efficiency of resource utilization (DESA, 2016). Several agency and interagency initiatives and websites have improved upon the delivery of government services using e-government and open government initiatives.

BusinessUSA (business.usa.gov) is a one stop location for business resources, services, and guidance provided by the federal government: start a business, find financing, start exporting, learn about taxes, credits and intellectual property rights, and much more are available. BusinessUSA is a hub of information and services for existing businesses, businesses looking to expand, and even entrepreneurs looking to start a business.

Most federal government processes and services can now be explored, undertaken, and tracked online, and these digital services have resulted in saving the public and government time and money. Grant applications can be collaboratively undertaken online by multiple participants. Permitting processes can be monitored by the public and applied for online. People can apply for disability, government loans, or freedom of information requests electronically. Nearly any federal government service can be undertaken online through its corresponding webpages.

Though, these services are not without their limitations and flaws. Ad Hoc platform designs and resources that are difficult to identify and navigate are very common. Another unfortunate trend through most online federal resources is poor maintenance of website links, comment sections, outdated information, and abandoned initiatives.

Federal OGD software applications. Data.gov/applications and usa.gov/mobile-apps provide directories to software applications that utilize OGD. Usa.gov provides links to 334 federal government applications and most of which are available on android and IOS operating systems, while data.gov also shows select applications that were not developed by the federal government but use open government data. These webpages are a great resource to explore how OGD is currently being utilized by the federal government and, in some cases, other organizations as well. Some of the open government applications available are discussed bellowed.

Climate FieldView is one of the available open government applications developed by a private firm that utilizes OGD from NASA, the National Weather Service, and the U.S. Geological Survey. The application provides farmers with in-depth models, simulations, and data for local weather as well as relevant economic conditions to plan farming processes and make informed decisions.

The FEMA app, developed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, has several built in functions including: emergency alerts, weather related information, sharing information and images with emergency workers, locate nearby shelters, and how to locate FEMA representatives for in person interactions.

The City Data application includes OGD from the Department of Commerce, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the National Weather Service, and the U.S. Census Bureau. The application and website provide in-depth information on cities that is so numerous they will not all be listed here but include: images of cities, maps, home sale prices, demographic data, geographic data, crime data, city government finances, political contributions, and much more. Also, much of this data is condensed and can be visualized graphically or within maps.

Open government and e-government webpages. The Open Government web pages range, by agency, from simple locations to be directed towards data and documents to impressive locations for service delivery resources, interactive tools, public participation initiatives, and other open government initiatives. The formatted web address for each agency was outlined in the Open Government Directive (2009) as www.[agency].gov/open. In the 2016 Agency Open Government Plans memorandum, it was further clarified that Open Government web pages should include “at a minimum, links to open government topics, reports, and projects described in the plans.”

Beyond the Open Government Webpages of federal agencies, several centralized websites from the federal government have improved the public’s access to information, government services, and public participation initiatives.

  • Acquisition.gov
  • Benefits.gov
  • Business.gov
  • Challenge.gov
  • Code.gov
  • Congress.gov
  • Data.gov
  • Data.gov/applications
  • Digitalgov.gov
  • Disability.gov
  • Disasterassistance.gov
  • Fedbizopps.gov
  • FOIA.gov
  • ForeignAssistance.gov
  • Govloans.gov
  • Grants.gov
  • Itdashboard.gov
  • Permits.performance.gov
  • Project-open-data.cio.gov
  • Recovery.gov
  • Regulations.gov
  • Supremecourt.gov
  • USA.gov
  • Usa.gov/mobile-apps
  • Usaspending.gov
  • Whitehouse.gov
  • Whitehouse.gov/open

State GeoNode and the Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX). State GeoNode was developed as a digital service by the U.S. Department of State’s: Humanitarian Information Unit and Office of eDiplomacy using the open source platform for spatial information sharing and collaboration, GeoNode (United States Department of State, n.d.-b). State GeoNode provides open geographic data to the public, decision makers, and partners “on complex emergencies, natural disasters, and diplomatic activities world-wide” (United States Department of State, n.d.-b).

A related project to State GeoNode began during the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa called Ebola GeoNode. Ebola GeoNode was a partnership project that included: the American Red Cross, the World Bank, the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), the U.S. Department of State’s Humanitarian Information Unit, and the United Nation’s Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) (Ebola GeoNode, n.d.). Open geospatial information and maps were provided online to help: NGOs, health workers, journalists, the public, international organizations, governments and any others that could benefit from this information to help combat the crisis. Crucial information like the location of: road networks, airports/airfields, health facilities, flood zones, schools, emergency telecommunication points, ebola treatment units, community care centers, administrative areas, global supply routes, ebola response offices, locations of confirmed Ebola cases, and more was released (Ebola GeoNode, n.d.). Also, information, analysis, and maps were made available through Ebola GeoNode to help combat the crisis and inform stakeholders (Ebola GeoNode, n.d.).

All data published on State GeoNode and Ebola GeoNode is also added to the Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX) that was launched in 2014 and is ran by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Humanitarian Data Exchange [HDX], n.d.). The goal of the HDX is to make humanitarian data easier to find and analyze. Humanitarian data is defined as:

● Data about the context in which a humanitarian crisis is occurring (e.g., baseline/development data, damage assessments, geospatial data)

● Data about the people affected by the crisis and their needs

● Data about the response by organizations and people seeking to help those who need assistance (HDX, n.d.).

Ebola GeoNode and the HDX are great examples of how open government data can be proposed to tackle large problems. While State GeoNode was not maintained and expanded to its potential, Ebola GeoNode served as a useful tool to combat an occurring crisis and highlights the ability for government to act as a facilitator to large scale problem solving using open government tools. While Ebola GeoNode and State GeoNode have not been maintained, HDX has approximately 4,400 data sets and appears to maintain regular, active participation (HDX, n.d.). Data.gov hosts the largest trove of open government data, including geospatial data, collected and produced by the federal government and has topical categorizations and sub-categorizations to easily identify relevant data. Whether it is done by government, researchers, nonprofits, private organizations, NGOs, innovators, or the public, repurposing open government data into new formats holds untapped potential that can: improve people’s quality of life, aid in development, help inform the public and decision makers, increase the efficiency of tasks, and even be repurposed privately and commercially.

Collaborative internal networks: IdeaHub and Max.gov. Several agencies have adopted internal networks to aid in internal collaboration, innovation, suggestion gathering, sharing knowledge and expertise, and developing agency initiatives across departments. The first federal agency to incorporate an internal online community was the Department of Transportation with IdeaHub in 2010 (United States Department of Transportation, 2015). Max.gov is a similar internal network that spans across the federal government and also includes government contractors. Max.gov also provides many tools and resources to federal employees and contractors to help create structured data, conduct surveys, share virtual machines, generate reports, and more. Though these types of collaborative internal networks are more e-government or collaborative government than open government, these types of networks represent a more decentralized approach to developing ideas, policies, and initiatives that open government can benefit from.

During the conducting of this research, one challenge for these types of internal networks was expressed in a conversation with a federal employee. The U.S. Department of State maintains separate internal networks for classified and unclassified material. Employees that handled classified material were less likely to utilize the non-classified internal network due to concerns and/or habits. This was resulting in more isolated internal communities and less potential collaboration. This case is highlighted to show the difficult challenges that can undermine e-government efforts and collaborative initiatives.

Challenge.gov. Challenge.gov hosts incentive-based challenges by more than 100 agencies and over 170 congressional offices, across the federal government, with 100s of millions of dollars in prizes having already been awarded (U.S. General Services Administration, n.d.). Challenges are used to find new talent, fuel innovation, increasing collaboration, and turn ideas into a reality. The range of challenges available to participate in is extremely wide. Current challenges include: ways to physically defeat unmanned aerial systems, designing waste management systems, and a high school competition to design a superhero, among several others. 735 challenges have been hosted since its launch in 2010.

While some of the challenges are talent searches or novelties, many of the challenges represent a type of collaborative development between the federal government and the public. The public brings labor, skills, knowledge, expertise, services, capital, and other assets to aid the federal government in accomplishing a task. The people-driven model of open government discussed by the United Nations’ Department of Economic and Social Affairs (2016) suggests we are seeing these types of “challenges” become more normalized into how alternatives are developed and problems are solved.

An obvious fault in current “challenge” type events is the lost potential for collaboration amongst unaffiliated members of the public. Integrating modern ICTs and the concepts of GaaP and collaborative networks lends itself to an increased ability to inform and engage the public as well as tackle larger and more complex problems. Platforms like GitHub allows for complex collaboration among people all over the world, and several government webpages and tools were openly developed on GitHub, including Data.gov. Creating a collaborative network that facilitates government-to-public and public-to-public interaction could be an ideal tool to increase innovation and efficiency while crowdsourcing: labor, knowledge, expertise, services, capital and other resources.

GitHub and developer pages. GitHub is used for collaborating on and publishing software code as well as software system version control. Through Github programming code is released, co-developed, critiqued, and even changes are requested. This might include tools, programs, software components, platforms, websites, etc. 129 official U.S. Federal Government GitHub organizations exist as well as accounts from governments around the world (GitHub, 2013-2016). Much of the open government tools, platforms, APIs, code, etc. used and developed by federal agencies are available online through GitHub and some originated from GitHub collaboration. Beyond GitHub, many agencies also have developer pages to aid software and application developers in the repurposing of RSS data feeds, OGD, APIs, and other agency open government tools. GitHub is a prime success story of the power of open data and collaboration and perhaps a model for creating systems to address complex issues collaboratively.

Code.gov allows access to software code developed by the federal government but pales in comparison to what is available from the federal government through GitHub.

Living Labs (LLs). A Living Lab is a Public-Private-People-Partnership (PPPP) for “people driven open innovation” and the concept has popped up in a variety of fields and regions around the world (DESA, 2016, p. 53). Living Labs (LLs) are engaged by producers and users of public services to co-create and co-design innovations. Living Labs have become a model of collaborative participation and involve the public in the collaborative design of new services (DESA, 2016, p. 53). Living Labs incorporate a user-centric approach to design and innovation that is often based in a specific area or region to customize the design to the specific needs of the area or group (European Network of Living Labs [ENoLL], n.d.). The European Network of Living Labs created a chart for understanding the common elements of LLs and is visualized in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Common Elements to Living Labs

The European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) is one of the most prominent LLs with partners from around the world including the World Bank and over 170 Living Labs members (ENoLL, n.d.). ENoLL’s vision is to create an open innovation ecosystem that empowers everyone to engage in innovation and design.

Project Open Data. Project Open Data was created by the White House to help federal agencies implement the OMB’s 2013 Open Data Policy memorandum. Project Open Data’s webpage provides: implementation guidance, tools, resources, case studies, suggested open data events, and more to aid federal agencies in unlocking the potential of open data (White House, 2013). The tools and suggested practices from Project Open Data appear in the Open Government Plans of several agencies. Project Open Data shows a glimpse of advised best practices that were implemented into the creation of the 2014-2016 agency Open Government Plans.

Smart City Expo World Congress (SCEWC). The Smart City Expo World Congress (SCEWC) is an annual international summit to address the link between the “urban reality and technological revolution” in the context of urban development (Smart City Expo World Congress [SCEWC], 2016-a). The first summit was held in 2011 and boasts a long and impressive list of partners, collaborators, and supporting organizations including: the World Bank, the European Commission, the Inter-American Development Bank, Hewlett Packard, Microsoft, Amazon, and many, many more (Smart City Expo World Congress, 2016-b). The event brings together stakeholders in urban development to network, innovate, share experiences, and do internal business deals and claims to be the “worldwide leading event for Smart Cities” (SCEWC, 2016-a).

The mission of the event is to “take advantage of the great improvements produced year by year, concerning technological advances, social achievements, urban issues, social and ecological challenges, new forms of economic development, and innovative forms of citizen governance.” (SCEWC, 2016-a).

The expo gives out yearly awards to exceptional projects from around the world in various categories and finalist projects and winners are posted online and highlight impactful, innovative strategies and projects. The 2016 winner for the Innovative Global South category was a project from Nairobi, Kenya that used digital health services to address the lack of health experts, large distances, limited health supplies, and poor public health by: connecting health experts with the public through remote videoconferencing consultations, allowing medical records to be accessed through cloud-syncing, and implementing new IT devices and software (Smart City Expo World Congress, 2016-c).

SCEWC is a great source for exploring ideas and projects from around the world that incorporate open government and e-government principles, especially in the context of urban planning.

Open Government: Tools, Infrastructure, and Practices Analysis

Many organizations and services, whether government, private, or public, rely on quality government information. Quality and accessible OGD and open government tools not only strengthens existing organizational missions and practices but also creates new potential for expanding services or organizational abilities. Beyond organizational benefits, the potential to inform, interact, engage, empower, and innovate with public, private, and nonprofit stakeholders is greatly increased by quality and accessible OGD and open government tools. While open government is scalable through cost effective or free solutions to informing and engaging stakeholders, more complex systems of OGD and collaboration require a functional and user-friendly open government infrastructure. Some of the identified best practices for improving open government infrastructure were:

  • properly manage data through its lifecycle;
  • abide by broadly accepted standards for open data publishing;
  • create quality delivery vehicles for data;
  • interconnect data to other sources and datasets;
  • streamline the digital publication of data whenever possible;
  • compartmentalize the creation of tools that can be interconnected and repurposed with minimal complications;
  • develop quality collaboration and public participation platforms and e-environments that draw upon private marketplace best practices.

Projects highlighted by the Smart City Expo World Congress and the UN’s DESA E-Government Survey show efforts already underway to revolutionize how problems are addressed and solved in the context of urban planning, health, environmental science, public administration and more. Open government isn’t a future aspiration but an evolving reality. The tools to increase the benefits and impacts of open government rest in the hands of everyone, and that is perhaps the most philosophical theme of open government. The government’s role in open government can be condensed to providing quality information to the public and creating opportunities for meaningful stakeholder interactions. But even if the government only provides access to open data, the potential to create positive impacts from OGD can still be achieved by public and private organizations as well as by individuals.

The role of the public and nongovernmental interests in government processes, policy making, and decision making is still evolving. Since the age of Enlightenment and the fall of divine right monarchies in Europe, the right of the people to participate in and influence their governments has grown to be recognized by nearly ever democratic nation in the world. Historically, when frustrations with government have arisen, governments have incrementally transformed to implement greater levels of transparency and public influence into policy making and decision making. The modern demand by the public for improved government services and greater input into policy processes is related to increased expectations acquired using private sector services, improvements in technology, and typical frustrations with government. Open government tools, infrastructure, and practices are realistic approaches for continuing the evolution of government to a more participatory and transparent institution.

In addition, the long list of positive externalities and impacts that have been shown to accompany open government practices make not pursuing open government a liability. Enhanced problem solving, new innovation and economic activity, leveraging data and public interactions as assets, increased government efficiency, and less barriers to collaboration and public participation are just some of the immediate benefits. While this research has focused on the tangible components of open government, it should also be noted that open government has an intrinsic value for promoting a more democratic and informed government that is representative of the public’s needs.

Download the complete research paper,”Open Government: Innovative Practices,” through the link below.

http://dustinmcg.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Open-Government-Innovative-Practices.pdf

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