Journal of Media Practice, 2015

BOOK REVIEW

Transparency in politics and the media: accountability and open government, edited by
Nigel Bowles, James T. Hamilton and David A. L. Levy, London, LB Taurus & Co.
Ltd, 2014, 238 pp., 19.99 (paperback), ISBN 978 1 78076 675 1, ISBN 978 1 78076
676 8

Anyone attending the conference on Transparency and Accountability in Govern-

ment and Media at Oxford Universitys Rothermere American Institute in October
2012, on which this book is based, would have left with their heads buzzing with
questions about the information transformation we are still living through and only
just starting to comprehend.
The many questions raised but not definitively answered in this volume concern
the often-contradictory interests of journalists, governments and the public. How are
governments finding ways round the demands of Freedom of Information provi-
sions? To what extent is journalism changing in response to the availability of
swathes of new and often confusing information, and what is happening to their
gatekeeper role in the face of competition from both gossip and data-driven web-
based news providers? What form of transparency is being fostered by the web
Sunday best as practised by tabloids like The Sun and National Enquirer, or liberal
transparency, as exemplified by the New York Times and the Guardian? And what
role do governments envisage for journalists in their new drive for open government?
The answer to the last question at least is very little demonstrating how the
long running battle between governments to maintain confidentiality, and journalists
to expose wrongdoing and scandal, continues behind the rhetoric of openness and
accountability. Journalism professor Philip Bennett argues that Obamas Open
Government initiative, for example, aims to offer the public direct access to the
workings of government, cutting out the middleman (110). And the middleman is
not much trusted: the results of the Pew Research Centres 2011 survey of public
attitudes towards journalists found that 66% of respondents thought stories were
often inaccurate, while 80% said that news organisations were swayed by powerful
people and institutions.
On the face of it, the book appears to have bitten off more than it can chew,
dealing as it does with a range of complex and contested concepts such as
transparency, democracy, the digital revolution accountability and open
government. In fact, it is strongly biased towards a journalistic worldview: of the
books 13 chapters, 10 are written by either current or former journalists or
journalism academics. This narrows the scope enough to begin to draw out some
patterns that might help us make sense of what is still a fast-developing story but
does not deal in much depth with the wider issues relating to democratic
accountability and good government.
2 Book review

In his chapter Transparencies, John Lloyd, Director of Journalism at the

University of Oxford, quotes Professor Clay Shirkys 2009 blog as saying that,
during a revolution:

the old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place. The importance of
any given experiment isnt apparent at the moment it appears; big changes stall, small
changes spread. Even the revolutionaries cant predict what will happen And so it is
today.

This book provides an antidote to some of the hyperbole that surrounds this subject;
correcting some myths, and offering some sobering thoughts. Benjamin Worthy and
Robert Hazell, from University College Londons Constitution Unit, use extensive
interviews, surveys and an analysis of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, to
examine the actual impact of FOI on the day-to-day operations of public bodies, and
on public opinion. Contrary to Tony Blairs often-quoted view, that the FOI Act
isnt used, for the most part, by the people. Its used by journalists, most FOI
requests actually come from the public. They do not concern political matters, but
issues of local and personal interest to the applicant. There has been no discernible
chilling effect in the way governments behave, and no positive impact on levels of
public trust and civic participation. Governments, they argue, still hold all the cards,
despite their evident discomfort at the continuing pinpricks of FOI.
There are some inspiring stories of those who made FOI the norm around the
world. In his history of the development of FOI in the USA, Michael Schudson
estimates that there are now more than 90 countries with freedom of information
laws. The little-known Democrat Congressman John E Moss (in office 19531978)
spent his entire career campaigning against government secrecy, for example,
highlighting instances when the Soviets appeared to be more open than the USA.
In 1958, he forced the American Air Force to admit that it had lied about the fact
that a mouse had died in the nose cone of a crashed missile one of many instances
where he demonstrated his rhetorical skills and media salacity. Perhaps surprisingly,
one of his avid Republican supporters was the Illinois representative Donald
Rumsfeld.
Bringing us closer to modern times, we find that, as an aid to transparency, online
viewers of Obamas democratic nomination acceptance speech in 2008 could
simultaneously follow a scrolling transcript annotated and fact-checked by New
York Times reporters. Yet, both of the two biggest news stories of the twenty-first
century the aftermath of the 9/11 atrocities, and the global financial crisis of 2008
were characterised by unchecked secrecy. As Bennett concludes, there is still some way
to go to reach the journalistic ideal of a fully transparent, living story which could
earn back the publics trust that it is engaged in an honest search for the truth.

Ruth Garland
Media and Communications, London School of Economics and Political Science
London WC2A 2AE, UK
r.garland@lse.ac.uk
2015, Ruth Garland
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14682753.2015.1015804
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