Exploring Open Development

Exploring open development

[First Published through the Open Knowledge Foundation at open-development.okfn.org]

Since human desire is so complex the road to address this need is of course complex as well. Considering its broad nature we might say that development is just such a journey toward improving human life. When states or organizations take on the responsibility of improving people’s lives one of their core values and a principle of development activities expected to be “openness”. It seems there is a hidden consensus that openness in development is considered as a core value. The necessity of transparency, especially in community development activities, is not strongly debated. The question is, however, what is the practical phase of open development? How does it manifest in the activities of a state or organization? Then, what does being open mean? These questions lead us to an exploration of the real openness of one’s state or organization.  There are four elements that help us to examine the idea of open development (OD). These elements are reliability, access, participation and integrity. Let us take a look at these elements in turn. 

Reliability

The idea of openness, however, is not only concerned with access to information for stake holders although this is an important. It is concerned with the reliability of data. The reliability of data shows the degree of openness of the state or organization. Reliability of data, especially in developing countries, is an important factor for any development progress. The word openness goes beyond just displaying information. It goes to the extent of providing plausible information about development projects.

The motive of people to see openness in societal development emanates from certainty. It is usually the result of excitement about the development project or the excitement to experience innovative ideas. People want to know about the development project in order to understand it and develop a sense of belongingness through it.

As we have mentioned reliability is important to the developmental process. The idea of reliability can be seen from two perspectives. One is statistical ability. The organization’s tools highly determine the quality of the data and its ability to extract truth from each activity. Stakeholders or partners and others will get plausible information if the data is of quality. If the tools of the organization are weak then this will distort the Open Development principle. The second perspective to view reliability is plausibility itself. In some less developed countries developmental reports will lack plausibility. In order to receive funds from donors such as the IMF or the World Bank and other bilateral agencies success is exaggerated. In some cases the information even confuses people. We see the same issues presenting with extremely different data. This huge difference comes not from development being abstract to measure but it seems in most cases it is the result of a lack of reliability.

Access

The second element or practical manifestation of Open Development (OD) is that of access. Access in this context is not only providing reliable data but also giving detailed further information when prompted. The development program will be most successful when it truly opens its door to giving and receive information. Openness to receive feedback and such ideas for innovation is one of the elements of OD.

Participation

The third OD element is that of opening a door to participation. In state and developmental organizations development programs have to be open to community participation throughout the planning and implementation process. If the participation of stakeholders or a community is only partly cooperative then that organization can be labeled as lacking transparency. The amount of participation can determine the success of an organization.

Integrity

No state or organization is perfect. Being open to accepting criticism and opinions from the public is one of the measurements of how open an organization is. Some organizations are closed to accepting criticisms. They even tire out their resources with defense. Criticisms should be seen as opportunities for a state or organization to generate innovative ideas.

As we have seen the four elements of open development can have a measureable impact on the smooth operation of community development projects.
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http://open-development.okfn.org/2013/04/16/guest-post-exploring-open-development/