Data as a Standardizing Force and Mechanism
Data Would be a Standardizing Force and a Mechanism for Greater Participation and Accountability.
Summary of Assumption
The data revolution was presented as a revolution for government accountability that would enable citizens to be informed so as to ensure transparency of, and participation in, social and environmental progress. The SDGs were to provide a framework and process for civil society organizations, non-governmental organizations, and the public to use data to empower themselves and to hold their governments to account.
Assumption 6 Recap
A World that Counts predicted that increased data usage would increase participatory governance, declaring that “By 2020, we hope to be witnessing the emergence of a vibrant ‘global data ecosystem’ to support the monitoring and implementation of the SDGs” in which “civil society organisations and individuals hold governments and companies accountable using evidence on the impact of their actions.” The authors alluded to the role of civil society in providing feedback to data producers, developing data literacy programs, and helping communities and individuals generate and use data to make better decisions for themselves and as a tool to hold governments accountable. Moreover, they expected that data would be used to give citizens more power and control, and that more diverse, integrated, timely, and trustworthy information would lead to better decision-making and real-time citizen feedback.
The report also framed the data revolution as a critical input to ensure no one is left behind, through data disaggregation and the inclusion of marginalized voices, including women, youth, and indigenous people. Better data would help ensure that no one was left unaccounted for in developing government programs and policies. The authors noted that “despite this significant progress, huge data and knowledge gaps remain about some of the biggest challenges we face, and many people and groups still go uncounted. These gaps limit governments’ ability to act and to communicate honestly with the public.” Unaddressed, knowledge gaps would undermine the promise of data as a standardizing force to promote better policies, better decisions, greater participation, and accountability for all.
Subsequent Experience
The widespread adoption of open data (openly accessible data) has been a pivotal development in relation to data increasing accountability. Since the publication of A World that Counts, open data initiatives have opened up new opportunities for governments to collaborate with citizens and evaluate public services by giving citizens access to data about those services. In 2022, the United Nations Statistical Commission made history by endorsing the principle of Open Data by Default. This monumental decision galvanized nations all over the world to actively embrace open data practices, ushering in a new era of transparency and accessibility. The consequential impact of open data is underscored by its instrumental role in facilitating SDG indicator monitoring, a feat made possible through the efforts of organizations such as Open Data Watch (ODW) and the World Bank’s Open Data Initiative , among others. The development of tools such as the Open Data Barometer —which provides information on data availability in more than 90 countries—and ODW’s Open Data Inventory —which measures the openness and coverage of official statistics in approximately 180 countries—have helped to ensure that government datasets are available and accessible to the public.
We have also seen greater data advocacy from civil society organizations. Their roles vary considerably by region, encompassing key activities such as making SDG-relevant data available to citizens, improving data literacy, promoting open data from governmental institutions, producing counter-narratives, and encouraging collaboration for greater data collection (Espinosa and Rangel, 2022). For instance, civil society organizations and advocacy groups are collecting their own data to make the case for action on issues that they work on—from human rights abuses to endangered species (Gray, 2015). In fact, a dynamic body of literature has discussed ways in which unofficial and alternative data sources have been made available to complement official data. For example, citizen science data and methodologies have provided data at finer spatial and temporal scales, enabling civil society organizations to directly monitor, demand, or drive change on issues affecting them including directing their advocacy toward elected officials or federal and state agencies responsible for service provision (Fraisl, et al. 2020). Ghana, for example, was one of the first countries to use locally-produced citizen science data to assess and present national progress on the SDGs within its Voluntary National Review.
In parallel, governments have increasingly recognized the need for participatory and inclusive processes in decision-making. Participatory data governance approaches have strengthened collaboration between public authorities and civil society organizations or representatives of communities that have been historically marginalized and excluded (Richards and Barbero 2022). For example, a partnership between the Canadian government and First Nations communities led Statistics Canada to better understand the factors that exacerbate exclusion and enabled them to capture the lived experiences of these communities. Government officials consulted Indigenous communities and data users across the country asking for their feedback on the 2021 Census. These regional discussions helped Statistics Canada ensure that their data were relevant and accurate for Indigenous people, governments, and organizations.
Discussion
Data use and accountability
The adoption of open data initiatives has enabled citizens to inform themselves in ways that have ensured participation in social and environmental progress. Civil society organizations have become increasingly involved, advocating for data literacy and collecting alternative data to address issues ranging from human rights abuses to environmental concerns. Governments have also recognized the importance of inclusive decision-making, with participatory data governance approaches fostering collaboration between authorities and historically marginalized communities. All of this marks substantial progress in using data as a tool for greater citizen participation.
However, the assumption that data use would lead to greater accountability remains heavily disputed. As is often the case, the reality is far more complex—resembling a set of complex interconnected factors rather than a direct causal relationship (Frankel, 2022). Despite the increase in open data initiatives, there is very limited cross-country empirical data to support the causal relationship between open data and greater accountability (Jelenic, 2019).
This is due to a myriad of other interrelated factors that influence accountability. Research suggests that in order to hold governments accountable, citizens need both formal and informal mechanisms to exercise their “voice.” Drawing on earlier work from Fox, these formal and informal mechanisms provide citizens with a degree of “answerability” and “enforceability,” which is crucial to maintaining the social contract between citizens and their state (Fox, 2007). Formal channels for citizens to exercise their voice include electoral mechanisms. Other non-electoral or informal accountability mechanisms include ICT-enabled platforms for collecting citizen feedback, satisfaction surveys, complaint and redress mechanisms, petitions, protests, and other participatory institutions for citizens (Jelenic, 2019). These channels create an enabling environment that is crucial for government accountability. Jelenic found that while open data, and open government data in particular—data held by national, regional, and city governments, international governmental bodies, and other types of institutions for public use (ODC, 2015)—are necessary for improved accountability, they alone are not sufficient. A host of other contextual factors including constitutional protections for freedom of speech, freedom of information, freedom of press, access to information legislation, and institutional mechanisms for citizens to sanction or reward public officials greatly influence accountability (Peixoto, 2013; Jelenic, 2019).
At the time of publication of A World that Counts, there was a focus on the technical aspects of data release rather than the intended accountability goal of its release (Lourenço et al. 2017), blurring “the distinction between the technologies of open data and the politics of open government” (Yu and Robinson 2012). However, recent studies have advocated for a shift in focus from data availability to data use (SDSN TReNDS and ODW, 2022), encouraging more granular analysis of the end users of open data as well as the outputs of open data use (e.g., dashboards, data visualizations, media articles) to better understand the linkage to accountability (Jelenic, 2019). Even with access to all data available on a particular issue, a group of people must make sense of this data and use it to influence a program or policy change. Thus, it is user behavior that determines whether open government data translates to greater accountability.
Accountability over data use
In recent years, data governance has also taken on significant prominence in the sustainable development and humanitarian sectors, to mitigate against potential risks of data breaches and data misuse. In adopting a human rights-based approach to data governance, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) upholds that government institutions have an obligation to respect, protect and fulfill human rights in their exercise of statistical activities (OHCHR, 2018). Parallel initiatives have emerged to encourage public trust and consent in governmental stewardship and experimentation with data.
Launched in 2021 by the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development’s Technical Advisory Group , the Data Values Project seeks to address questions relating to the accountability systems needed to govern data use. Similar initiatives such as the Inclusive Data Charter Initiative and UNESCO’s Ethics of Artificial Intelligence have sought to codify the governance frameworks—laws, policies and strategies—needed to protect people’s data rights. COVID-19 fueled debates around the world about what should and shouldn’t be done with sensitive and highly invasive personal data (Privacy International, 2021). Debates between privacy and rights advocates, on the one hand, and proponents of digital innovation on the other, centered on where the lines should be drawn in relation to the use of things like location data to track people’s movements during the pandemic. There have also been instances where highly sensitive data (such as biometric data) on refugee populations have been shared with repressive governments, subjecting the refugee population to greater risks of future harm (Rahman, 2021). Additional research is needed to highlight the relative importance and trade-offs associated with a human rights-based approach to data for sustainable development and humanitarian purposes, to safeguard against similar human rights abuses.
Reflections on Future Directions
In the evolving landscape of participatory governance, data emerges as a powerful standardizing force to foster greater transparency and accountability for all. The subsequent experience since the publication of A World that Counts underscores the need for comprehensive research to delve further into the multifaceted relationship between data use and accountability, and accountability over data use. As we look to the future, several crucial research questions come to the forefront. They encompass exploring how different user groups engage with data to influence accountability and evaluating the connection between accountability and outcomes, as well as investigating the accountability mechanisms needed to govern data use.
● What is the nature of the linkage between data use and accountability, and how does it vary among different user groups? What are the key channels through which different user groups seek to enhance government accountability?
● To what extent does data advocacy contribute to improved public service delivery outcomes, and how can this connection be better understood and quantified?
● What are the potential implications of these findings for promoting greater participatory governance in the future?
● What data governance mechanisms are needed to build public trust and safeguard against misuse of data?
● Can we identify case studies or examples that demonstrate a human-rights based approach to sustainable development data use?
These research questions offer a foundation for investigating the role of data in promoting transparency and government accountability.
