[Wg-economics-advisory] Fwd: question re your Open Economics Principles - and national security

Tue Aug 20 14:34:15 UTC 2013

I am genuinely interested in what circumstances would make publishing 
economic information a population better off to the point that it is a 
national security issue.

What I can think of:

- failure to publish poor unemployment data may prevent the population to 
become "less happy", and thus consumption is sustained.

- failure to publish some data reduces cost to the government and thus 
taxes. If the data was not that useful to begin with, this may lead to an 
improvement in well-being in the end.

In both cases I would not call this a national security issue, unless you 
think releasing data about poor economic performance would lead to riots.

On Tue, 20 Aug 2013, Velichka Dimitrova wrote:

> Dear Advisory Panel members,
>
> We had an email from a legal officer at the Open Society Foundation which
> suggested a discussion on when data and information can be withheld by
> governments on national security grounds (please see below for her input).
>
> This may be out of the scope that we want to cover with the Open Economics
> Principles or we may want to include a footnote to "national security" to
> reference the Principles on National Security and the Right to Information.
> Let us know whether you have ideas or input.
>
> Thank you!
>
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Velichka Dimitrova <velichka.dimitrova at okfn.org>
> Date: 20 August 2013 15:16
> Subject: Re: question re your Open Economics Principles - and national
> security
> To: Sandra Coliver <sandra.coliver at opensocietyfoundations.org>, "
> open-economics at lists.okfn.org" <open-economics at lists.okfn.org>
> Cc: "economics at okfn.org" <economics at okfn.org>
>
>
> Dear Sandra,
>
> Thank you very much for writing to us. I am cc-ing here our Economics
> mailing list as I think it would be useful to have other people's input as
> well. I would also share your thoughts with our Advisory
> Panel<http://openeconomics.net/about/advisory-panel/>who have actively
> participated in drafting the Open Economics Principles.
>
>
> We were considering the “national security” as one of the reasons for which
> economics researchers may not be able to make their data openly available
> as many may work with data which is subject to non-disclosure agreements,
> with firms, governments or other institutions. Basically, these
> restrictions are not in the decision-making power of the researchers
> themselves, as often economists use data published by others. These
> Principles are addressed towards researchers, research institutions and
> funders of researchers rather than towards the primary publishers of data
> which economists use.
>
> We did not take into account that national security may indeed include
> protection of the country’s own economy and we were considering this more
> in the context of military and intelligence. Do you think this should be
> clarified explicitly or this is probably out of the scope as our statement
> doesn't cover the reasons for governments to without information on
> national security grounds?
>
> Best wishes
>
>
> *
>
> Velichka Dimitrova
>
> Open Economics Project Coordinator |
> @vndimitrova<http://twitter.com/vndimitrova>
>
> The Open Knowledge Foundation
>
> Empowering through Open Knowledge
> http://okfn.org/  |  @okfn <http://twitter.com/OKFN>  |  OKF on
> Facebook<https://www.facebook.com/OKFNetwork> |
> Blog <http://blog.okfn.org/>  |  Newsletter<http://okfn.org/about/newsletter>
> *
>
> Have you endorsed the Open Economics
> Principles<http://openeconomics.net/principles/>yet?
> *Open Economics | http://openeconomics.net/ |
> @okfnecon<http://twitter.com/okfnecon>|best practice for open economic
> data
> *
>
>
>
>
> On 16 August 2013 20:07, Sandra Coliver <
> sandra.coliver at opensocietyfoundations.org> wrote:
>
>>  Dear OKFN:****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> I was very pleased to read about your Open Economics Principles.  ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> I have facilitated development of a set of Principles on National Security
>> and the Right to Information, called the Tshwane Principles after the
>> province in South Africa where they were finalized, drafted by 22 CSOs and
>> academic centres, and endorsed by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council
>> of Europe (PACE) Legal Affairs Committee and others. See
>> http://www.right2info.org/exceptions-to-access/national-security         *
>> ***
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> One of the vexing issues that we side-stepped is whether governments may
>> legitimately withhold information on national security grounds if its
>> disclosure could negatively impact a state’s economic well-being.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> A note following Princ 3 states: “*The fact that disclosure could cause
>> harm to a country’s economy would be relevant in*
>>
>> *determining whether information should be withheld on that ground, but
>> not on national security grounds.”*
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Some experts urged that in many European and other countries, economic
>> well-being is considered a core element of national security and
>> accordingly that some info re a nation’s economy could legitimately be
>> classified on national security grounds.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Our concern re that assertion is that classification on national security
>> grounds results, in most countries, in increased secrecy and increased
>> penalties for disclosure, even where the public interest in the information
>> exceeds any harm from disclosure.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> I note that your Principles accept that economic info may be restricted on
>> grounds of national security among others. ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> I wonder, have you given thought to identifying the categories of info
>> that could legitimately be limited on national security grounds?****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> And the info of especially high public importance that should be
>> proactively published? ****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> For instance, You will also see that Principle 10 lists categories of info
>> of high public importance, including info about military contracts.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Principle 9 lists categories of info that may legitimately be withheld on
>> national security. We wanted to include a provision re economic info, but
>> given failure of consensus, we added a catch-all paragraph at the end. That
>> compromise didn’t make us happy but we agreed that some ambiguity was
>> better than either a) making the list unrealistically narrow, or b)
>> including a broad exemption of info whose disclosure could negatively
>> impact the economic well-being of a state.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Do you have any thoughts to contribute to this discussion?****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Do you have one or more papers to which we could link on our webpage?****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> We will include a link to your Principles.****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Thanks much for your thoughts,****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Sandra****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>> Sandra Coliver****
>>
>> Senior Legal Officer, Freedom of Information & Expression****
>>
>> Open Society Justice Initiative****
>>
>> Open Society Foundations****
>>
>> 224 West 57th Street****
>>
>> New York, NY 10019 USA****
>>
>> +1 212 548 0384****
>>
>> Sandra.Coliver at OpenSocietyFoundations.org****
>>
>> www.justiceinitiative.org****
>>
>> www.right2info.org****
>>
>> ** **
>>
>

Christian Zimmermann                          FIGUGEGL!
Economic Research
Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis
P.O. Box 442
St. Louis MO 63166-0442 USA
http://ideas.repec.org/zimm/