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De vill öppna Sveriges dataguldgruva
De vill öppna Sveriges dataguldgruva
2 juli, 2020 - I Sverige görs det inköp på över 700 miljarder kronor om året av offentliga aktörer. Men datan från de här inköpen är fortfarande väldigt otillgänglig. Denna ”guldgruva” vill aktörerna bakom projektet Open Up! tillgängliggöra. Målet är att få så många myndigheter, kommuner och regioner att öppna upp.
Cross-posted from DIGG – Myndigheten för digital förvaltning
Så ska offentlig upphandling bli mer transparent
Så ska offentlig upphandling bli mer transparent
30 juni, 2020 - Nu startar projektet Open Up! som ska öppna upp data om offentliga upphandlingar i Sverige. Projektets mål är att ta fram en prototyp för en plattform där användare kan visualisera och analysera upphandlingsdata. Parallellt med detta ska samma data bli tillgängliga via dataportal.se
Cross-posted from Medium
1 juni, 2020 - Mycket inom öppna data i Sverige står på spel just nu. En av de viktigaste delarna är hur det nya EU-direktivet 2019/1024 om öppna data ska implementeras i svensk lag, vilket undersöks i en pågående Öppna data-utredning. Här är de synpunkter som skickades in till utredningen den 29 maj 2020 från nätverket Civic Tech Sweden (CTS), Föreningen Grävande Journalister (FGJ), Open Knowledge Sweden (OKS) och konsultbolaget Sweco.
Blog post cross-posted from Transparency International Ukraine's website
April 21, 2020 - Sweden is working on a potential project to launch an online platform with open data on procurement. As part of the joint project, Transparency International Ukraine will share experience of launching the Prozorro system in Ukraine and engaging the public in monitoring as it has been done with the DOZORRO community.
The OpenProcurement portal will be constructed based on the same model as the Prozorro public procurement system, which inspired this project, according to the organizers of Open Knowledge Sweden and DIGG ...
Open Knowledge Sweden press release
In the midst of corruption scandals, Sweden stands without key data
In the midst of corruption scandals, Sweden stands without key data
March 19, 2020 - Sweden has no open datasets in key anti-corruption areas shows a study carried out by Open Knowledge Sweden. Sweden also ranks the lowest on open data release compared to other Nordic and Baltic countries, according to a report by the partner organisation Transparency International Latvia.
Sweden is perceived as one of the least corrupt countries in the world, ranking among top-5 on the Corruption Perceptions Index (2019). However, recent years have seen a spike in high-end cases of financial crime, abuse of power and conflict of interest in the allocation of public contracts. Our research suggests that corruption is thriving in different forms and at various levels of Swedish government, while the legal framework for political integrity is not up to international standards. A key area of concern is procurement, where the value of public purchases is estimated at about SEK 683 billion (EUR 64 billion or 1/6 of the Swedish GDP). Over time, procurement has become more international, the number of private providers of public services has grown and there is a greated labour mobility between private and public sector. At the same time, Sweden lacks a national database for public procurement advertisements and there is no authority that collects information on public procurement conducted in the country.
In the framework of their study, Open Knowledge Sweden has conducted research specifically on the challenges and opportunities for harnessing open data in five key political integrity areas (public procurement, beneficial ownership, lobbying, conflict of interest/asset disclosure and financing of political parties). Our findings show that Sweden has no open datasets in the five areas under study.
The research carried out in parallel by our partner organisation, Transparency International Latvia, reveals that other Nordic and Baltic countries are also lagging behind in opening data but, in comparison, Sweden ranks the lowest on data release.
These findings are in line with Sweden’s ranking on the OECD's OURdata 2019 Index (Open-Useful-Reusable Government Data Index). Of the 33 countries assessed by OECD, Sweden ranks 32nd, being at the bottom both in terms of the amount of data and their accessibility. In Sweden, many public authorities are not aware of the importance of open data for transparency and lack the necessary expertise to release the data, while a comprehensive open data strategy and the leadership that could drive the issue forward in Sweden is yet to emerge.
In our report, we suggest the government to develop a coherent strategy, to support civic initiatives in the area, and to invite the emergence of clear strategy and leadership in this area. We also propose a set of concrete recommendations to both public officials and the non-governmental ecosystem. Given Sweden’s strong digital competencies and human capital, as well as the openness of the Swedish democracy, there are good opportunities to make progress in this area.
Link to our report: https://sites.google.com/view/oksweden/publications
The study was carried out within the framework of the project “Building an Anti-Corruption Data Ecosystem in the Baltics and the Nordic Countries” with the financial support of the Nordic Council of Ministers. The content of the study is the responsibility of the project leaders and does not necessarily reflect the official views or policies of the Nordic Council of Ministers.
Contact:
Alina Ostling, co-chair of Open Knowledge Sweden: alinost@gmail.com
Open Knowledge Sweden press release
Open data and the fight against corruption in Latvia, Sweden and Finland
Open data and the fight against corruption in Latvia, Sweden and Finland
December 7, 2018
This blog has been crossposted from the Open Knowledge Foundation blog.
Transparency International Latvia, in collaboration with Open Knowledge Sweden and Open Knowledge Finland, has published a new study on open data and anti-corruption policies in Latvia, Sweden and Finland, showing that governments in the three countries could do more to leverage the potential of open data for anti-corruption policies and public accountability.
The study comprises an overview report summarising the overall findings and identifying opportunities for knowledge transfer and regional cooperation as well as specific reports assessing to what extent governments in Latvia, Sweden and Finland have implemented internationally agreed-upon open data principles as part of their anti-corruption regime, providing recommendations for further improvement at the national level.
The study is the outcome of a project funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers. The aim of the project was to gain a better understanding of how Nordic and Baltic countries are performing in terms of integration of anti-corruption and open data agendas, in order to identify opportunities for knowledge transfer and promote further Nordic cooperation in this field. The study assessed whether 10 key anti-corruption datasets in Latvia, Finland and Sweden are in line with international open data standards. The datasets considered in the frame of the study are:
Lobbying register
Company register
Beneficial ownership register
Public officials’ directories
Government Budget
Government spending
Public procurement register
Political Financing register
Parliament’s Voting Records
Land Register
Within this respect, Sweden has made only 3 of 10 key anti-corruption datasets available online and fully in line with open data standards, whereas Finland have achieved to make 8 of these datasets available online, six of which are fully in line with open data standards. As for Latvia, 5 of them have been found to be available and in line with the standards. When it comes to scoring these three countries with regard to anti-corruption datasets, in Sweden, the situation is more problematic compared to other two countries. It has the lowest score, 5.3 out of 9, while Finland and Latvia have scored 6.1 and 6.0, respectively. Similarly, there are some signals that transparency in Sweden has been worsening in recent years despite its long tradition of efficiency and transparency in the public administration, good governance and rule of law as well as being in the top-10 of the Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI) for several years.
The problem in Sweden stems from the fact that the government has had to cope with the high decentralization of the Swedish public administration, which seems to have resulted in little awareness of open data policies and practices and their potential for anti-corruption among public officials. Thus, engaging the new agency for digitalisation, Agency for Digital Government (DIGG), and all other authorities involved in open data could be a solution to develop a centralised, simple, and shared open data policy. Sweden should also take legal measures to formally enshrine open data principles in PSI (Public Sector Information) law such as requiring that all publicly released information be made ‘open by default’ and under an ‘open license’.
The situation in Finland and Latvia is more promising. In Finland, a vibrant tech-oriented civil society in the country has played a key role in promoting initiatives for the application of open data for public integrity in a number of areas, including lobbying and transparency of government resources.
As for Latvia, in recent years, it has made considerable progress in implementing open data policies, and the government has actively sought to release data for increasing public accountability in a number of areas such as public procurement and state-owned enterprises. However, the report finds that much of this data is still not available in open, machine-readable formats – making it difficult for users to download and operate with the data.
Overall, in all three countries it seems that there has been little integration of open data in the agenda of anti-corruption authorities, especially with regard to capacity building. Trainings, awareness-raising and guidelines have been implemented for both open data and anti-corruption; nonetheless, these themes seem not to be interlinked within the public sector. The report also emphasizes the lack of government-funded studies and thematic reviews on the use of open data in fighting corruption. This applies both to the national and regional level.
On the other hand, there is also a considerable potential for cooperation among Nordic-Baltic countries in the use of open data for public integrity, both in terms of knowledge transfer and implementation of common policies. While Nordic countries are among the most technologically advanced in the world and have shown the way with regard to government openness and trust in public institutions, the Baltic countries are among the fastest-growing economies in Europe, with a great potential for digital innovation and development of open data tools.
Such cooperation among the three states would be easier in the presence of networks of “tech-oriented” civil society organisations and technology associations, as well as the framework of cooperation with authorities with the common goal of promoting and developing innovation strategies and tools based in open data.
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