Transparency

Building on Günter MEY's (2000, para. 2) argument that "reviews should help to promote additional perspectives … and to open up new scientific discourses," in this essay review of Carol GRBICH's (2007) "Qualitative Data Analysis," we present an approach to reading texts ethnographically that enabled us to uncover how the choices GRBICH makes in positioning readers and in choosing particular ways of representing select qualitative approaches inscribes particular worlds and possibilities for qualitative research. In her text GRBICH argues that authors position readers through the ways in which they report and write about their work. In this review essay we use this argument as a basis to uncover how GRBICH positions readers, researchers, those researched, different qualitative traditions and perspectives as well as herself as an author of the text, to lay a foundation for engaging readers of FQS in a hermeneutic dialogue (KELLY, 2006) about the authoring and reviewing processes and their inter-relationships. Through this dialogue, we seek to develop with readers of FQS a new discourse about the necessity of transparency in the position that authors and reviewers take in reporting/reviewing of research, and in representing the traditions that differ from the author's/reviewer's own tradition(s). Our goal in framing this essay review as a hermeneutical dialogue is to identify previously unexamined issues of how the writing of introductory texts is shaped by the often invisible perspectives of authors, which in turn leads to a particular inscription of what counts as qualitative research.

"States remain a central form of ordering but only one among several. In the transnational space, a wide range of autonomous public- and private-norm producing organizations and regimes operates, which is not, or only partly controlled, by states. The consequence is that the contemporary world is characterized by a multiplicity of overlapping normative orders that rely on different organizational principles: for example, some are territorially bound and some are functionally delineated. Governance structures have emerged as the form through which the multiplicity of orders is linked together. They are inter-contextual forms which simultaneously serve as buffer zones and transmission belts between these orders. As such, governance structures can be understood as institutional mechanisms that fulfill the function of ensuring the societal embeddedness of autonomous normative orders in the wider world through increased reflexivity.

The type of law which has emerged in order to structure the governance phenomenon reflects the societal function of governance structures. Transnational law is an “in between worlds” law in the sense that a central aspect of transnational law is the framing of learning processes capable of ensuring mutual adaptability between normative orders. As such transnational law fulfills a different function than nation-state law which in essence remains oriented towards the upholding of already established normative expectations. As governance structures are the no man’s land between normative orders, they possess an intrinsic political quality. They are the battlefields were the delineation of normative orders are established and continuously reaffirmed. Grasping the kind of political processes unfolding within governance structures is however conditioned by the development of a concept of the political which reflects the inter-contextual function of governance structures.
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"ABSTRACT. In this paper we assume that innovation requires transmission of information. The content of the transmitted information currently is subject to legal regulation, typically
intellectual property, where the agents and the requirement of a needed consent hinder free transmission. To solve this problem, two type of solutions are being implemented: first through legal code and second through computer code. These solutions, rooted on ethical foundations, have political consequences and
determine the kind of society we can build using the transmitted knowledge."

"Citizens increasingly use the Internet to buy products or engage in interactions with others, both individuals and businesses. In doing so they invariably share (personal) data. While extensive data protection legislation exists in many countries around the world, citizens are not always aware (enough) of their rights and obligations with respect to sharing (personal) data. To remedy this gap, users ought to become better informed of companies’ data processing practices. In the past, various research groups have attempted to create tools to this end, for example through the use of icons or labels similar to those used in nutrition. However, none of these tools have gained extensive adoption, mostly because it turns out that capturing privacy legislation in simple, accessible graphics is a complicated task. Moreover, we believe that the tools that were developed so far do not align closely enough with the preferences and understanding of ordinary users, precisely because they are too ‘legalistic’.

In this paper we discuss a user study conducted to gain a better understanding of the kinds of information users would wish to receive with respect to companies’ data processing practices, and the form this information ought to take. On the basis of this user study we found a new approach to communicating this information, in which we return to the OECD’s Fair Information Principles, which formed the basis for (almost all) data protection legislation. We end the paper with a rudimentary proposal for an end user tool to be used on companies’ Web sites."

El número de empresas que difunden su información financiera por Internet es cada vez mayor. La ausencia de reglas o recomendaciones que regulen este fenómeno permite una gran diversidad de prácticas en cuanto a contenidos, diseños, formatos, frecuencias de actualización, etc. Frente a esta diversidad surge la necesidad de definir algunas líneas de actuación para la divulgación digital de la información financiera. En este artículo se identifican algunas de las cuestiones que, en nuestra opinión, requieren el establecimiento de unas líneas de actuación más inmediata.

La Constitution italienne ne mentionne pas la transparence, même si depuis longtemps la doctrine et la jurisprudence la considèrent comme un principe incontournable à l’appui de l’architecture démocratique tout entière : « en phase (ascendante) de délégation et légitimation à l’exercice du pouvoir, comme en phase (descendante) de contrôle sur les formes et sur les résultats de cet exercice » (Donati, 2008 : 129). En effet, la notion de transparence exprime une exigence de « clarté et de compréhensibilité d’une structure (dans notre cas, l’administration publique) et de son action, afin de garantir la confiance des citoyens et d’autres organisations publiques et privées dans le respect [...] de la légalité substantielle, c’est-à-dire de la légalité-justice et non seulement de la légalité-légitimité » (Marrama, 1991 : 56). Ce qui fait de la transparence le fondement constitutionnel de la relation administration-citoyen (Arena, 2006 : 5946), ancrée avant tout sur les valeurs d’égalité substantielle et de participation (art. 3, Const.). Il faudra quand même attendre la loi fondamentale sur la procédure administrative non contentieuse (loi du 7 août 1990, n° 241) pour que la publicité, d’abord, et la transparence, ensuite (loi du 11 février 2005 n° 15), acquièrent formellement...

"In South Africa a range of civil society organizations and coalitions have been central to post-Apartheid efforts to protect vulnerable children through social security grants. This case study describes how the persistent campaigning of these organizations has contributed to significant budget and policy changes over the last decade such as the expanded eligibility for the Child Support Grant.

The full version, short summary, and one page summary of this case study are available in English. Summaries are also available in Spanish and French."

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Greater knowledge and transparency are often promoted as the keys to solving a wide array of governance problems. In Instituting Nature, Andrew Mathews describes Mexico's efforts over the past hundred years to manage its forests through forestry science and biodiversity conservation. He shows that transparent knowledge was produced not by official declarations or scientists' expertise but by encounters between the relatively weak forestry bureaucracy and the indigenous people who manage and own the pine forests of Mexico. Mathews charts the performances, collusions, complicities, and evasions that characterize the forestry bureaucracy. He shows that the authority of forestry officials is undermined by the tension between local realities and national policy; officials must juggle sweeping knowledge claims and mundane concealments, ambitious regulations and routine rule breaking. Moving from government offices in Mexico City to forests in the state of Oaxaca, Mathews describes how the science of forestry and bureaucratic practices came to Oaxaca in the 1930s and how local environmental and political contexts set the stage for local resistance. He tells how the indigenous Zapotec people learned the theory and practice of industrial forestry as employees and then put these skills to use when they become the owners and managers of the area's pine forests--eventually incorporating forestry into their successful claims for autonomy from the state. Despite the apparently small scale and local contexts of this balancing act between the power of forestry regulations and the resistance of indigenous communities, Mathews shows that it has large implications--for how we understand the modern state, scientific knowledge, and power and for the global carbon markets for which Mexican forests might become valuable.""

Social media is becoming ever more popular; there's no doubt about that. What may not be as obvious, however, is to consider social media as a platform that is capable of contributing to the increased corporate transparency of the financial sector, something that is now accepted as a key factor for economic stability in the future. The Web 2.0 emphasis on transparency, information sharing, and empowerment coincides with recent trends in corporate governance. In this article, the authors address two specific questions regarding transparency and valuation: are the companies that have supported the creation and popularity of the social media acting as exemplary transparent corporations? And is it possible to properly estimate how much these companies are worth using publicly available information? To answer the first question, they analyzed several of these companies. They believe that their analysis will give public relations officers and corporate managers an additional element they can use to decide which social networks to launch their corporate dialogue strategy with.