Friday, August 12, 2016



Open Government: Co-create!

The State services Commission and Engage2 are currently running a public engagement process on the development of New Zealand's second Open Government partnership National Action Plan. And after some initial work on developing the background (which you can still submit on here), we're into the second phase: co-creating the actual commitments. For those who haven't been following this closely, our action plan has to consist of specific, measurable, answerable (I would say "additional"), relevant and time-bound commitments - basicly, promises to do something that can be checked on. They should also be ambitious, aimed at creating a "race to the top" among countries for transparency and open government. The commitments in our first action plan failed miserably at this task. This is our chance to do better.

There's a specific website for submitting suggested commitments here. There's also a host of good advice on commitments, including some suggestions on format and structure. Once you've read those, you can register on the website and start making suggestions. We'll also be able to comment on suggested commitments, so we can refine them and see what has popular support.

If you're looking for ideas, I have a couple of suggestions here and here. There's also an open government guide to see what other governments have promised.

Finally, there will be a co-creation workshop in Wellington on August 26 to discuss these ideas. Details are here.