Land rights campaigners on Friday called on the Ministry of the Interior to ease its meeting restrictions, allow for more public participation in meetings and begin real-time broadcasts of meetings online, citing similar moves by the Environmental Protection Administration.
While it is a good idea to allow increased public participation in meetings where protection of information security is not an issue and where the rights of certain groups are directly affected by the outcome — such as those regarding land rights — uniformly opening all government meetings to the public unnecessarily exposes private or sensitive information, which could adversely affect individuals or the public as a whole.
It has long been the concern of many in Taiwan that China employs a fifth-column strategy in the nation to exploit political bipartisanship and destabilize society. Increasingly, China uses social media toward this aim, as was allegedly seen during this year’s Han Kuang military exercises, and more recently it is suspected of fanning the flames on a rumored ban on incense at temples.
Government transparency is an important component of a democratic society — but what types of government meetings does the public need updates on and do these updates need to be live? In the US, these questions are addressed by the Government in the Sunshine Act.
The act stipulates that “every portion of every meeting of an agency shall be open to public observation,” with 10 exceptions.
Those exceptions include ongoing investigations and national defense. Meetings that are not exempted should be broadcast, since that is the only way they could be made available to everyone in the US. Unlike this federal act, which affects all US federal government bodies similarly, the solution in Taiwan, as with other legal issues in the nation, has been to enact separate laws that introduce different regulations for different government agencies — a confusing and inefficient approach.
Taiwan needs its own “sunshine act” to address access to information across all government agencies, while clearly stipulating when access must be limited or withheld. Any such act would also need to determine what types of meetings should be made accessible through television or radio broadcasts and which could be streamed online.
Only the least sensitive discussions would be streamed, since these would be the most vulnerable to computer attacks. The most sensitive meetings could remain accessible to the public through individual press releases by the different political parties, with a non-party-affiliated auditor reviewing the statements before release.
More transparency from the government might even help combat fifth-column activities, if done in a way that protects the privacy of lawmakers and the interests of the public. The more the government is willing to provide information, answer questions and allow public participation, the less effective the inflammatory and divisive comments from pro-opposition and pro-China elements would become.
An increased online presence is important for politicians as more people receive news and other information via social media. An independent observer could provide updates from Legislative Yuan and Executive Yuan sessions, as well as cross-committee meetings, through Twitter or another platform, while party spokespeople could provide highlights on Facebook. In this way the public could gain some awareness of policy proposals and the government’s focus and plans. Specialized staff could moderate posts and sift through comments to gauge public sentiment.
If the government could better connect with the public while simultaneously protecting sensitive information, it would gain public support and overcome the challenges of the opposition.
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
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