What is this absence called transparency?

Abstract

Campaigners against corruption advocate transparency as a fundamental condition for its prevention. Trans-parency in itself is not the most important thing: it is the accountability that it makes possible. Transparency itself is, in fact, a metaphor based on the ability of light to pass through a solid, but transparent, medium and reveal what is on the other side. In practice it allows the revelation of what otherwise might have been concealed, and it is applied in a social context to the revelation of human activity in which there is a valid public interest. It can be applied to all of those who hold power and responsibility, whether that is political or economic. More accurate definition of the term, including distinctions between open governance, procedural transparency, radical transparency, and systemic or total transparency is important. Various ways in which an observer can make use of transparency to scrutinise the activity of others, including freedom of information laws, accounting and audit systems, and the protection of public interest disclosure (whistleblowing) also need to be distinguished from each other.