You've got mail: The role of digital civil society platforms in improving Right to Information regimes

Over the past two decades, advances in information and communication technology (ICT) have transformed the way people access and interact with the information that governments produce and hold. The development of online platforms, which enable users to submit requests for information under right to information legislation (RTI), is one of many examples of these changes [23]. This paper, commissioned by U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, presents an analytic framework to explore how RTI online portals impact RTI regimes, while reviewing the experience of 5 civil society portals in developing and developed. We argue that these civil society-led portals have affected in a positive way these RTI regimes. This paper also includes, a set of recommendations to enhance these positive outcomes