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Fighting Phantom Firms in the UK: From Opening Up Datasets to Reshaping Data Infrastructures?
The document discusses the reshaping of data infrastructure for company ownership in the UK and the implications for open data initiatives and data activism. It outlines civil society campaigns advocating for beneficial ownership transparency, highlighting the importance of public registries and the collective efforts required for successful data reform. The text emphasizes that merely releasing datasets is insufficient; a comprehensive understanding of data creation and infrastructure is necessary for effective advocacy.
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Fighting Phantom Firms in the UK: From Opening Up Datasets to Reshaping Data Infrastructures?
- 1. Fighting Phantom Firmsin the UK: From Opening Up Datasets to Reshaping Data Infrastructures? 27th May 2015,Open Data Research Symposium Jonathan Gray | jonathangray.org | @jwyg" Tim Davies | timdavies.org.uk | @timdavies
- 2. The politics ofpublic information
- 3. Talk of “release”,“disclosure”, “publication”, “transparency”, “opening up” of public data
- 4. From the disclosureof datasets to shaping data infrastructures?
- 5. Two parts: ! 1. Reshapingthe data infrastructure for company ownership in the UK; 2. Implications for open data initiatives and data activism.
- 6. Two parts: ! 1. Reshapingthe data infrastructure for company ownership in the UK;" 2. Implications for open data initiatives and data activism.
- 7. Open Government PartnershipSummit, October 2013
- 8. Joint Stock CompaniesActs of 1844 and 1856
- 9. “Nominal ownership” Who isofficially named as the owner?
- 10. “Beneficial ownership”" Who benefitsfrom ownership and control?
- 11. Beneficial ownership: ! • UKlaw in 19th century; • Origins in trust law 11th and 12th century; • International tax rules (OECD) from 1970s; • “Financial Action Task Force” (FATF) in relation to money laundering and illicit financial flows.
- 12. Civil society campaigningin the UK commencing around 2012
- 13. G8 “Lough ErneDeclaration” in June 2013
- 14. “Transparency and Trust” consultationin July 2013
- 15. Civil society actorsincluded: ! • Action Aid • Avaaz • CAFOD • Christian Aid • European Network on Debt and Development • Financial Transparency Coalition • Global Witness • IF campaign • Involve • ONE • OpenCorporates • Open Knowledge • Oxfam • Publish What You Pay UK • Save The Children • Tax Justice Network • Tax Research UK • Tearfund • The Rules • The Transparency and Accountability Initiative • Transparency International UK • War on Want • World Development Movement
- 16. Beneficial ownership advocacy: ! •Consultation responses; • Joint open letters; • Petitions; • Public events; • Media engagement.
- 17. Beneficial ownership advocacy: ! •Meetings as part of OGP National Action Plan; • Cost-benefit analysis of public register; • Analysis of not publishing different data fields; • Opinion polls to gauge support of broader publics; • Addressing concerns around privacy, data protection and administrative burden; • Petition of 22,000 business owners; • Evidence of data quality improvements and personal information as part of public record; • Software development and design to mock up how a public register might look and function.
- 25. Two parts: ! 1. Reshapingthe data infrastructure for company ownership in the UK; 2. Implications for open data initiatives and data activism.
- 26. In case ofbeneficial ownership advocacy, the disclosure of existing datasets was not enough.
- 27. Civil society organisationshad to undertake a more creative, sustained and holistic engagement with shaping and influencing the development of data infrastructures as socio-technical systems.
- 28. This included researchand advocacy around: ! • Costs, functionalities and user interfaces of software systems that would run the register; • Changes to primary and secondary legislation; • Additional administrative requirements and their impacts on different actors inside and outside the public sector.
- 29. Campaigners had tolook beyond the question of what information is released, towards the question of what information is collected and generated by the public sector in the first place, how this is information is generated through data infrastructures.
- 30. The campaign forpublic registries of beneficial ownership as an example of a deeper intervention into the composition of public data systems.
- 31. Highlights social andpolitical work that goes into the creation of data infrastructures.
- 32. Contingent events andalignment of different interests: ! • UK hosting both the G8 and the OGP; • Prime Minister’s personal interest in the topic; • Controversies around tax avoidance by large multinational companies and illicit capital flight in the wake of the Arab Spring; • Anti-corruption advocacy around resource extraction and international development; • Increasing public trust and confidence in UK businesses.
- 33. Two other considerations: (i)who uses information, (ii) how information acts.
- 34.
- 35. From “information asresource” to “information as agent”. ! (Sandra Braman, Change of State, MIT Press, 2009)
- 36.
- 37. To what extentdo data infrastructures address needs and interests of civil society actors?
- 38. Role of publicinformation systems in shaping and organising collective life.
- 39. How to broadenthe publics that shape data as well as the publics that use it.
- 40. Bringing data infrastructuresinto orbits of democratic political life?
- 41. Legal, social andtechnical measures for making open data initiatives more responsive to needs of civil society?
- 42.
- 43. Jonathan Gray |jonathangray.org | @jwyg" Tim Davies | timdavies.org.uk | @timdavies