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What information do citizens want? Evidence from one million information requests in Mexico

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  • Berliner, Daniel
  • Bagozzi, Benjamin E.
  • Palmer-Rubin, Brian

Abstract

While scholars have emphasized the importance of information for accountability, little research has addressed the demand for government information by real citizens. We study the totality of information requests filed with Mexican federal government agencies from 2003 to 2015, over 1 million requests in all. We use unsupervised methods to categorize requests, revealing the diversity of topics including environment, security, budgets, and government procurement and employees. While many topics have clear public accountability-seeking purposes, others are focused on more private, micro-political goals. Analysis over time and across states reveals linkage between information demand and issues of public interest such as environmental impacts and criminal violence. Our results demonstrate that, given functioning access-to-information institutions, citizens in a transitional democracy really do demand information relevant to public accountability.

Suggested Citation

  • Berliner, Daniel & Bagozzi, Benjamin E. & Palmer-Rubin, Brian, 2018. "What information do citizens want? Evidence from one million information requests in Mexico," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 222-235.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:109:y:2018:i:c:p:222-235
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2018.04.016
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    5. Relly, Jeannine E. & Rabbi, Md. Fazle & Sabharwal, Meghna & Pakanati, Rajdeep & Schwalbe, Ethan H., 2020. "More than a decade in the making: A study of the implementation of India's Right to Information Act," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
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    7. Benjamin E. Bagozzi & Daniel Berliner & Zack W. Almquist, 2021. "When does open government shut? Predicting government responses to citizen information requests," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(2), pages 280-297, April.
    8. Han, Chunjia & Yang, Mu & Piterou, Athena, 2021. "Do news media and citizens have the same agenda on COVID-19? an empirical comparison of twitter posts," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    9. Berliner, Daniel & Ingrams, Alex & Piotrowski, Suzanne, 2022. "Process effects of multistakeholder institutions: theory and evidence from the Open Government Partnership," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 111060, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

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