Keywords: Freedom of Information Act, public access, Sunshine Act, Privacy Act, Federal Advisory Committee Act

Social and political crusades from all over the world have begun calling for more receptive and democratic governments (Blanton, 2002, p. 50). Former Russian President Boris Yeltsin partially opened the Soviet records, while former American President Bill Clinton declassified more government secrets than all of his predecessors combined (Blanton, 2002, p. 50). Truth commissions on three continents disclosed disappearances and acts of genocide. Prosecutors persecuted state terrorist suspects, courts imprisoned generals and the Internet overturned censorship and wore away the monopoly of state run media (Blanton, 2002, p. 50).

Today, as a result of globalization, the idea of freedom of information is growing from the truly moral position of an indictment of secrecy to incorporate a more value-neutral meaning- as another form of market management, of more effective administration of government, and as an aid to economic growth and the development of information industries (Blanton, 2002, p. 53).

Within the last decade, twenty-six countries including Japan, Bulgaria, Ireland, South Africa, Thailand, and Great Britain decreed formal statutes guaranteeing their citizens’ rights of access to government information. In the first week after Japan’s access law went into effect in 2001, more than four thousand requests were filed by citizens. More than half a million Thais utilized the official Information Act in its first three years of existence. The U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) ranks as the most heavily invoked access law in the world. In 2000, the U.S. federal government received more than two million FOIA requests from citizens, corporations, and foreigners; and, it spent about a dollar per U.S. citizen ($253 million) to administer the statute (Blanton, 2002, p. 51).

Nearly all of the freedom of information laws in the world today were created because of contention for political power between parliaments and administrations, ruling and opposing parties, and present and prior rulers. In fact, the first freedom of information law- Sweden’s 1766 Freedom of the Press Act- was propelled by party politics, as the new majority in parliament sought to view documents that the prior government had kept hidden (Blanton, 2002, p. 51).

Also, the U.S. FOIA, which has become a model for reformers worldwide, was not the result of democratic education, but more correctly Democratic loyalty. The legislation was the result from ten years of congressional hearings from 1955-1965 as the Democratic majority attempted to gain access to deliberations of the Republican executive branch under former President Dwight D. Eisenhower (Sherick, 1978, p. 8); (Blanton, 2002, p. 52).

The U.S. FOIA would not be as progressive had it not been for the Watergate scandal. In fact, scandals have continued to be a catalyst for freedom of information movements on a global basis. Canada enacted its freedom of information statute in 1982 after scandals involving police surveillance and government regulation of industry. Public outrage over conditions in the meat-packing industry and the administration of a public blood bank incited Ireland to pass a similar statute in 1997. Japan’s 1999 national access law was the result of two decades of scandals, from the Lockheed bribery case in the 1970’s to the bureaucracy’s masking of HIV contamination of the blood reserve in the early 1990’s. Japan’s information disclosure movement began twenty years ago as local access statutes uncovered methodical forgeries of government reports and revealed widespread demoralization within the Japanese public works and construction industries- a political bribery system that safeguarded forty years of one-party rule in Japan (Blanton, 2002, p. 53).

There are four major federal statutes that were developed to furnish public access to government information to U.S. citizens and foreigners, as well (Marwick, 1985, p. xv); (Blanton, 2002, p. 50).

This statute is a generic access statute that was first decreed in 1966. Its main objective was to allow the public to request access to records that were in the federal agencies’ possession. Until 1966, public requests for records and documents held by the Federal government were governed by a "need to know" basis. This was a result from the 1789 "housekeeping" law, which gave Federal agencies the right to authorize the withholding of information from the public; and from a provision of the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 (United States Department of Justice, 2002, p. 1), which stated that matters of official note should be made available to the public, but added that an agency could limit entry to its papers "for good cause found" or "in the public interest" (Sheirck, 1978, p. 2).

With the exclusion of certain types of information that are unequivocally preserved by exceptions, the agencies are required to relinquish anything that is requested. The nine exceptions are:

· exemption for national security

· exemption for internal agency rules

· exemption material exempted by other statutes

· exemption for confidential business information

· exemption for certain internal government memoranda

· exemption for protecting personal privacy

· exemption for certain records of law enforcement investigations

· exemption for regulation of financial institutions

· exemption for oil wells. (Sherick, 1978, p. 28-34)

.Since first being enacted, the FOIA has seen alterations to keep up with the country’s ever-growing needs and requests for more and new types of information. In 1974, Congress proposed a series of amendments which covered the concerns of index publication, record identification, search and copying fees, court review, response to complaints, expedited appeals, assessment of attorney fees and costs, sanction, administrative deadlines, national defense and foreign policy exemptions, annual reports by agencies, distinguishable portions of records and expansion of agency definition (Sherick, 1978, p. 12).

In 1996, a subsection of the FOIA was modified as part of the Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments (EFOIA). These modifications require annual reports from each federal agency regarding its FOIA operations and an annual report from the Department of Justice to Congress with regards to both FOIA litigations and the Department of Justice’s attempts (usually through the Office of Information and Privacy) to encourage agency conformity with the FOIA. Agencies now prepare their annual reports for submission to the Department of Justice for approval and then make them available to the public at a single World Wide Web site (United States Department of Justice, 2002, p. 3). Each agency also must make its annual FOIA report readily available on its own FOIA Web site, and it should do so quickly so that the Department of Justice can prepare a summary of all agencies’ total annual report data for each fiscal year (United States Department of Justice, 2002, p. 3).

The first Congressional hearing since the 1996 amendment, in June of 1998, revealed that agencies have been slow in issuing their own regulations to implement EFOIA requirements for electronic reading rooms and for prompt review for requests of compelling urgency (Most federal agencies behind schedule on EFOIA, 1998, p. 20). However, a month later (in July of 1998), the FBI announced the new section of its web site (http://www.fbi.gov) called "The FBI FOIA Electronic Reading Room." The FBI in Washington now offers a host of previously secret records released in accordance with Freedom of Information Act requests (Caterinicchia, 1998, p. 32).

It is an accepted fact that the FOIA has had a major effect on the flow of information. It is the toughest, most utilized, most litigated, most efficient, and most important of the federal access statutes. Because of its impact, the FOIA is the subject of more controversy than the other access statutes (Marwick, 1985, p. xvi). In summary, the FOIA is a vital and ever developing public access tool which, with amendments over time to accommodate both technological advancements and society’s growing interests in an open and honest government, will enhance the sense of democratic awareness in American citizens’ daily lives (United States Department of Justice, 2002, p. 4).

The Federal Privacy Act is meant to protect personal privacy from abusers by the federal government agencies that deal with personal information. One method of protection that it provides consists of allowing individuals the right to look over their own personal records. The right of access to these records allowed by the PA, overlaps with right given under the FOIA (Marwick, 1985, p. xvi).

The Sunshine Act was enacted in 1976 as an "open meetings" law. It gave individuals the right to attend meetings of the governing boards of some fifty federal agencies. It also established the right of access to the records of such meetings. Like the FOIA and the Privacy Act, the Sunshine Act has certain exemptions:

• exemption for nation security reasons

This statute, enacted in 1972, gave the public the right to attend federal advisory committee meetings. The categories of exemptions of the FACA are the same as those of the Sunshine Act, but it is otherwise a weaker open meetings statute (Marwick, 1985, p. xvi).

Privatization, the actions of governmental agencies contracting private entrepreneurs to perform governmental functions on a for-profit basis, has spread to nearly every aspect of public life. Private prisons are just one reflection of the increased political pressure on federal, state, and local governments to cut costs and tapered operations. Hospitals, schools, developmental agencies, film commissions, and even dog-racing tracks have become the focus of privatization attempts. Underrated in the push to privatization is the threat posed to public access to governmental records. Records long open to public scrutiny now are being created, kept, and controlled by private businesses often at odds with the very purpose of public records laws. In recent years, businesses handling privatized governmental functions have tried to refuse the public access to a variety of records (Bunker and Davis, 1998, p. 464).

Access to public records is very much a subject of statutory law in the United States. Both the federal government and all fifty states have statutes establishing some level of access to public records. Unfortunately, neither the FOIA nor most state public records statutes clearly allow access to the records of private bodies contracted to perform public functions. The FOIA appears unlikely to allow access to records of privatized service providers, both because of its statutory language and because of its meaning by the courts (Bunker and Davis, 1998, p. 464).

Due to the terrorist attacks against the United States, openness in all facets of government has now come under its own attack. Using the threat of terrorism as a rationale, the current presidential administration has been moving rapidly to create new boundaries. The regard for the long-run stems from well-intentioned advocates who fear that in the computer age, more public access means less security for individuals. The privacy movement has been under way for more than a decade, building public support and gaining some sizeable legislative goals. Driver's license information, a principle public record if ever there was one, has been limited in many states. And basic medical news, such as the condition of a hospitalized crime or accident victim, may soon become off-limits (Layton, 2002, p. 20).

Blanton, Thomas (2002). The world's right to know. Foreign Policy, 131, 50-58.

Bunker, Matthew D. and Charles N. Davis (1998). Privatized government functions and freedom of information: Public accountability in an age of private governance. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 75, 464-477.

Caterinicchia, Dan (1998). The real x-files. Editor and Publisher, mediainfo.com, 32.

Layton, Charles (2002). The information squeeze. American Journalism Review, 24 20- 29.

Marwick, Christine M. Your Right to Government Information: Comprehensive and Up- to-Date, A Basic Guide to Exercising Your Right to Government Information Under Today's Laws. New York: Bantam Books, Inc. 1985.

Most federal agencies behind schedule on EFOIA (1998). News Media and the Law, 22, 20-21.

Paige, Sean (1998). A sunshine law still in shadows. Insight on the News, 14, 14-15.

Sherick, L.G. How to Use the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). New York: Arco Publishing Company, Inc., 1978.

United States Department of Justice (2002). Freedom of Information Act Guide, May 20002. Retrieved October 22, 2002 from http://www.usdoj.gov/oip/introduce.htm/

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