Presentation in the first workshop of the Exploring the Emerging Impacts of Open Data in Developing Countries project. Looking at the context of open data, and the research case study planned for 2013 - 2014. See http://www.opendataresearch.org/project/2013/jcv

1. Opening the Cities:
Open Government Data in
Local Governments of
Argentina, Brazil and
Uruguay
MPP. Silvana Fumega
MSc. Ricardo Matheus
MSc. Manuella Maia Ribeiro
MPP. Fabrizio Scrolini
PhD. José Carlos Vaz

2. Contextualization
• Open Government Data is increasingly gaining relevance at the
national and local level in Latin America. (Scrollini & Fumega, 2011);
• Majority of Latin American population is currently urban and have an
mobile phone on the hands;
• Data can be potential to face challenges of cities, although theirs
budgetary and political limitations (Davies & Bawa,2012);
• Three case studies from the Southern Cone:
• Buenos Aires, Argentina/ São Paulo, Brazil/ Montevideo, Uruguay

3. The Cities
• Buenos Aires (Argentina)
• Decree on OGD and Portal opening (2012);
• Evidence of top-down approach for OGD implementation;
• Presence of community hacker. Until now, the main detected users of data published.
• Montevideo (Uruguay)
• First municipality to adopt OGD in Latin America (2010);
• Evidence of bottom-up approach of policy design (Scrollini, 2011);
• Good quantity of Dataset published and presence of applications made by civil society.
• São Paulo (Brazil)
• Biggest and wealthy city in Latin America;
• Evidence of bottom-up policy design (Vaz et al, 2011);
• Good quantity of Dataset published and presence of applications made by civil society.

4. Research Objectives
• General Objectives:
• Identify how OGD policies emerged on these selected cities;
• Identify what impacts OGD policies are producing on Civil Society and Private Sector;
and,
• Identify what are the challenges for local government to implement OGD.
• Specific Objectives:
• Produce an on-going historical description of political context, implementation and
civil society usage; and,
• Seeks to provide in-depth description of the context and structure of governance
issues around open government data in cities, addressing key institutional and social
challenges.

5. Expected Outcomes and Impacts
• A framework of how open government data works on selected case studies local
governments;
• An analysis on key governance issues around open government data policies in
cities that could be relevant for policy makers and activists designing OGD
policies;
• An analysis of main drivers for demand of open government data at a local level;
• A description of the context and structure of governance issues around open
government data in cities, addressing key institutional and social challenges;
• Measuring of OGD governmental portals level of five star classification of
Berners-Lee (2006) and OGD rules from W3C (2012);
• Map of Impacts of OGD policies produced by social control, transparency and
innovation on Civil Society and Private Sector; and,
• In terms of the dissemination it will deliver an executive summary in English,
Spanish and Portuguese.

6. Research Approach (Methodology)

7. References
• BACKICI T. Open Cities available at
http://opencities.net/sites/opencities.net/files/content-files/repository/D1.1%20State%20of%20the%20Art_Open%20Innova
accessed 22 Dec 2012.
• BERNERS-LEE, T.. (2006). Linked Data. Available at: http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html. Accessed in:
09/03/2013.
• DAVIES T.; BAWA Z. A. (2012). The promise and peris of Open Data. Journals of Community informatics Vol 8 n2.
• FUMEGA, S.; SCROLLINI, F.. (2011). Access to Information and Open Data in Latin America. First Global Conference
on Transparency Research. New Jersey, US, Rutgers University.
• SCROLLINI, F.. (2011). Open Government Data: The Rise of a "web Institution"?. 6th European Consortium for
Political Research (ECPR) General Conference. Reykjavik, Iceland, European Consortium for Political Research.
• YIN, R. K.. (2005). Case Study Research: Design and Methods. 3rd Edition. Bookman, 2005.
• YU, H.; ROBINSON, D. G.. (2012). The New Ambiguity of Open Government. Princeton CITP/Yale ISP Working Paper.
United States of America, Princeton CITP/Yale ISP.
• VAZ, J. C.; RIBEIRO, M. M.; MATHEUS, R.. (2011). New perspectives for electronic governance: the adoption of
open government data in Brazil. First Global Conference on Transparency Research, Rutgers University, Newark,
May 19-20, 2011.
• W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). (2012). Publishing Open Government Data. Available at:
http://www.w3.org/TR/gov-data/. Accessed in: 09/03/2013.

8. Any Suggestions? Comments?
• Ricardo Matheus (ricardomatheus@gmail.com)
• Fabrizio Scrollini (f.a.scrollini@lse.ac.uk)
• Silvana Fumega (silfumega@gmail.com)
• Manuella Maia Ribeiro (maiamanuella@gmail.com)
• José Carlos Vaz (vaz@usp.br)
Thanks!