The New Presumption of Transparency

by L. Gordon Crovitz
The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal
June 9, 2009

http://www.legal-project.org/article/385

Excerpt:

 During the Cold War, the joke went that an American explained to a Russian that, in the U.S., anyone could stand in front of the White House and criticize the president. The Russian shrugged and said anyone could stand at the gates of the Kremlin and criticize the American president, too.

We live in a new era, as seen in such varied efforts to suppress information as expense fiddling by British parliamentarians, Beijing's censorship of Tiananmen Square, and libel laws that deter reporting on terrorism. A growing list of institutions and countries find themselves on the wrong side of this shift in expectations. Information that was once locked away is fair game, and anyone who refuses to play by the new rules is presumed guilty of having something to hide.

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