The People’s Right To Know
The people’s right to know the processes of government is an undisputable privilege of democratic societies, but alongside with unquestioned positive effects of this right the mentioned societies have to face a dilemma of limits of freedom of information. What kind of information may still be withheld without any damage to the “right to know”? How to ensure that private information is safe? To my mind, the current law copes with this task and does not expand “the People’s right to know” beyond government business and into the private businesses and personal matters of individual citizens.
In the USA, the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA, passed in 1967) and the Electronic Freedom of Information Act (passed in 1996) are the major laws governing freedom of information. None of the provisions of these acts tell us that private businesses should be made publicly available; on the contrary, FOIA stipulates that any files that can constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy (personnel, medical files, etc) should not be disclosed (Smolla, 2003). However, in the age of information technologies the question of keeping the private data safe is of vital importance. Different government agencies know almost all about us, and this information is stored in their databases. Of course, we all want it to be protected from any misuse. Besides, it is also worth to mention that public access to criminal trials seems to be a controversial question, since it may also endanger the right of every person to keep his/her businesses in secret, especially if cameras are used. I believe that cameras may be used only in case of consent of litigants, or if a case has serious importance for the public.
Despite all these controversies, I should say that the laws protect the right for privacy as much as it is possible at this stage of historical development. Globalization, that is now a determinant in all spheres of life, on the one hand, invokes a desire of every individual to ensure a bit of secrecy and personal space (as a kind of defense reaction to the processes of growing interdependence and convergence), and on the other hand, requires that every individual as well as every society becomes more open to others and more public, as a result of this growing interdependence. We all are now connected with each other in a way that the mankind has never known before, and we have a right to know as much as possible about the people we are connected with, so every individual should be ready to become more open and public. The balance between publicity and privacy should be observed, and the current laws do have the potential to observe it.
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