AP Impact: Right-to-know laws often ignored

From The Associated Press:

The promise is magnificent: More than 5.3 billion people in more than 100 countries now have the right – on paper – to know the truth about what their government is doing behind closed doors. Such laws have spread rapidly over the past decade, and when they work, they present a powerful way to engage citizens and expose corruption.

However, more than half the countries with such laws do not follow them, The Associated Press found in the first worldwide test of this promised freedom of information.

Readers are invited to read more stories and submit suggestions for future freedom of information requests in any country from the AP Facebook post at http://apne.ws/vgMTQ6

In the spirit of transparency, AP is also opening its notebooks, sharing raw data, spreadsheets and methodology. View all of these source documents here.