Abstract
Citizens’ attention to Open Data initiatives and Open Government policies is growing rapidly, but fragmentation in their implementation makes for a confusing approach. This research aims to bring structure to their assessment by analyzing 63 selected Spanish cities and 110 selected Italian cities and mapping their content. The analysis shows that (i) Open Data portals are not developed consistently; (ii) the various levels of public administration are not coordinated in their Open Data strategies; (iii) however, there are some good practices to be followed and underlined. Research into Open Data initiatives could benefit from previous examples regarding the success and failure factors of an Open Government. This paper highlights the main trends for an Open Data portal strategy in Spanish and Italian cities from the citizens’ point of view. The basic content, structure of the websites, quality, accessibility, crosscutting nature and data visualization of the datasets have been assessed from the user’s perspective. Currently, Spain has 115 open-data portals embedded in datos.gov.es (Government of Spain 2016), and Italy has 40 open-data portals at the city level. Open Data initiatives are the basis to achieve transparency, participation and collaboration, and also to establish the pillars for the integration of intelligent policies.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
AgiD. (2015). Agenda Digitale Italiana. Accessed at: http://www.agid.gov.it [16-07-2017].
Berners-Lee, T., & O’Reilly, T. (2009). A conversation with Tim Berners-Lee. In Web 2.0 Summit 09.
Calderon, C., & Lorenzo, S. (2010). Open government. Gobierno Abierto. Algón Editores.
Dawes, S., Vidiasova L., & Parkhimovichc, O. (2016, January). Planning and designing open government data programs: An ecosystem approach. Government Information Quarterly, 33(1), 15–27.
EU Open Data Portal. Accessed at: https://open-data.europa.eu/ [15-12-2016].
European Data Portal. (2015). Open data maturity in Europe. Insights into the European state of play. European Union.
European Data Portal. Accessed at: http://www.europeandataportal.eu/ [10-12-2016].
Garau, C., Balletto, G., & Mundula, L. (2017). A critical reflection on smart governance in Italy: Definition and challenges for a sustainable urban regeneration. In Smart and sustainable planning for cities and regions (pp. 235–250). Berlin: Springer International Publishing.
García, M. (2015). New businesses around open data, smart cities and fiware. European Public Sector Information Platform. Topic Report 2015/04.
Giffinger, R., & Fertner, C. (2007). City-ranking of European medium-sized cities (pp. 1–12). Vienna UT: Centre of Regional Science.
Global right to information rating. Centre for Law and Democracy. Accessed at: http://www.rti-rating.org/ [16-06-2016].
Gurin, J. (2014). How open data is transforming city life. New York: FORBES.
Janssen, K. (2011). The influence of the PSI directive on open government data: An overview of recent developments. Government Information Quarterly, 28(4), 446–456.
Jetzek, T., Avital, M., & Bjorn-Andersen, N. (2012). The value of open government data: A strategic analysis framework. In SIG eGovernment Pre-ICIS Workshop 2012.
Misuraca, G., et al. (2010). Environmental digital Europe 2030: Scenarios design on future ICT for governance and policy modelling. Seville: Joint Research Centre Institute for prospective technological advancements.
Municipal Transparency Index ITA. Accessed at: http://transparencia.org.es/ [02-07-2016].
OGDP. (2007). Open government data principles: 8 principles of open government data. Accessed at: http://www.opengovdata.org/home/8principles [15-04-2016].
Open data initiatives map. CTIC Foundation. Accessed at: http://www.fundacionctic.org/. [18-04-2016].
Rojas, L. A. R., Lovelle, J. M. C., Bermúdez, G. M. T., Montenegro, C. E., de Ory, E. G., & Crespo, R. A. G. (2017). Metamodel to support decision-making from open government data. Journal of Ambient Intelligence and Humanized Computing, 1–11.
Spanish Government Transparency Portal. Accessed at: http://transparencia.gob.es/ [22-01-2017].
Stephenson, P. J., Bowles-Newark, N., Regan, E., Stanwell-Smith, D., Diagana, M., Höft, R., et al. (2016). Unblocking the flow of biodiversity data for decision-making in Africa. Biological Conservation, 213(2017), 335–340.
The open data handbook. Accessed at: http://opendatahandbook.org/ [25-04-2016].
U.S. General Services Administration. Accessed at: https://www.data.gov/ [03-03-2016].
Each official Open Government website of the assessed Spanish and Italian cities was visited during February and May 2016.
Acknowledgements
The authors take this opportunity to gratefully acknowledge the assistance and contributions of Dr. Sergio Ramos, Dr. José Maria Lapuerta, Javier Dorao, Estefanía Rueda and Daniel Martinez. And last, but not least, we would like to thank the SSPCR2017 attendees for their useful suggestions during the conference.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature
About this paper
Cite this paper
Sisto, R., García López, J., Paéz, J.M., Múgica, E.M. (2018). Open Data Assessment in Italian and Spanish Cities. In: Bisello, A., Vettorato, D., Laconte, P., Costa, S. (eds) Smart and Sustainable Planning for Cities and Regions. SSPCR 2017. Green Energy and Technology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75774-2_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75774-2_9
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-75773-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-75774-2
eBook Packages: EnergyEnergy (R0)