KJC Korea
Journal Central

Establishment and expansion of a FOI regime is a fundamental basis for modern democracy. Informed decisions and supports by the people are critical to establishment of democratic institutions and policies. The best tool to make informed decisions and to ensure accountability is the FOI. For effective FOI, good records management is necessary requirement. This paper observes and analyses the development of the FOI in the U.S., the Open Government policy, and the government records management reforms under Obama Administration to search viable solutions for Korean FOI and public records management reforms. Major revisions and advancement of the FOIA in the United States are examined, especially the revision of the FOIA as the OPEN Government Act of 2007. The FOIA revision enhanced greatly the freedom of information in the U.S. including the establishment of an independent FOI ombudsman by the Congress. The paper also discusses the Presidential memoranda on the Open Government and the FOI by President Obama, the following directives, Presidential memorandum on government records management and the Government Records Management Directive. Major contents of the directives, plans, and achievement are summarized and analysed. Finally, this paper compares the government records management reforms under former President Roh Mu Hyun with the Obama’s reform drive. The comparison found that major difference in the “top-down” government records reforms are the difference in democratic institutions such as weak congressional politics, strong bureaucratic obstacles, and relatively weak social and professional supports for the reforms in Korea, while these reforms were similar in terms that they were driven by insightful political leaders. Independent FOI ombudsman and national records administration are necessary for such democratic reforms.

There have been numerous steps of growth in policy system since the legal systemization through the enactment of Information Disclosure of public institution Act in 1996 and Records Management of public institution Act in 1999 as well as infrastructure advancement led by government bodies, but it still shows insufficiency in some aspects of information disclosure system and records management. In particular, the issue of reliability on record information disclosed through information disclosure system is raised, and institutional base through the legal and technical devices to ensure the reliability are not well prepared. Government has attempted to enact laws and regulations to guarantee the public right to know through information disclosure and records management at government level, and establish the national system in a way that advances the infrastructure for encouraging the participation in state affairs and utilization of national record information resources. There are limitations that it lacks internal stability and overlooks the impact and significance of record information itself by focusing upon system expansion and disclosing information quantatively. Numerous record information disclosed tends to be falsified, forged, extracted or manufactured by information disclosure staffs, or provided in a form other than official document or draft. In addition, the disclosure or non-disclosure decisions without consistency and criteria due to lack of information disclosure staff or titular supervising authority, which is likely to lead to societal confusion. There are also frequent cases where the reliability is damaged due to voluntary decision, false response or non response depending upon request agents for information disclosure. In other cases, vague request by information disclosure applicant or civil complaint form request are likely to hinder the reliability of record information. Thus it is essential to ensure the reliability of record information by establishing and amending relevant laws and regulations, systemic improvement through organizational and staff expertise advancement, supplementing the information disclosure system and process, and changing the social perception on information disclosure. That is, reliable record information is expected to contribute to genuine governance form administration as well as accountability of government bodies and public organizations. In conclusion, there are needed numerous attempts to ensure the reliability of record information to be disclosure in the future beyond previous trials of perceiving record information as records systematically and focusing upon disclosing more information and external development of system.

It is principle that the National Assembly Minutes are open to the general public based on the Constitution of the Republic of Korea. However, it will not be released to the public when the minutes are produced at a meeting held privately -the closed minutes- and the parts of the minutes are not published because of ‘the demands on keeping confidential of the Chairman of the National Assembly or needs for the National Security’ based on the National Assembly Act article 118 clause 1. These two minutes infringe the democratic rights, the public’s rights to know seriously by reason that there are no procedures to disclose to the public. Especially the non-published parts of the minutes are highly likely in breach of the constitution. This paper will deal with the regulations and guidelines related to the disclosure of the closed minutes focusing on the United States and the United Kingdom where developing countries on the parliamentary democracy. Then, it is suggested placing an emphasis on the legal aspects that the plans to make public of the closed minutes and non published parts of the minutes based on the reviewed results of the committee of the National Assembly Archives and the initiative proposed by the member of the National Assembly, Jung Chang-rae in the last 2004.

As the network and electronic devices have been developed rapidly, the influences the web exerts on our daily lives have been increasing. Information created on the web has been playing more and more essential role as the important records which reflect each era. So there is a strong demand to archive information on the web by a standardized method. One of the methods is the snapshot strategy, which is crawling the web contents periodically using automatic software. But there are two problems in this strategy. First, it can harvest the same and duplicate contents and it is also possible that meaningless and useless contents can be crawled due to complex IT skills implemented on the web. In this paper, we will categorize the problems which can emerge when crawling web contents using snapshot strategy and present the possible solutions to settle the problems through the technical aspects by crawling the web contents in the public institutions.

‘Maeul’ is a concept connoting a community. As a place where ordinary people’s lives are planned and realized, Maeul is the foundation of their daily lives as well as a place where they work, rest and enjoy pastime activities. In Korea, however, most Maeul communities are dismantled while going though the modern period representing colonization and developmental dictatorship. Growth-oriented industrialization and urbanization turned into such adverse effects as individualization, a sense of loss and a sense of alienation. Recently, through innovations from below, Maeuls are restored, and through Maeul communities restored this way, every Maeul and many researchers carry out activities to build a healthy civil society. This study was conducted on such a background. For a healthy restoration of Maeul communities and a sustainable operation of those communities, it is necessary to establish archives where record the trace of Maeul members’ daily lives and relations between those members. The archive of Maeul communities is a place that contains each Maeul’s local characteristics as well as human relations as well. It is because this place can be space where Maeul members can record their history, communicate with each other and make a better future. The archive of Maeul communities can be made into various different models, which can be operated by reflecting the identity of a community such as main agents and characteristics, objectives and orientation of objects recorded. Rather than when Maeul communities exist as individuals, they can display more important functions and better effect when they form a network. Therefore, it is needed to provide various and creative methodologies different from the existing government-led record management. Not only on the form of archives, but also all over their functions, such as collection, arrangement, classification, evaluation, management and utilization, Maeul and Maeul residents’ norms, orientation and realistic conditions should be thoroughly reflected. Starting from a chance to look back at individuals’ lives, the archive of Maeul communities will be a new chapter to restore and build a healthy community in our society and overcome social contradictions from below. Moreover, the archive of Maeul communities has a great significance that it will broaden its prospect creatively with a new paradigm, not only mechanically turning the existing public sector-centered record management into a non-governmental sector.