A field experiment on bureaucratic discretionary bias under FOI laws

Rodríguez, Rafael Piñeiro; Rossel, Cecilia

doi:10.1016/j.giq.2018.06.001

Cited by 25 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Other findings revealed by the current study include a significant and positive correlation between more compliant responses and the use of Web‐based request‐and‐response platforms for sending FOI requests (as opposed to via e‐mail or a generic contact form); and, contrary to other FOI field experiments (e.g., Rodríguez & Rossel, ), we find no significant difference in the probability that males receive more compliant responses than females.…”

Section: Introductioncontrasting

confidence: 85%

“…Their results show striking impartiality, a result we later question while specifying our own experimental design. In Uruguay, Rodríguez and Rossel () test the effects of professional cues (e.g., journalist, businessperson), gender, as well as the effect of demonstrated knowledge about the country's FOI law. Only signaling knowledge about the FOI law has an effect, but exclusively for men, which means that women appear to be the subject of bias.…”

Section: Moving Beyond the Paradigmatic Field Experiments On Discriminmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Googling the requester: Identity‐questing and discrimination in public service provision

et al. 2019

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Innovating upon previous field experiments and theories of identity‐based discrimination, we test whether public officials are using searches (“identity‐questing”) to profile citizens and acting on latent biases. Pairs of “institutional” and “noninstitutional” requesters send lower and moderate burden freedom of information (FOI) requests—providing no identity cues apart from undistinctive names, e‐mails, and ID numbers—to nearly 700 of Brazil's largest municipalities. Results show institutional requesters receive one‐fifth more responses than noninstitutional comparators. For moderate versus lower burden requests, noninstitutional requesters are 11% less likely to receive a compliant response than their institutional comparators. The only plausible explanation for these results is identity‐questing, a phenomenon that has far‐reaching policy implications. Most of the world's FOI laws, for example, contain vague ID obligations, which translate incoherently from laws to regulation and practice. Results enjoin public service providers to protect the identities of citizens by default or upon request.

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Section: Introductioncontrasting

confidence: 85%

Section: Moving Beyond the Paradigmatic Field Experiments On Discriminmentioning

confidence: 99%

Googling the requester: Identity‐questing and discrimination in public service provision

et al. 2019

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“…Second, we show that making a formal FOIA request significantly increases access to municipal government officials. This second contribution advances a growing comparative FOIA compliance literature (Grimmelikhuijsen, John, Meijer, & Worthy, 2018;Michener, Velasco, Contreras, & Rodrigues, 2020;Peisakhin, 2012;Rodríguez & Rossel, 2018;Worthy, John, & Vannoni, 2017) and is vital in showing that FOIAs are an effective means of increasing transparency in the municipal governments of California, Texas, Florida, New York, and Pennsylvania. As Grimmelikhuijsen et al (2018) argue, there is immense value in increasing the number of FOIA compliance studies in order to allow us to exploit cross polity variation in institutional design.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 81%

“…A study of Mexican agencies tested if purportedly influential citizens received higher FOIA request response rates than ordinary citizens but found few differences (Lagunes & Pocasangre, 2019). Uruguayan studies have tested compliance by purported group membership (e.g., industry, journalists, ordinary citizens, influential citizens) and gender (Piñeiro & Rossel, 2015;Rodríguez & Rossel, 2018) and find evidence of discrimination against females. FOIA studies conducted in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands find that informal requests were less likely to be complied with (Worthy, John, & Vannoni, 2017;Grimmelikhuijsen et al, 2018).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do political donors have greater access to government officials? Evidence from a FOIA field experiment with US municipalities

Jenkins

Landgrave

Martinez

2020

JBPA

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Whether political donors have greater access to government officials is a perennial question in politics. Using a freedom of information act (FOIA) compliance field experiment with US municipalities in California, Texas, Florida, New York, and Pennsylvania, we fail to find evidence that political donors have greater access to government officials compared to engaged citizens. We contribute to the lobbying literature by testing for preferential treatment towards political donors in municipal government. Consistent with the extant FOIA literature, we do find that a formal FOIA request increases compliance rates and decreases wait time before an initial reply. This is an important contribution because, although many polities have FOIA laws, it cannot be taken for granted that FOIA laws will lead to transparency in practice. Testing the effectiveness of FOIA laws in the US is particularly important because state laws vary substantially.

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“…among other characteristics. Audit studies have been fielded on legislators and bureaucrats (Einstein and Glick 2017; Rodríguez and Rossel 2018) and been applied to the comparative context in Africa (McClendon 2016), Latin America (Lagunes and Pocasangre 2016; Michener et al 2019), Europe (Habel and Birch 2019), and elsewhere.…”

Section: Audit Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can We Reduce Deception in Elite Field Experiments? Evidence from a Field Experiment with State Legislative Offices

Landgrave

2020

State Politics Policy Q.

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The use of deception is common in elite correspondence audit studies. Elite audit studies are a type of field experiment used by researchers to test for discrimination against vulnerable populations seeking to access government resources. These studies have provided invaluable insights, but they have done so at the cost of using deception. They have relied on identity, activity, and motivation deception. In addition, they request unnecessary work. Is there a less deceptive alternative? In this article, I present results from a field experiment with state legislative offices that minimize the use of deception. Consistent with elite correspondence audit studies, I find evidence of discrimination against Hispanics among state legislative offices. In addition, I find that discrimination is mitigated when subjects believe their behavior will be public knowledge. This suggests that discrimination can be mitigated through increased monitoring. This article advances the discussion on how to minimize the use of deception in elite field experimentation and how to mitigate discrimination against vulnerable populations.

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A field experiment on bureaucratic discretionary bias under FOI laws

Cited by 25 publications

References 31 publications

Googling the requester: Identity‐questing and discrimination in public service provision

Googling the requester: Identity‐questing and discrimination in public service provision

Do political donors have greater access to government officials? Evidence from a FOIA field experiment with US municipalities

Can We Reduce Deception in Elite Field Experiments? Evidence from a Field Experiment with State Legislative Offices

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