Will we see a reduction in overclassification of state archives?

Meredith Fuchs reported that in December 2009, President Obama issued a new Executive Order governing Classified National Security Information. Elsewhere details have been reported about why the President had to take action on classification by December 31, 2009. That was the deadline for automatic declassification of large swaths of historical (more than 25 year old) records that were not ready, from certain agencies’ perspectives, for declassification. Even though this was essentially a legacy problem that developed under prior presidential administrations, the Obama Administration did not want to be seen as limiting transparency without also committing to improving transparency. Thus, last May, President Obama directed the National Security Advisor to oversee an interagency process to revise the Executive Order and improve the classification system.

There has now been a call for public comment on the process of making US governance more open. Hats off to Obama!

See here an interview about public challenges to the White House’s record keeping practices in regard to emails.

Photo attribution: ViaMoi
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