Open Data from the Brazilian Government: Understanding the Perspectives of Data Suppliers and Developers of Applications to the Citizens
Open Government Data, Developers, Data Providers, e-Government, Government Transparency, Open Data Ecosystems, Brazilian Open Data.
Open Government Data (OGD) are seen as a way to promote transparency, as well as providing information to the population by opening data related to various government sectors. Citizens, by using applications developed with this type of data, gain knowledge about a certain public sphere; governments, in turn, are able to promote transparency and improvements through the interaction with citizens who use such applications. However, the creation and success of projects that use OGD depends on developers who are able to extract, process and analyze this information, as well as on the quality of data made available by their suppliers. This research was conducted in two phases: the first phase sought to investigate the perspective of the developers who use Brazilian OGD for the development of applications that aim to promote greater transparency to citizens; in the second phase, we investigate the perspectives of citizens responsible for publishing OGD in portals, i.e. OGD providers. Through twenty-four semi-structured interviews with twelve developers and twelve suppliers, this work reports what motivates them to work with OGD, as well as the barriers they face in this process. Our findings indicate that both actors seek to promote transparency for the population, however they struggle with the poor quality of OGD, cultural barriers, among other issues. In this work, we present and qualitatively characterize these issues. We also provide recommendations, according to the perspectives of developers and data providers, with the aim of bringing benefits to the Brazilian OGD ecosystem and citizens.