Open Data for Accountability in the Fight Against Corruption

There has been a lot of research on the use of open data in the fight against corruption. Although there are some promising examples, it appears that a systematic approach is lacking. What are the design principles for an architecture to open up data and thereby reduce corruption? In this paper we use theory about fraud, and about public accountability to derive design principles for an open data architecture. Crucial is the sustained presence of a specific forum: a group of people who are critical, have expertise, are free to challenge the authorities. Unlike the general public, a specific forum has an interest in reviewing the data. The architecture is motivated and illustrated by an extensive example of an E-procurement system in the context of an anticorruption program in Palembang, Indonesia.