Power and Public Administration: Applying a Transformative Approach to Freedom of/Access to Information Research

Freedom of Information (FOI) or Access to Information (ATI) legislation regulates the right to make written requests for government records. Previous research either interrogates the effectiveness of FOI/ATI legislation for advancing government transparency or positions the requests as a means for gathering data on government institutions. This article intervenes in this debate by treating FOI/ATI mechanisms as the vantage point from which to examine questions about power in public administration. Adopting a transformative approach, this article explores the potential of using FOI/ATI requests as a liberatory tool that enables the analysis of power dynamics in public administration. For this purpose, the author draws upon her experience with Canada’s ATI regime and requests from the Immigration and Refugee Board. This article documents how ATI requests reveal policy tensions within the Board related to case and performance management, as well as patterns of front-line staff resistance to these measures. It goes on to examine complaints about delays made to the ATI watchdog which expose the attribution of ATI resources towards non-ATI responsibilities. This article highlights the contribution that FOI/ATI requests can make to public administration research.