Open Government Review of Romania

Executive summary

Open government policies are more vital than ever to reinforce trust in public institutions in times of crisis, to strengthen democratic processes, and to improve the responsiveness of public policies and services. Romania has made important progress regarding open government. Nonetheless, there is a need to improve the implementation of relevant laws and policies and establish a more coherent vision for promoting a culture of openness across government and society. In this context, the OECD analysed Romania’s open government policies to identify good practices and distil lessons for a potential Open Government Strategy.

Key findings

• Romania has made important progress in implementing transparency obligations in recent years, including those in Law no. 544/2001 on free access to information of public interest. Nevertheless, barriers for citizens and stakeholders to access information and data persist. Sensitive information is rarely disclosed proactively, and information is not always published in a standardised and user-friendly way, and in formats that can be re-used.

• Romania is one of the few OECD Member and Partner countries to have a dedicated law on citizen and stakeholder participation (Law no. 52/2003). Nevertheless, participation is largely limited to public consultation on draft laws or regulations, implying that it takes place at a late stage of the policy cycle and with few spaces for in-depth interaction between decision makers and citizens and stakeholders.

• A range of high-level government policies and strategies include measures on openness, including the National Anticorruption Strategy, the Open Government Partnership (OGP) Action Plan and the recently adopted Recovery and Resilience Plan. However, these initiatives remain fragmented. Romania could develop a clearer vision for open government and a coherent whole-of-government policy agenda to bring citizens’ voices into the policy cycle.

• A “citizen focus” is not yet part of the administrative culture of Romania. While there is legal compliance with open government policies and practices, public administrations could be more proactive in engaging stakeholders. Despite the General Secretariat of the Government’s efforts to adopt guidelines and create training programmes, public officials and civil society stakeholders still have limited skills and knowledge on how to contribute to open government.

• Romania’s participation in the OGP has led to positive results (e.g. creation of the E-consultare platform, etc.) and has allowed the government to start creating advanced governance frameworks for open government reforms (e.g. OGP Club). But buy-in into the OGP process is still limited across government and levels of ambition have varied over time. These measures must now be consolidated with greater buy-in from across the administration and with a view to making continual, ambitious progress.

• The clustering of competences relative to access to information, open data, civic space, and citizen participation under the General Secretariat of the Government is unique and could be better exploited. Co-ordination of open government reforms across government is limited and levels of political commitment to open government have varied over time.

• Romania already collects a wide range of information and data on open government policies and practices, mostly through monitoring of open government laws, regulations and policy documents (e.g. the OGP Action Plan). Adopting an Open Government Strategy would allow Romania to develop a holistic monitoring and evaluation scheme that is coupled with an Open Government Index and/or Open Government Maturity Model.

• Some local governments in Romania have pioneered practices to get closer to citizens and hear their views and inputs using innovative tools such as participatory budgets. The central government has taken steps to support subnational governments in their open government efforts. However, reaping the full benefits of collaboration among different levels of government and branches of the state (that is, achieving an “open state”) will require further efforts.

Key recommendations

• Enable citizens to see, understand and monitor the decisions and activities of government, including by focusing on the quality, reusability and accessibility of information and by applying the provisions of the recently adopted Government Decision no. 830/2022.

• Consider reviewing Law no. 544/2001 on free access to information of public interest to offer an external review process in case of denied or unanswered ATI requests. Consider establishing a dedicated body to ensure oversight, supervision, monitoring and evaluation of Law no. 544/2001 with a clear mandate, sustained resources, an adequate level of independence, and enforcement capacity.

• Enable citizens and stakeholders to contribute to the activities and decisions of the government, including by promoting participation earlier in the policy cycle and by providing incentives for innovation and experimentation with new participatory methods and practices, such as representative deliberative participatory mechanisms.

• Move forward with the inclusive design of Romania‘s first holistic and integrated Open Government Strategy to bring together fragmented open government initiatives and elevate open government approaches to the political level. In the Strategy, emphasise initiatives that foster citizen and civil society involvement in the policy cycle, as recommended in the OECD Civic Space Scan of Romania.

• Make the Open Government Directorate in the General Secretariat of the Government a centre of expertise for opening up government and ensure that it has the necessary means and resources to design and implement the Open Government Strategy.

• Increase monitoring and evaluation of open government reforms, including by reviewing ongoing monitoring exercises (e.g. for Law no. 52/2003 and Law no. 544/2001) and by creating an Open Government Index and/or Maturity Models.

• Build skills, awareness, and knowledge on open government within the public sector and in civil society, including by organising specific training and capacity-building activities for public officials from national and local governments and by including a general introductory course on open government in mandatory training requirements for public officials.

• Encourage the integration of subnational efforts in the national open government agenda by supporting stronger collaboration and co-ordination across levels of government through a permanent space for dialogue and by strategically using the OGP process and the upcoming Open Government Strategy to design a shared roadmap.

• Develop an Open Parliament agenda by building on existing transparency and participatory initiatives, and create positive synergies with other branches of the State by including joint commitments in the forthcoming National Open Government Strategy or future OGP Action Plans.