Making federal government science websites publicly accessible and accountable: findings and recommendations of The Environmental Data and Governance Initiative
Abstract
Websites are often the first interfaces and primary vectors through which US federal agencies provide information to the public. A high percentage of federal webpages are created to increase public knowledge and scientific literacy. To achieve this, agencies should make their website scientific information accessible to interested publics and impartial to political persuasion. Through monitoring, analyzing, and contextualizing changes to thousands of federal agency websites since January 2017, EDGI has identified problematic practices and developed a framework for implementable recommendations to help make agency scientific websites more trusted and impactful.
We have observed significant impediments to the public utility of federal web resources, including the dearth of avenues for the public to verify or seek further information, isolation of resources due to neglected web maintenance, and insufficient comprehensiveness of information for its intended purpose. While positive examples of agency web resource provision and management can be found, the above practices have contributed to the subjection of government website information to political manipulation, as have subtle language changes and reassignment of priorities for topic-specific information. Among the most blatant examples is EPA's Climate Change website, which was scheduled to be updated to "reflect EPA's priorities under the leadership of President Trump and Administrator Pruitt," but ultimately was deleted. Some problems with web resource accessibility and utility are pervasive across agency webpages; others are unique to certain politically charged topics. To make web-based scientific information more publicly accessible and shielded from politicization, we argue that federal web resources must be available, discoverable, navigable, and contextualized. We recommend adopting the following academic standards: citations for all facts and assertions; links to relevant, updated data; highlighted summaries; and clearly articulated methods and limitations. Further, we recommend including a discoverable record of website changes, including timeframes and rationales, to inform users of the ephemeral nature of the information they encounter and preserve a record of public information.- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AGUFMPA33B..05B
- Keywords:
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- 6309 Decision making under uncertainty;
- POLICY SCIENCES & PUBLIC ISSUES;
- 6324 Legislation and regulations;
- POLICY SCIENCES & PUBLIC ISSUES;
- 6349 General or miscellaneous;
- POLICY SCIENCES & PUBLIC ISSUES;
- 6620 Science policy;
- PUBLIC ISSUES