The document explores different perspectives on what open development means. It shares quotes from over a dozen individuals working in international development who define open development as: fostering cooperation over competition to create a better future; enabling intended beneficiaries to author development activities; developing capabilities through transparent and collaborative mutual learning; and more. The quotes illustrate that while open development means different things, common themes include transparency, participation, challenging closed decision-making, and providing access to information.

1. What does Open Development
Mean to You?
Join us to explore different perspectives on open development
at the Open Knowledge Festival.
Wednesday 19th September 11:30 - 13:00
Inspire Auditorium
(and on #opendev hashtag)
(Or share your answer in advance at:
http://bit.ly/DefiningOpenDev)

2. What does Open Development
Mean to You?
Here are some of the visions of open development that have
been shared so far...

3. “
Open Development is a Freedom Song
Open Development is about people co-creating according to their own
design, the spaces, ways and means that will evolve humanity into
experiencing more life, liberty and happiness through the connecting
”
power of ICT.
Ineke Buskens, GRACE Project

4. “
To me open development means harnessing the
power of sharing and cooperation over hoarding
and competition to create a better future.
Matthew L. Smith, IDRC ”

5. “
To me open development means means enabling the intended
'beneficiaries' of development (rather than technocrats) to be the
authors, architects and artisans of any development activity.
It is not an API.
It is much more than a top-down technical fix of being technically open, and
technically transparent.
It requires commitment to a human process that is genuinely inclusive and
”
collaborative and which leaves people better able than before, to independently
identify and realise any development that they have reason to value.
Tony Roberts

6. “
If we see development as the capability to sustain and improve
a life in dignity in a changing socio-economic context, then open
development means to develop these capabilities in a
transparent and collaborative process of mutual learning.
Steps towards open development that can be taken by organizations working in development
cooperation include: publishing of project evaluations of all successful and failed projects in
open formats, open publication of budgets and donors, and publication of all gathered and
generated data that might benefit others in open formats (except private data of individuals).
René Herlitz, Digital Unite ”

7. “
To me, open development is about informing the
masses openly about the efforts of the development
community to eradicate world poverty, and thus
increasing donations and support for development aid.
Anna Härri
Intern at Pro Ethical Trade Finland
”

8. “
To me Open Development means being honest when showing
the whole picture.
Being able to show all development projects and admit that development projects can fail,
even when that is not the desired outcome.
Being able to see who is working in a specific zone, no matter which organization belongs to.
Being able as a citizen of the world to get an understanding of how aid and international
”
development is affecting a particular zone.
Ruth del Campo
Director of Open Aid Register www.openaidregister.org

9. “
Open development is a process
Open development is about providing access to information, and permission to participate
Open development is about challenging closed and distant decision making on development
issues
Open development should sit alongside inclusive development, providing foundations for
greater inclusion
Open development is more than just using open data for development, or taking open source
”
to developing countries
Open development is still open to debate
Tim Davies

10. “
Open development means different things to different people.
Getting access to information in provincial Africa is vastly different than in the global north
where we are talking about IATI and aid data sets.
Information is more than data, it emerges from social process; relevant and useful information
often comes as metaphor and story. Stories that can be shared and debated.
More stories told by more people, more debate and more involvement in
a discussion about what development IS, this is open development.
Janet Gunter
Consultant, blogger, activist
”

11. “
There are different aspects of openness in development:
1. Increasing transparency and reducing friction – making use of technology to
make it easier to share development related information and knowledge in a standard way so
it can be easily assessed, compared, mashed up, acted upon by anyone.
2. Participation – using technology (and building upon transparency) to give people a
voice and to change existing power structures, and decision-making processes.
Openness in development is more of a journey than a destination i.e. new technologies and
shifts in power structures will I hope make development more and more open - but there will
”
probably never be a time when we can say that it is totally open and that there is no more
work to be done.
Ian
UN aid worker, knowledge manager and blogger

12. “
For me, open development means thinking about
the word 'development' differently. It means
that development happens everywhere, all the
time, in many different ways, and that we are
ALL complicit in the ongoing unfolding of
development.
Katherine Reilly ”
Assistant Professor, School of Communication, Simon Fraser University

13. “
Over the last 10 years, the legitimacy and effectiveness of one-size-fits-all models of
development and top-down models of governance has been challenged.This has been seen
most recently in the demands of citizens on the streets of North Africa, the Middle East
and beyond – and through social media – for more open, transparent and accountable
governance.
“Open Development” represents a new vision of what
development means, how it comes about and the role that
external partners can play. Open Development, ultimately, is
about people in developing countries having the information
”
and resources that they need to hold their governments
accountable and to make well-informed decisions to improve
their lives.
ONE
From http://one.org/c/us/issue/4299/

14. “
The Open Development approach is about supporting and
creating an environment of sustainable information and
knowledge sharing. Having a cultural environment that is
supportive of open approaches leads to improved access to
quality information and knowledge, and to more effective and
coordinated development efforts.
BELLANET, 2005 Open Development programme
Shared by Michael Roberts, Acclar.org
”

15. “
Open development is the opening of development processes (of
planning, implementation and monitoring) to all parties
concerned (partners, beneficiaries, donors etc.) in a way that
guarantees transparency, open participation and
communication, integrity in the process of decision-making etc.
It is about inviting the multiple knowledges concerned by micro or macro development
initiatives to be aware of and have their say. It is thus strongly focused on empowerment
along the participation scale (from open observation to open iterative decision-making - the
”
latter being obviously a much better guarantee for sustainable 'open development').
Ewen Le Borgne
Knowledge sharing & communication specialist, International Livestock Research Institute, Ethiopia

16. “
For me, Open is an attitude; a fundamental way
of being.
Individuals can be open starting with their body language, acceptance of others,
collaboration, willingness to really hear ideas, ability to share and modify what they are
doing and thinking, admitting mistakes and really feeling and demonstrating respect for
others, no matter where they come from.These same attitudes can be applied to
institutions and processes.
Technology is sometimes an enabler of openness, but not always. Development workers/
organizations can learn from horizontal and networked structures and other attitudes and
”
practices from the 'open' movement, and use tech and non-tech tools to help development
become more open, horizontal, transparent and respectful of a broad range of persons,
ideas and cultures.
Linda Raftree

17. What does Open Development
Mean to You?
Join us to explore different perspectives on open development
at the Open Knowledge Festival.
Wednesday 19th September 11:30 - 13:00
Inspire Auditorium
(and on #opendev hashtag)
(Or share your answer in advance at:
http://bit.ly/DefiningOpenDev)