History of Transparency in Politics and Society

History of Transparency in Politics and Society

Veranstalter
TU Darmstadt, Research Group HISTRANS
Veranstaltungsort
Lichtenberghaus, Dieburger Str. 241, 64287 Darmstadt
Ort
Darmstadt
Land
Deutschland
Vom - Bis
18.06.2019 - 19.06.2019
Deadline
18.06.2019
Website
Von
Martin Mainka, Institut für Geschichte, TU Darmstadt

International Conference

History of Transparency in Politics and Society (June, 18. & 19. 2019)

The demand for "transparency" is omnipresent. Transparency is the standard demand of crit-ical observers in almost all areas: in health care, in football, at the university - shortcomings in this respect are diagnosed everywhere, and those responsible are eagerly committed to greater transparency. Moreover, transparency is considered a prerequisite for good govern-ance, for political participation and thus for a developed civil society.
On closer inspection, however, transparency proves to be a problematic concept. For trans-parency is only apparently the characteristic of a political system. In reality, it is mainly reflected in political demands - complete transparency has not yet been achieved anywhere. Transparency seems to function primarily as an ideal, coupled with continuing experiences of deficits. Therefore, measures to increase transparency often stir up mistrust.

While transparency in day-to-day political business continues to be a miracle formula, a largely sceptical scientific research of this concept has begun in recent years. Especially in the fields of political and social sciences, media studies and law, a research context with conferences and publications has emerged. However, historians are just beginning to discov-er the topic. The conference is intended to provide a forum for historical research which deals with the concept of transparency in politics and time diagnosis since the Enlightenment.

During the conference we will focus on the invention of the concept of transparency, eluci-date corruption and transparency and political parties. We will discuss instruments for ‘transparency’, the role of transparency actors and the construction of the transparent politi-cian. The limits of transparency will be analysed in such contexts like secret services and economic policy. The empirical examples are from the period of modern history with a strong focus in the 20th century. Geographically, European countries and North America will be privileged.

The conference is organised by the Franco-German research group HISTRANS (headed by Frédéric Monier, Olivier Dard and Jens Ivo Engels) and financially supported by ANR and DFG. The scientific selection committee for the conference also includes Andreas Fahrmeir, Ronald Kroeze, Silvia Marton and Gemma Rubí.

Registration: transparenz@pg.tu-darmstadt.de

Programm

18.06.2019

09.00-09.30: Jens Ivo Engels (Darmstadt): Welcoming and Introduction

Panel 1: The ‘Invention’ of Transparency and Criticism of Opacity

09.30-10.30:
Olivier Meuwly (Lausanne): Entre anarchisme et libéra-lisme: Les premiers débats autour de l’idée d’une société transparente

Theo Jung (Freiburg): The Political Sphinx: Political Opacity as Re-source and Risk in Napoleon III and Benjamin Disraeli

10.30-11.00: Discussion

11.00-11.30: Coffeebreak

Panel 2: Transparency, Corruption and Party Finance in Romania around 1900

11.30-12.30:
Silvia Marton (Bucharest): Transparency and corruption in Roma-nian electoral politics (1866-1914)

Alexandra Iancu (Bucharest): ‘Everything must change if every-thing is to stay as it is’: Party finance contingencies and intra-party transparency in the beginning of the 20th century Romania

12.30-13.00: Discussion

13.00-14.30: Lunchbreak

Panel 3: Transparency Instruments: Parliamentary Enquiries in the 20th Century

14.30-15.30:
Sandra Zimmermann (Darmstadt): Between "clarity" and "darkness". The role of public disclosure in the Barmat- parliamentary committees (1925)

Ronald Kroeze (Amsterdam): Transparency’s rise: the Dutch RSV-enquiry and the context of the 1980s

15.30-16.00: Discussion

16.00-16.30: Coffeebreak

Panel 4: Secret Services: In Opposition to Transparency?

16.30-17.30:
Florian Altenhöner (Berlin): Selective Transparency. Pri-vate intelligence services in Germany, 1918/ 1934

Christopher Kirchberg (Bochum): Surveillance, control and trans-parency. Reflections on the relation of intelligence service and society

17.30-18.00 Discussion

From 19.00: Conference Dinner at the restaurant ‘Die Sitte’

19.06.2019

Panel 5: Transparency Actors: Whistle-Blowers and the Media

09.00-10.00:
Joris Gijsenbergh (Nijmegen): Struggling for the right to know. Whistle-blowers, their supporters and their opponents in the United States of America, the United Kingdom and Germany (1945-2018)

Martin Mainka (Darmstadt): Media as Transparency-Actors. The case of the SPIEGEL during the Flick-Affair (1980s)

10.00-10.30: Discussion

10.30-11.00: Coffeebreak

Panel 6: The (Auto-)Production of the Transparent Politician

11.00-12.00:
Harm Kaal (Nijmegen): The private becoming public: politics, pop-ular culture and the mediatisation of politicians’ private persona in the 1960s and 1970s

Vojin Saša Vukadinović (Basel/Berlin): “Let me make one thing perfect-ly clear”. Richard Nixon’s attempted language of transparency

12.00-12.30 Discussion

12.30-14.00: Lunchbreak

Panel 7: Implementing Transparency in Public Bodies: An Ambivalent Task

14.00-15.00: Cora Schmitt-Ott (Tübingen): Saving Secrecy. The “Com-mission on Protecting and Reducing Government Secrecy” and its ori-gins, ca. 1965-1995

Eric Dehay (Arras) / Nathalie Lévy (Tours): Une histoire de la transparence des banques centrales dans la littérature économique

15.00-15.30: Discussion

15.30-16.00: Concluding Remarks

16.00-16.30: Coffee

Kontakt

Sandra Zimmermann, Martin Mainka
Dolivostraße 15
D-64293 Darmstadt

transparenz@pg.tu-darmstadt.de


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Englisch, Französisch
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