Yes, John, this is an enormously important issue!
We all know the statement attributed to Amartya Sen (and I think appearing in a short piece in the New York Review of Books some years ago) that a famine has never occurred in a country with a free press.
One of the very negative things about the secrecy that has enveloped the U.S. government under the Bush, Jr. administration is to make it much more difficult for citizen watchdog organizations, academic scientists, etc. to monitor such things as the location and amounts of hazardous chemicals stored in or near populated areas, the safety of nuclear and chemical facilities, etc., etc.
This is ironic because as Charles Perrow, Yale sociologist who wrote "Normal Accidents," with the lamentable state of U.S. infrastructure (in need of maintenance) and lax regulation of hazardous industries, the U.S. is more at risk from it's own activities than from those of terrorists! See his recent book, "The Next Catastrophe."
"National security" and "public safety" are real concepts, but they also can be used carelessly or lazily or can be intentionally misused, as some believe W and Cheney have in order to control the minds of US citizens with fear. This is very tricky semantic, philosophical, and political ground indeed!
Cheers, BEN
-----Original Message-----
>From: John Twigg <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Jul 23, 2008 6:06 AM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: freedom of (emergency planning) information
>
>I thought it would be interesting to start a debate on this issue.
>
>Under the UK's Freedom of Information Act, which came into force in 2005,
>reasons for exempting official information from the act's requirements include
>safeguarding national security, but it is not clear how far this extends to
>emergency planning in general. In the London Borough of Camden, though,
>disaster response plans are kept secret 'as the release of these could
>endanger public safety'.
>
>There are lots of ethical, legal and institutional questions to be debated about
>transparency and secrecy in emergency planning - it's not a simple issue. It
>would be interesting to hear the views and experiences of other members of
>the group.
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