2021 Solomon Lecture

2021 Solomon Lecture by Professor Beth Simone Noveck on Solving Public Problems with Data

Traditionally, the right to know is rooted in the belief that members of the public should know what their government does in order to hold the government to account, lessen the risk of corruption and shine a light on wasteful and inefficient operations. But, in recent years, especially during COVID when we all came to appreciate the value of data and information for helping each of us to make better decisions about our health and wellbeing, we have come to recognise that the value of information disclosure goes far beyond government accountability or even government performance. Instead, the ever-expanding universe of data available from government and the private sector have extraordinary value for solving public problems and doing so collaboratively with citizens.

When our goal is public problem solving, we recognise the important role that data can play in helping us, in particular, to define a problem and its root causes and increase our ability to solve it. In this talk, Beth Simone Noveck will discuss how a focus on public problem solving and improving people’s lives changes how we think about data. She will discuss specific policy prescriptions for creating a right to know that fosters better government, stronger citizenship and more agile solutions to contemporary challenges.

Beth Simone Noveck is the author of Solving Public Problems: A Practical Guide to Fix Our Government and Change Our World. She is a professor at Northeastern University, where she directs the Burnes Center for Social Change and its partner project The Governance Lab. She is also the Chief Innovation of the State of New Jersey.