Research On The Exemption Mechanism For The Open Public Data Based On Risk Of Responsibility Perception In China

The opening of public data is critical to economic growth,social governance,transparency and accountability system.Under the background of global public data opening,China is also doing the same work.However,we are facing the problem that the public data provision departments(government,public institutions and public enterprises)are not willing to open their data,as they are afraid of responsibility risks arising therefrom.Their blame-avoidance out of the fear for perceived responsibility risks will make it hard to implement public data opening polices effectively,and even leads to the failure of these policies.Although some researches advocate data opening by constructing an exemption mechanism,there are not many researches made on how to optimize it.Based on the cognition of responsibility and liability risks and its influencing factors,this paper draws on the experience of the exemption mechanism in the public data opening of foreign countries,and proposes the perfect path of the exemption mechanism in the public data opening in China.In this study,research data are obtained by interviewing 27 people who came from public data provision departments,competent data opening management departments;the responsibility risk factors that public data provision departments perceive are obtained with the encoding method of grounded theory and perceived responsibility risk dimensions are preliminarily constructed.Then,research data are obtained through a questionnaire,and perceived responsibility risk dimensions are acquired through exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis.There are totally 11 measuring items,and 3 dimensions of perceived responsibility risk:The responsibility risk brought by data disclosure,the risk of accountability of power and the responsibility risk brought by data utilization.While studying the factors that influence the perceived responsibility risks in the public data opening,the grounded theory is used to encode interview materials,combined with the existing theory,this paper proposes the organizational capacity,uncertainty avoidance culture,and the completeness of law and policy affect all dimensions of perceived responsibility risks.Then,research data are obtained through a questionnaire and hypothesis are verified through structural equation modeling.This paper finds that the uncertainty avoidance culture of organizations significantly positively affects all dimensions of perceived responsibility risks;the completeness of law and policies significantly and negatively affects all dimensions of perceived responsibility risks.Organizational capacity significantly positively affects the perception of power accountability risk,and does not directly affect the liability risk caused by data leakage and data utilization,but influences the two dimensions of perceived liability risk through the intermediary role of uncertainty avoidance culture.In addition,the completeness of legal policies significantly positively affects organizational capability.Next,this paper examines the performance and causes of cognitive conflicts reflected by perceived risk of public data.Summarize the problems existing in China’s current exemption mechanism.It is believed that there are conflicts between confidentiality and data openness,individual accountability and institutional obligations,individual interests and social responsibilities.In the explore of the causes of conflicts,based on China’s existing legal policy framework,this study compares the perceived risk of public data provision department with the existing legal policy,and investigates whether the liability risk is consistent with the actual conditions.The paper points out the problems existing in China’s current exemption mechanism,including:①The exemption mechanism cannot effectively exempt the liability caused by the unforeseen factors leading to the disclosure of third-party rights data;②the exemption mechanism cannot effectively exempt the public officials from the opening behavior;③lack of effective measures to avoid liability caused by user behavior uncertainty;④the implementation of the exemption mechanism is not in place.This paper investigates the exemption mechanism of open public data worldwide and summarizes the characteristics.Finally,the path of optimizing the exemption mechanism in the openness of public data in China is proposed,including three aspects:①The optimization path of the exemption rule in the legal policy.China should clarify and rationalize the legal system by enacting and amending legislation and rules.It is proposed that some of the current exemption mechanisms should be revised.Providing predictability of behavioral consequences for data provision departments and public officials.②Optimization path for contract exemption.In order to avoid the responsibility of the data provision departments due to the uncertainty of users’ behavior,this paper proposes that we should set a format disclaimer in the open license.③Risks management based on cognitive bias.Since the perceived responsibility risk is based on the subjective cognition of the data provision departments,the perceived responsibility risk is magnified,which forms an over-emphasis on data security and neglects open data.Cognitive biases can therefore reduce by changing the way the data provides departmental awareness,making the risk acceptable.In view of the problem of ineffective implementation of the exemption mechanism,this study proposes that China should China should enhance the data provision department’s understanding of the exemption mechanism.In response to the problem that data provision departments are not actively opening up data because they are worried that power is being held accountable,this paper proposes to reduce cognitive bias through organizational capacity building.