Neal Ascherson, 2 April 2020
21 March 2020 · 19mins
Like sturgeons and swans in medieval England, public information began as royal property. Today, we understand more vividly than ever before that information is also a commodity: I have it, you don’t; if you want it, you must pay me for it; if you don’t, I will use your lack of it to control you. Against this, and very reluctantly, a public ‘right to know’ has been imported into the Anglo-British state in the form of the Freedom of Information Act. But it’s a newborn right still struggling to survive against a centuries-old tradition of government.
21 March 2020 · 19mins