Page - 69 - in Radical Solutions and Open Science - An Open Approach to Boost Higher Education

5 WhoBenefits fromthePublicGood… 73 the set of practices towhich this concept refers are those adopted by communities responsiblefortheproductionofcommonsandpublicgoodslikeWikipedia,oropen and/or free software like thecode for theApacheWebserver. Similarly,most early participants in theOERmovementweremotivatedby the idea thatOERcouldcon- tribute tosocial justiceandthat thepracticesassociatedwiththe“open”ethoswould fit innaturallywitheducational theoriesandvalues likecollaboration, transparency, horizontality, andothervaluesof thecommons. Butthereisanothersidetotheconceptofopen,notlesspowerfulinitscapacityto mobilizeattention.WhereBenkleremphasizescollaboration,andtheempowerment of local communities through the commons, other proponents of open practices defend its role in efficiencygains and interoperability, concepts that are associated withtraditionalmarketmechanisms(cf.Evangelista,2010).Forexample, inthearea oftransparencyandopengovernment,callsformoreopennessaretargeteddifferently for audienceswithdifferentpolitical outlooks.For aconservativeaudience focused onso-calledfreemarketsandtraditional liberalandindividualrights,openadvocacy canemphasize theeconomicefficiencygainsof initiatives likeopeninggovernment data tomarket actors. For this audience, open government fits in perfectlywith an ideologyoftheminimalstateandfreemarkets.Butatthesametime,opengovernment advocacycanalsobetargetedtopeoplewithotherpoliticalconvictions, forexample asbeingabout the empowerment of civil society, favoringparticipatorydemocracy and thecollectiveconstructionofcommonservices.4 If thesameconcept iscapable toserve to rhetoricalnecessitiesofbothsidesof thepolitical spectrum, thequestion arises: forwhomand towhat end theexpression“open” isbeingput intoplay? It’scommonplace—atleast inthesocialsciences—toaffirmthat technologiesare not neutral, that their use andmeaning is at least in part political (Winner, 1993). Analogously,wecansaythattheconceptof“open”andthesociotechnicaldiscourses arounditareloadedwithpoliticalvalues,eventhoughthesearenotexpressedexplic- itly.Technologies, especiallycomplexones like those thatmediate thecreationand disseminationofculturalproducts,cannotbeconsideredtobemeretools thatcanbe usedforgoodor forbadpurposes.These technologieshavestructure, theyfacilitate certain uses and discourage others. Therefore, if open government can be used to advancedistinctpoliticalandeconomicmodels, thentheideaof“open”ineducation should also be analyzed criticallywith respect to the underlying assumptions that influence its goals and results.Open licenses, inparticular, canbe seenasakindof legal technology thatneeds tobe interrogated in thismanner. To show that these considerations arenotmerely theoretical,wenowexemplify the risks of not doing the necessary critical analysis by pointing to some cases in areas thatdirectly inspired theOERmovement:openaccess,opensource, andopen culture ingeneral. Wikipedia is thecanonicalexampleofhowtheinternetmadepossible largescale collaborativeprocesses. Its success isundeniable in termsofvolumeof thematerial produced,andtoa lesserextent in termsof itsquality.However, researchhasshown that the project suffers froma lack of diversity of its contributorswhich in turn is 4See, for example, theOpenGovernmentPartnership (https://www.opengovpartnership.org/).