Our first strategy is released

Thirteen years seems like a long time to create a strategy for our organisation, but we think that Open Data Manchester isn’t a normal organisation. It started out as an idea formed from a group of people who thought that by making data open and accessible people could understand more about their communities and the decisions being made about them. This would hopefully lead to better scrutiny and accountability of those in power as well as create an environment for better decision-making and greater participation in policymaking. Open data also had the potential – a lot of it fulfilled – to drive new forms of economic activity through services built on newly accessible data.

Over the years we started becoming more critical about the role of data and open data in society. Who where the winners and losers and was our increased datafication exacerbating existing inequalities and creating new ones. There is no doubt data and open data can help solve some of the biggest challenges that we face as a society today, but we need to go forward mindful of the unintended and in some case intended consequences, and strive to ensure the benefits of data practice are for everyone.

This strategy is a snapshot of where we are now, what we are trying to do and how we are going to get there we hope you will join us on our journey.

The strategy can be viewed here