La información de las administraciones públicas locales. Las webs de los ayuntamientos de Cataluña

Amparo  Moreno Sardà; Pedro  Molina Rodríguez-Navas; Marta Corcoy Rius

doi:10.4185/RLCS-2013-987

Authors

Amparo Moreno Sardà Autonomous University of Barcelona https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7297-7900
Pedro Molina Rodríguez-Navas Autonomous University of Barcelona http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1586-881X
Marta Corcoy Rius Autonomous University of Barcelona http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9283-7884

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4185/RLCS-2013-987

Keywords:

Public communication, participation, information quality, transparency, good communication practices

Abstract

The information issued by government institutions must be complete and intelligible so that citizens are able to exercise their right to participation based on informed decisions and the media professionals can use consider these institutions as reliable sources of information. This article presents the results of the development and application of a method to evaluate the information offered by the websites of the municipal governments of Catalonia in order to encourage policymakers to introduce improvements to these platforms. Methods. The sample of study includes the institutional websites run by the government of 947 municipalities of Catalonia. The evaluation is based on 41 purpose-created indicators. Results. The results have been represented on an online geographical mapping tool, titled Map of Good Practices in Local Public Communication, which offers individual and general results and statistics. Conclusions. The publication of results has quickly led to improvements in the sample of websites under analysis, which has led the research team to apply the same evaluation method to the websites of the municipal governments of other five Spanish autonomous communities.

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Author Biographies

Amparo Moreno Sardà, Autonomous University of Barcelona

Amparo Moreno Sardà holds a PhD degree in History, an area in which she has focused her journalist career. She is Professor Emerita at the Department of Journalism and Communication Sciences of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she is also the Director of its Laboratory of Journalism and Communication for Plural Citizenship.

In 1974 she joined the School of Information Sciences of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she teaches Communication History, Media Research Methodology, Local Journalism, among others. She has also taught at the postgraduate level in other Spanish and Latin American universities. She has directed many doctoral theses and competitive research projects.

The criticism to the androcentric thought has led her to develop proposals to innovate teaching and journalism practices based on the use of internet tools for the creation of knowledge about the past and present, distributed territorially, cooperatively and in networks.

Pedro Molina Rodríguez-Navas, Autonomous University of Barcelona

Pedro Molina Rodríguez-Navas holds a Doctoral degree in Communication Sciences and a bachelor’s degree in Contemporary History. He is a research member of the Laboratory of Journalism and Communication for Plural Citizenship and Associate Professor at the Department of Journalism and Communication Sciences of the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

He has worked in European-wide projects, directed research projects on education and communication, participated in research and teaching innovation projects, exhibitions and magazines. For over 20 years he has worked as Professor in adult education.

His main lines of research are: communication, education and democracy; communication and social participation; history of communication and research methods. He has published many articles on these subjects in communication and education journals and books

Marta Corcoy Rius, Autonomous University of Barcelona

Marta Corcoy Rius holds a bachelor’s degree in Communication Sciences from the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She is a PhD student and thesis examines the news content posted on the websites of local corporations. She is a research member of the Laboratory of Journalism and Communication for Plural Citizenship of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, in which she carries out studies and assessments of the public information of local governments

She is also a journalist and consultant on gender issues. For more than 15 years she has worked as press and communication officer in two municipal governments of the metropolitan area of Barcelona.

She has carried out and published research on the representation of men and women in public institutions and the information published by Catalan local institutions.

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