Depending on how one precisely formulates what transparency is and what its
key elements are, the origins of the concept can be traced back to various
classical Chinese and Greek ideas about government and governance.
Researchers have suggested that there are multiple, interrelated strains of
pre–twentieth-century thinking
inspired the
contemporary notions of transparency, including long-standing “notions of
rule-governed administration, candid and open social communication, and
ways of making organization and society ‘knowable’” (Hood 2006, p. 5).
However, it is generally accepted that transparency as it is understood today
became popularized ﬁrst in the writings of certain major Enlightenment
political theorists, especially Jeremy Bentham, Immanuel Kant, and Jean-
Jacques Rousseau. Their notions of transparency – often posited as an
antonym to secrecy – reﬂected their presiding views about human nature,
politics, and international relations. For Kant, arguing against government
Social_Media_and_Democracy