"I have always felt that public, commercial and community organisations should be as open as possible about their affairs. They need to be accountable to their owners, their customers, their members and communities and other interest groups"

Openness across public, commercial, and community organizations is presented as a universal duty rather than a sector-specific virtue. The principle is simple: legitimacy flows from those affected by decisions, so visibility into affairs is the foundation for consent and trust.

Accountability is multidirectional. Owners may be shareholders or, in the public sphere, citizens who fund and authorize institutions. Customers judge value, safety, and fairness. Members of associations deserve insight into governance and use of dues. Communities bear externalities, jobs, pollution, cultural change, and hence warrant a say. “Other interest groups” extends the circle to employees, suppliers, unions, NGOs, and future generations whose interests are often silent in markets. By making information open, power is converted into responsibility, corruption is deterred, and decisions improve because more relevant knowledge and perspectives enter the process.

Practically, this demands clear disclosure of objectives, budgets, procurement, risks, environmental and social impacts, executive pay, lobbying and political donations, conflicts of interest, and performance metrics. Independent audits, freedom-of-information compliance, open meetings, stakeholder advisory councils, and accessible grievance mechanisms translate principle into practice. Openness should be proactive and usable: not a data dump but timely, contextualized information, written plainly and, where possible, machine-readable. Confidentiality, security, and personal privacy matter, yet the default should lean toward disclosure of decisions and rationales.

The benefits are cumulative: higher trust, stronger social license to operate, resilience during crises, faster learning, and innovation sparked by external scrutiny. Transparency reduces rumor and speculation, aligns incentives, and invites participation that turns stakeholders into stewards.

The warning is against performative transparency, greenwashing, metrics manipulation, and governance theater. Standards, watchdogs, and consequences are required, as is inclusion to counter power imbalances. Openness, practiced consistently, is not a tactic but the ethical posture of institutions that understand they exist by public permission. Such transparency anchors legitimacy and enables genuine shared prosperity.