Five Change.gov Clues to Obama's Approach to Governing

As the Obama transition team gathers policy information and vets potential appointees, many outsiders are eager to know what the new administration will do and how it will govern. The transition website, change.gov, may hold clues to some of these questions.

It is important to note that the purpose of change.gov, as a transition website, differs greatly from administrative websites such as those of the White House or an executive agency. As such, it is difficult to directly connect aspects of the transition site to specific tasks or policies the incoming administration may pursue. However, there are aspects of the site that offer clues about Obama's likely approach to governing.

Transparent

Despite the incredibly daunting task of needing to prepare to take over management of the entire federal executive branch in just a couple of months, the transition team is demonstrating a strong commitment to transparency just in the efforts to launch and maintain a robust public website. Many of the traditional activities of a transition team are behind-the-scenes-type work — collecting input from experts, considering candidates for key government positions, and researching problems the country is facing. Despite the insider nature of this work, one of the transition team's first activities was the public website launch. With each passing day, change.gov contains more useful information and features for users.

The commitment of time and resources to transparency during this hectic planning phase bodes very well for the importance of transparency during Obama's time in office. Exact transparency policies are impossible to determine at this stage, but that the administration will attempt to be transparent seems a near certainty.

Interactive

There are many aspects of the transition website that would lead a visitor to conclude the Obama administration will be placing great emphasis on interactivity with the public. First, the site has numerous requests for input from the public, with standing requests for visitors to share their stories and their vision for an Obama administration. The transition blog then uses excerpts from public input on stories about community service and climate change. These efforts convey a new attitude that attempts to make government and politics more participatory.

The site also ties into outreach on other popular sites with an Obama transition channel on YouTube and a photo account on Flickr. Using these services indicates an aggressive effort by the transition team to engage the public by going to where the masses are, rather than requiring the public to come directly to change.gov. The YouTube video and Flickr photo postings also create opportunities for dialog with the public through the comments and feedback interested people can leave.

Another example of the emphasis on interaction and participation is the discussion thread recently launched on change.gov to gather input from the public on health care priorities. The thread discussion was initiated by a short video of comments and specific questions from Dora Hughes and Lauren Aronson of the Health Policy Transition Group. The site allows users to log in, leave comments, and vote for or against comments left by others. More than 3,600 comments have already been made on the health care question.

Missteps

Whenever new approaches are explored, there are bound to be initial missteps, and the Obama transition team's mistakes, though so far relatively few and minor, remind everyone to prepare for similar glitches from the administration as it seeks to establish new techniques and functions.

With high expectations for the Obama administration and intense scrutiny, these missteps have been immediately announced and discussed by dissatisfied experts. For example immediately on the heels of President-elect Obama's first "fireside chat" on YouTube, Ellen Miller, Executive Director of the Sunlight Foundation, noted the missed opportunity of the transition team's initial decision to disable the comments feature. Miller, whose organization explores innovative online tools for government transparency, wanted the interactivity that she knew the tool possessed.

Other missteps and concerns have been raised. Jim Jacobs of Free Government Information voiced concerns about the transition team's decision to exert copyright claims over materials contained on change.gov. Jacobs and other librarians argued that the copyright claims unnecessarily restricted use of the online materials and significantly reduced the potential benefits of the transition team's website efforts. Similarly, after the policy section of change.gov disappeared for a few days without explanation and was then reposted with much of the partisan campaign rhetoric removed, Tim O'Reilly, technology expert and advocate for open source and open standards, proposed that revision control be implemented for the website. Revision control, similar to the method used on Wikipedia, would only allow the public to see what changed and when.

Reactive

Change.gov also indicates that the Obama administration will utilize reactivity in governing. The transition team has demonstrated that the interactivity and information collection is being put to use. For instance, one of the videos posted on the President-elect's YouTube channel features a policy team member responding to questions on energy and environment issues, which were received from users via e-mail. Even more impressive has been the transition's responsiveness to complaints of missteps, as mentioned above. Within a few days of complaints about the inability to post comments on the transition videos, the feature had been turned on for both the YouTube videos and the Flickr photos. Similarly, on Dec. 1, the transition team announced a new copyright policy using a creative commons license, which gives visitors more freedom to reuse content from the site. These activities indicate that the Obama administration may do more than just listen — it may actually respond to what it hears from the public.

Innovation

The final, overarching characteristic about the incoming Obama administration that can be gleaned from exploring change.gov is the willingness to try new technologies and innovative approaches to traditional tasks. The website's use of videos, blog posts, and message threads conveys a commitment to getting the most out of the available online tools better than any policy statement. The previously mentioned YouTube videos with comments from the public are a good example of such innovation. This modernizes the functional dialogues that allow the government to learn as much, or even more, about the public's thoughts on a given issue. The online tools transform the traditional "fireside chat" radio addresses into national talk radio call-in programs that can be played at any time.

As the transition process continues, additional insights into the coming Obama administration will likely be available. However, it is unlikely we will be able to determine to what extent these new approaches will be implemented in the administration — at least until after inauguration on Jan. 20, 2009.

back to Blog