TRANSPARENCY OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT BODIES IN THE CONDITIONS OF DIGITAL ECONOMY

Abstract

At present, the level of civic participation in resolving issues of local importance in Russia remains low. This is partly due to the lack of transparency of government. The new conditions of universal digitalization, a change in the format of interaction from offline to online in the mode of self-isolation, have changed the understanding of the principle of transparency of power. This determines the need to study the concept of transparency of local authorities, its components and the problems of its implementation. The article discusses the evolution of normative regulation of the concept of transparency and openness of public authorities, identifies the features of these categories in relation to local governments. The authors formulated the concept of transparency of local governments, highlighted its elements (openness and accessibility of information, initiative for interaction between local governments and civil society, reliability of information, transparency of management processes, public control), identified transparency development tools (modern information and communication tools, common regulations (standards) for the provision of information about the municipality, etc.). We identified problems that impede the implementation of the principle of transparency of local governments in the digital economy: the distrust of the population in electronic forms of appeal to local governments, the lag in digitalization of local governments from the federal and regional levels, the impossibility of fully converting forms of interaction with the local community into electronic form. The study allows us to determine the essence of the concept of transparency of local authorities and to identify further areas of research in terms of developing the concept of transparency and the mechanism for increasing it.