No human rights without the right to know
Access to information legislation was first seen in Sweden in 1766, with parliamentary interest to access information held by King Adolf Frederick. Finland followed suit and adopted similar legislation in 1951, the United States in 1966, and finally, Norway in 1970. Today, there are 98 sovereign states with access laws; of these, more than 50 are incorporated into their respective constitutions. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2006 and the European Court of Human Rights in 2009 both ruled that access to information is a human right, which was confirmed in July 2011 by the United N...