The Ring of Gyges and Ridiculous Classes

Throughout the "Tale of Two Task Forces, I kept thinking about the philosophical legend of the Ring of Gyges.  If you don't know the tale, it's a story in Plato's Republic, to show the inevitable dangers that come with complete secrecy. The ring makes the wearer completely invisible (like in Lord of the Rings!).  Everyone thinks that he or she would only use the ring for fun, and certainly never use it for evil.  However, everyone gradually begins to use the ring more and more often for dishonest purposes, and in the end, everyone becomes completely corrupted, knowing they will never be caught for their wrongdoings. Gyges, who the ring is named after, uses the ring to rape the queen, murder the king, and become the new king.  

Complete secrecy in the government, I think is a similar tale. I like to believe that humans are naturally good, but I think that the two entities that corrupt most are power and secrecy.  Without transparency, it is nearly impossible for government officials not to become corrupted. Without checks and balances and accountability, it is much easier to succumb to personal (and often corrupt) agendas. 

In the Dick Cheney Task Force example, I think it was definitely wrong that the GAO was not allowed to investigate. I imagined taking a class in which I was not held responsible for my work: In this class, I feel that instead of writing blog entries, I will write personal diary entries, which will be completely private. I will still do all the work and read the readings, but I will only discuss them in private meetings, and I will grade my own work. At the end of the course, I'll submit my grade to the Dean.  Would I ever actually do all the work unless I was being held accountable for everything I did? Sorry to say, but no, I would maybe do the first few readings but would quickly give up. When it came time to graduate I would probably still submit my grade as an A to the dean. Maybe an A- if I was feeling particularly guilty. 

You may say that you would not fall into this trap; you would be honest and give yourself whatever grade you felt you deserved. And maybe you would--but the point is, without transparency, without people holding us accountable, I believe humans will almost always take advantage of these facts

To bring it back to the cases at hand, I think that both situations should have used more transparency. While I somewhat understand the idea that a full out investigation of officials sitting in on meetings and observing discussions would be rather intimidating, I don't think that the negative effects of this would be as serious as the negative aspects of having a system without checks and balances.  Timeliness may be slightly affected, but this would be a cost that we should be willing to make in order to maintain accountability.  In situations serious enough where officials must act quickly, it seems that it would be even more important that their actions are not secret.