Acesso à informação pública nas universidades federais: o caso das coordenações de curso do Centro de Ciências Sociais e Aplicadas da Universidade Federal da Paraíba

Abstract

Access to public information is a fundamental right indispensable to strengthening democracy. In Brazil, for many decades, a culture of secrecy has been perpetuated, with many challenges related to transparency. The enactment of Law No. 12,527/2011, known as the Access to Information Law, represented a milestone by formally establishing publicity as the rule and secrecy as the exception. However, many challenges remain for government bodies and entities to meet the established transparency precepts. Considering the context of the Federal University of Paraíba, this study aimed to analyze access to public information in the Course Coordination offices of the Center for Social and Applied Sciences, based on the perception of technical-administrative staff in the exercise of their functions. To achieve the proposed objective, a qualitative, descriptive research approach was carried out, using bibliographic and documentary procedures, employing questionnaires as a data collection instrument. The data analysis was conducted using Content Analysis and inspired by Interpretative Comprehensive Analysis, enabling the identification of analytical categories related to the knowledge of staff members regarding the Access to Information Law, passive transparency in Course Coordination, and best practices in transparency. The results revealed weaknesses in the understanding of the boundaries between transparency and the protection of personal data, as well as gaps in the understanding of basic concepts related to the legislation. A lack of standardization in service provision was observed, and there is no systematized institutional guidance on the subject, with training courses on this topic also being scarce. As a contribution, the study proposed a guide to best practices directly aimed at the service provided by Course Coordination. The results demonstrate that the proposed improvements have the potential to assist in improving practices within the UFPB and can be replicated in other higher education institutions.