Misleading Title

The title of this article (“Transparency vs. Privacy — Where to draw the line”) misses the mark: Privacy vs. The Commons. Privacy is an interest (that of the individual usually). Transparency is not --- it's more of an idea. IMO, the correct struggle would be:

"Privacy vs. The Commons – Where to Draw the Line".

Semantics and Presentation

NB: I swapped privacy to first, making it the dependent interest (e.g., y value in a chart). The original title had it second as the primary interest (e.g., the x value in a chart). Now it's secondary, and rightly so.

NB: I did not put a predicate, “the”, before "Privacy" because I'm not sure what specific rights Privacy entails since it is secondary. I did before the commons, because the group rights should more often than not prevail, if not only as a matter of principle then also as a matter of anti-fraud, anti-corruption, and open book government (e.g., so that any constituent can practice audit and correct government missteps, e.g., versus curruption, racketeering, lobbying, et al.). Again, in the new title, the rights of the Commons take precedence due to the primacy of the group over the individual in general governmental affairs.

These "little" changes completely reframe the question. Now it's interests vs. interests: rights of individual privacy vs. the rights of the commons to full disclosure, inspection, review. And the rights and interests of the Commons are fundamental (x axis) and established. Individual rights and privacy are the challenger (y axis).

Salary Disclosure

After rejigging the thesis, there's the specific issue of salary disclosure. Shocking!

Really? Not so fast IMO. I think salary (and wealth) sensitivity vary according to social norms, e.g., USA sensitivity to salary and wealth seems above average. That's a social norm. However, salaries are not that big a deal, and open government (to inspection) can be very important. Working for government involves compromises. Open salary could trivially be one of them. Plus, salaries aren’t so mysterious anyway —- pay grades are standardized. Salary inspection sometimes reveal improper pay hikes (historically), bonuses, or other discrepancies which can reveal masked corruption. And, any non-standard salary probably deserves scrutiny and sanity checking anyway. Think: open book management.

So, despite US social norms, salary and income are not necessarily such a big deal, but inspection and sanity-checking of government are a big deal to ensure properly functioning (non-corrupt) democracy (i.e., interest of the commons). So I believe there’s a strong case that the Commons can have an interest in salary review as well, and that it should supercede any salary “privacy” issue.

Privacy Abuse (False Confidentiality)

But there's a bigger problem. Privacy itself can be abused. Corrupt government organizations (offices, departments, et al.) can use privacy as an excuse for false confidientiality to prevent full disclosure of documents. This technique can become creative, e.g., by adding extraneous salary information to a large document, and then claiming it's not available for distribution due to privacy issues. Or claiming it’ll be edited and released, and then (intentionally) never releasing it. Even worse, they can claim the document contains private material (even if it doesn't, because they didn't realize they'd get caught with a request). This information fraud happens with minutes, meeting documents, everything you can think of. So privacy itself is a powerful tool for corruption, cover-up, and governmental malfeasance. In other words, privacy is a two-edged sword which is overly powerful in the wrong hands (cover-ups, etc.). So due to such abuses, privacy should generally take a backseat to the Commons interest.

(That devil's advocacy is substantial, but wait... there's more, because this issue (privacy in general, but privacy abuse) is way more important and pervasive than generally recognized.)

Privacy's Perilous Catch-22's for the Commons

I will just add one more point. The abuse of privacy outlined above leads to severe catch-22's for rights of The Commons. If you can't get the document in the first place, how can you check whether it really contained any privacy information at all? (You can not.) If you don't control the political railroad (yeah, I'll just say it), then how do you prevent the technique from recurring? (You can not.) So privacy becomes a shield for corruption, fraud, political abuse, the works.

Stopping such political hijinx and fraud is a major (i.e., essentially impossible) undertaking like solving a crime blindfolded, and IMO should be avoided at virtually all costs. What do I mean? Well, if anyone even suggests there's a privacy issues with documents I need, then I want 1. them to prove I'm a privacy risk, 2. full review of the privacy concerns (I should have the docs by now to do my own review), and 3. their position fully reviewed with potential for termination with prejudice (for whatever job they have --- volunteer, paid, commercial, government). In other words, privacy can be abused to cover-up fraud, malfeasance, racketeering, graft, everything. So privacy guidelines need to be very, very strict, limited, and err on the side of the Commons.

Conclusion: Privacy Should Take Back Seat to the Rights of The Commons
So here's a stronger advocacy point, than just devil's advocate above:

Privacy is fraught with risk and peril and should be avoided in government whenever possible.

P.s., do I believe in any privacy at all? Sure, but rarely due to the risks mentioned above. Several areas with valid privacy concerns are medical records, law enforcement, and national security. In general, though, privacy needs to be secondary to the needs and rights of the Commons.