Transparency and Access to Public Information: Institutional Mechanisms in the Academic Literature. A Systematic Review Using the PRISMA Protocol (2002–2026)

Abstract

The literature on transparency, access to public information, and accountability has expanded steadily over the past two decades, yet this growth has not produced an equivalent theoretical consolidation. This article examines the structure of the academic field and the institutional mechanisms the literature employs to explain the outcomes of transparency policies. Drawing on a systematic review based on the PRISMA 2020 protocol, complemented by bibliometric analysis and structured analytical coding, the study characterizes the field across its thematic, authorial, and editorial dimensions, and identifies both explicit and implicit expressions of institutionalist frameworks in the literature. The results reveal a field that is thematically diverse, authorially dispersed, and editorially channeled through a stable set of specialized journals. The analysis further shows that institutionalism does not operate as a dominant theoretical school but rather as a cross-cutting analytical logic, and that the outcomes of transparency policies depend on specific institutional configurations that vary according to the type of policy instrument and the context of implementation. The article contributes to shifting the analysis of transparency from a predominantly normative perspective toward an explanatory approach grounded in institutional mechanisms.