Presentation at Open Legislative Data Conference, Paris, France.

Title: Open Data Analytics for Parliamentary Monitoring in Finland
Authors: Leo Lahti, Juuso Parkkinen, Joona Lehtomäki
Presenter: Leo Lahti

Public bodies in Finland are now taking active steps towards releasing decision-making data in machine-readable formats, and a variety of parliamentary monitoring organizations are popping up across the globe to ensure wide and transparent access to data streams associated with public governance. The new data streams are opening up new opportunities for academic research and creating a rapidly increasing demand for flexible analytical tools to fetch and integrate these information resources. Dedicated software libraries, customized to local standards and needs, are essential for realizing their full potential. Louhos is a Finnish initiative that provides general-purpose algorithmic tools for open government data analytics for the research community and beyond.