Almost undisputedly, transparency is now considered as a core component of good governance and
a prerequisite to a lively democracy. One of the main features of this development is the global
explosion of freedom of information laws, which provide citizens with the opportunity to request
official information from administrations, excluding documents subject to exemption. These laws
have attracted the attention of a growing number of scholars worldwide, with the focus on how
they should be built in order to guarantee access rights to the general public. This study is based on
oversight bodies’ perceptions of the present state and future perspectives regarding public access
to official information. It concentrates more specifically on the supposed beneficial effects of
transparency, the continuity and structural changes faced by oversight bodies and the resistance
displayed by administrations. The results show that although problems and barriers to access are
still clearly in place, oversight bodies remain optimistic about the future of freedom of information
laws and point out that beneficial effects have already been observed. Moreover, these effects are
generally expected to further increase in the near future.