What is a "whistleblower"?
What is a “whistleblower”?
The word can describe any person who knows about something bad or illegal that happens inside an organisation, and he/she then reports this. Sometimes, there is a difference between people who report this type of information without giving their names – they can be called a “source”; and people who give their names – a “whistleblower”. For example, Chelsea Manning was first a ‘source’, when she gave information, without her name, on Wikileaks. But then she became a ‘whistleblower’ when Adrian Lamo gave her name. And Julian Assange is not really a whistleblower, but a publisher who gives a space for whistleblowers to talk.
© Ben Jennings/Cartoon Movement
Did you know...
In Britain, they asked questions to 1,000 whistleblowers and found that after they talked about the problem in the organisation:
19% suffered some disciplinary action or demotion, 15% were dismissed from their job, 74% said nothing was done about the problem.
In India:
about 150 whistleblowers were harassed or jailed in the past 5 years, about 20 were killed.
In China:
15% of those who report corruption in the Chinese government are unhappy girlfriends of government officials.
The biggest ever reward to a whistleblower was $14million – to the person who helped get back a lot of money to investors, paid out by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
To take action on whistleblowing:
ORGANIZATIONS
International Wikileaks: wikileaks.org
International Whistleblowers, based in Aotearoa /NZ but international in scope: internationalwhistleblowers.com
Whistleblowing Network, an international network of NGOs: whistleblowingnetwork.org
Amnesty International: amnesty.org
PEN International: pen-international.org
Electronic Frontier Foundation: eff.org
Aotearoa/New Zealand International Whistleblowers: internationalwhistleblowers.com
Australia Whistleblowers Australia: whistleblowers.org.au, plus The Whistle newsletter, bmartin.cc/dissent/contacts/au_wba/
Britain Public Concern at Work: pcaw.org.uk
Whistleblowers UK: whistlebloweruk.org
The Whistler: thewhistler.org
Canada FAIR: fairwhistleblower.ca
United States GAP (Government Accountability Project): whistleblower.org
Pvt Manning Support Network: bradleymanning.org
BOOKS
Whistleblowing: A Practical Guide by Brian Martin (updated 2013), free to download at: bmartin.cc/pubs/13wb.html
The Corporate Whistleblower’s Survival Guide: A Handbook for Committing the Truth by Tom Devine and Tarek F Maassarani (Berrett-Koehle, 2011)
The Art of Anonymous Activism: Serving the Public While Surviving Public Service, a joint effort of US whistleblower organizations. Available from GAP: whistleblower.org
5 TOP TIPS for people who want to be whistleblowers:
● Talk to a whistleblowing charity for advice BEFORE you take action.
● Keep to facts and what you know; write everything down and keep evidence.
● Make sure you know why you are doing this – don’t confuse private problems with public worries.
● Be careful – the organisation often fights back and whistleblowers often have many problems if they trust too much.
● Prepare well – carefully choose the time and place for whistleblowing and how you do it.
http://newint.org/features/2014/04/01/keynote-whistleblowers/
