ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the challenges of access to information and privacy (ATIP) requests as part of a multi-pronged methodology in investigating the proliferation of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in Canada. The role of ATIPs has been pivotal in investigating the policy-making for, and proliferation of, unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in Canada. However, while ATIP requests are a useful methodological strategy to trace transformations within a particular space, they “rarely lead to full-picture explanations” of the topic at hand (Monaghan & Walby, 2012, p. 138), and must often be supplemented with additional methods. Initial findings from ATIP data highlighted a revolving door of stakeholders in Canada’s nascent drone industry with key stakeholders moving back and forth between roles in government, industry and the military (see Bracken-Roche, 2016; Gersher, 2013; Hayes, 2012). ATIPs and the other research methods deployed often encountered the same spins, stalls and shutdowns seen across security and surveillance research (Lippert et al., 2016). In a small, emerging industry, ATIP requests can be quite political and might hinder other methods of access, and thus must be balanced against how they help or hinder access (interviews, in this case). This resulted in the need to balance formal access avenues such as ATIPs versus gathering data directly from stakeholders as a result of correspondence and rapport building prior to, during and after conferences and interviews.
