Intro to e gov

Chapter V
Introduction to
e-Government

Concepts: Government & Technology
Governments' use of ICTs is now well
established:
 from the use of mainframes for mass-
processing tasks,
 to email, WWW and the full-range of
enterprise IT technologies.
Governments adopt new technological
solutions.
Governments facilitate the
development of ICT industries.
Governments benefit from embracing
ICT.

Concepts : Government & Society
Governments are under pressure:
 from globalisation
 from fiscal demands
 from evolving societies
 from citizen expectations
They are expected to be responsive to
social change, to address
public concerns, to manage public
funds efficiently, etc.
The expectations on governments
grow as IS is more widespread.

Concepts: Response
Public reform:
 customer orientation
 business-like management
 citizen engagement and trust, etc.
ICT on governments' agendas:
 e-government strategies
 e-government development targets
 e-government coordination offices and
structures

Concepts: Resistance
At the same time:
 governments adapt slowly
 they tend to regard e-government as only
one among
many challenges they confront

Concepts: e-Government
Different definitions:
 Internet (on-line) service delivery and other Internetbased
activity by governments – front-office only
 All uses of ICT by governments, on-line and off-line,
frontoffice and back-office
 Capacity to transform public administration through the
use of ICT or new forms of government built around ICT
They reflect different priorities in
government strategies, and shift as
priorities change and progress is
made.

Concepts: e-Government Definition
Definition : e-Government refers to
the use of ICT, particularly the
Internet, as a tool to achieve better
government.

Concepts: e-Government as a Tool
 e-Government is not an aim in itself.
 It is a tool to enable:
 better policy outcomes
 higher quality of services
 more efficient use of public funds
 more efficient government processes
 greater engagement with citizens and businesses
 improvements in other selected performance indicators,
etc.
 e-Government is more about government
than about “e”!
 What starts as a technical exercise at
developing more responsive public services
becomes an exercise in governance.

Reasons for e-Government
 The main reasons to embrace e-
government:
 e-government improves efficiency
 e-government improves service quality
 e-government helps achieve policy outcomes
 e-government contributes to achieving
economic objectives
 e-government can be the major contributor to
reform
 e-government builds trust between citizens and
government

Reasons for e-Government
 Until now, the main drivers for e-government
have been efficiency gains and effective
delivery of policy outcomes.
 Recently, the focus has shifted to other
objectives: improving services, increasing
accountability, facilitating engagement.

Efficiency
 Cost reduction is the major driver for ICT use
by governments:
 replacing paper-based application processes with Internet
 applications – cut down costs of data re-entry and checking
 improved booking arrangements – more efficient use of
 scarce resources: skilled staff and facilities
 greater sharing of data within government – eliminate costs
 of multiple collections, data reconciliation and checking
 reduce government publication and distribution costs by
relying more on on-line publications, etc.
 Greater efficiencies are generated from ICT
projects that involve transformation of
business processes.

Customer Focus
 Adopting customer focus is the main part of
the countries' public reform agendas and e-
government strategies.
 Definition: Customer focus is about
providing citizens and businesses with a
coherent interface with government
which reflects their needs rather than the
structure of the government.

Customer Focus Initiatives
 e-Government initiatives to improve customer
focus:
 on-line portals focused on particular topics or groups,
 bringing together relevant information and services
 targeting of on-line information to specific groups of citizen
 so that relevant information can be found more readily
 e-mail lists to push customised information to specific
groups,
 whenever the information becomes available
 allowing identified users to carry out routine transactions with
the government as on-line government services

Improve Policy Outcome
 e-Government can help achieve better
outcomes in major policy areas, such as:
 taxation policy - improved collection of taxes through
increased sharing of information by agencies
 health policy - reduced demand for health services through
better use of health information and scarce health resources
 fiscal policy - reduced unemployment payments owing to
better matching of the unemployed and vacancies
 social policy - promoting the use of native languages and
awareness of indigenous people
 environmental policy – through better sharing of information
between national and sub-national governments
 It is expected that all policy areas will be
affected by e-government.

Economic Objectives
 Through reduced corruption, greater openness
and increased trust in government, e-
government contributes to economic
objectives.
 Specific measures:
 improving business productivity by administrative
simplification and on-line support for small and medium-size
businesses
 business portals providing access to economic information -
market trends, export opportunities, assistance programmes
 reduced government calls on public funds through more
effective programs and operations
 direct consumption of ICT goods and services by
government is significant and more stable than by private
sector

Public Management Reform
 Public management reform has been on the
agendas of many countries long before e-
government emerged.
 Reform and e-government are mutually
dependant:
 reform is necessary for e-government to deliver
 e-government is an enabler of the reform

Reform for e-Government
 Reform is necessary for e-government to
deliver:
 The promise of e-government will not materialise
by simply digitising government information and
placing it on-line.
 Instead, e-government is about the use of ICT to
transform the structures, operations and the
culture of government.

e-Government for Reform
 e-Government is an enabler of the reform:
 • it serves as a tool for reform:
 simplifies administrative processes
 makes such processes more transparent
 helps to deliver services in more efficient ways
 facilitates the integration of services and
processes
 enables seamless government

e-Government for Reform
 e-Government is an enabler of the reform:
 • it serves as a tool for reform:
 it renews public interest in the reform
 Captures imagination of political leaders and civil
servants.
 Raises citizen expectations, creating pressure on
government.
 it highlights internal government inconsistencies
 it underscores commitment to good governance
objectives

Citizens Engagement
 Building trust between government and
citizens is fundamental.
 In the absence of trust:
 the rule of law
 legitimacy of government decisions
 support for specific government reforms
 may be all called into question.
 ICT is an enabler to build trust by engaging
citizens.

Citizens Engagement
 Ways of engagement:
 consultation and feedback by service users – web
logs, questionnaires and feedback contacts
 citizen engagement in policy making –
consultation and active participation to better
address constituents' needs
 helping individual's voice be heard

Challenges to e-Government
 Implementation of e-government can face a
number of challenges.
 The following have to be addressed on a
whole-of-government basis in order to be
overcome:
 legislative barriers – e-government processes must have the
same standing as paper-based processes
 financial barriers – funding arrangements should account for
the agencies working together on e-government projects
 technology change – adoption of whole-of-government
standards, software integration and middleware technologies
 digital divide – large differences in the level of access to the
Internet and therefore ability to benefit from e-government

Legislative Barriers
 Governments must ensure that a proper legal
framework exists before e-government
initiatives and processes can take up.
 What is needed:
 Recognition of electronic processes and services as
equivalent with paper-based processes and services. The
legal recognition of digital signatures is necessary!
 Clarification of requirements on the agencies implementing
e-government: what they can and cannot do. Attention
areas: data security, technical standards, existing ICT
regulations, agency cooperation frameworks.

Legislative Barriers
 What is needed:
 Overcoming collaboration barriers:
• accountability rules designed to ensure responsible use of
public resources by clearly identifying who does what Who
is responsible for the shared project?
• performance management also follows clear distinction of
who does what
How to evaluate shared project?
 Legislations designed to protect the privacy and security of
data, to balance free access with society's expectations.

Budgetary Barriers
 Traditional public management funding:
 vertical funding structure
 agency is held accountable for achieving its
mission
 agency receives the resources to accomplish its
mission
 the resources are budgeted on the annual or bi-
annual basis
 This principle does not act in favour of e-
government projects that involve long-term
funding and collaboration across agencies.

Barriers to e-Gov Funding
 Factors acting against e-government funding:
 e-government is unlikely to win out in competition with other
public policy objectives e.g. health, education, security
 it is difficult to measure costs and potential benefits of e-
government, so to develop funding cases for projects
 if not treated as capital investment, e-government has to
compete with other pressing recurrent funding proposals,
and will seem to involve comparatively large expenditure
 governments are reluctant to commit expenditure beyond
budgeting horizons, and yet many e-government projects are
of multi-annual nature

Barriers to e-Gov Funding
 Factors acting against e-government
collaboration:
 the vertical nature of traditional budget arrangements do not
encourage shared funding of collaborative projects
 difficulties to assess the extent to which agencies benefit
from (and should contribute to) shared projects
 performance-based budgeting rewards independent projects
 at the expense of collaborative projects
 no framework for benefit-sharing, so no incentives to
eliminate redundant systems by sharing systems with other
agencies

Measures to e-Gov Funding
 Measures to assist e-government funding:
 classifying major e-government projects as capital
investment with up-front capital outlays and subsequent
benefits
 separate approval by the e-government coordination office to
ensure no duplication of inconsistency with broader
strategies
 public-private partnerships to overcome: capital limitations,
budget-time horizons, disincentives for collaboration
 central funding for innovation for high-risk demonstration
project that wouldn't receive funding otherwise
 a government-wide approach to the assessment of costs
and benefits of e-government
 ability for agencies to retain savings created by e-
government

Measures to e-Gov Collaboration
 Measures to assist e-government
collaboration:
 central register of e-government initiatives seeking funding
 central funds to encourage certain initiatives e.g.
collaboration
 lead agency model – an agency funds a project that benefits
other agencies as well as itself
 several agencies coordinating their approach to obtain
funding
 pooled funding – several agencies share funding for a
common project, under a semi-contractual arrangement
 agency payment model – co-ordinating agency funds the
project, other agencies then pay to use the service
 a mandatory levy on agencies to enable some joint projects

Technology Change
 Technology-related barriers to e-government:
 legacy systems
 lack of shared infrastructure
 too rapid technological changes, etc.
 Complex technical issues arise.

Legacy Systems
 Legacy systems can be a major barrier to e-
government.
 Integrating back-office information systems
with Internet to provide on-line access to
clients, has occupied many e-government
projects.
 Common solutions:
 middleware and web services
 data-exchange standards relying on XML
 Also, promotion of government-wide
frameworks, standards and data definitions by
e-government coordinators.

Lack of Shared Infrastructure
 Technology-related barriers to collaboration
between agencies and the uptake of e-
government:
 lack of shared standards
 lack of compatible infrastructure between
agencies
 Infrastructure development is too expensive
for a single agency.
 Shared development faces budgetary and
collaboration barriers. What can be done?

Shared Infrastructure & e-Gov
 Governments can provide a technological,
legal and organizational framework for
delivering electronic services:
 common technical standards
 common technical infrastructure
 whole-of-government approach to lower the legal
and technical barriers for inter-agency cooperation
 whole-of-government approach to reduce
redundancy, e.g. by adopting common back-office
processes

Technology Change
 How to plan development of e-government
facing uncertainty over the fast-moving
technological change?
 Public-private partnership is one solution,
provided they are in the areas where
established standards already exist in the
market.

Technology Change
 Other approaches:
 technology neutrality in legislation and regulation
 flexibility within broad regulatory frameworks
 adaptation of current laws to a digital world
 involvement of all stakeholders in the regulatory
process
 international cooperation to harmonise
approaches
 performance requirements rather than technical
specifications when procuring new technologies

Digital Divide
 e-Government can indirectly improve services
to citizens with no Internet access - back-
office improvements, however:
 Advantages of on-line services cannot be replicated off-line,
so people without Internet access will be unable to benefit.
 The groups in society with lower level of access are already
disengaged - the target of government intervention. Such
groups have higher level of interaction with government:
• establishing identity
• entitlement for assistance
• complex medical or social intervention
Some, but not all, suited for on-line provision.
 Many governments pursue policies to reduce
digital divide.

Intro to e gov

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