IT Progress Stage and Management Level Growth in Local Governments

This chapter considers the management of local governments in a growing information society. We highlight two proposed models for the management of local governments. The first model is the IT progress stage. This stage considered the previously published literature. The second model is the management level model. This model indexed the appearance of management activities learned from an original empirical survey completed in 2009. We analyzed the relationship between the IT progress stage and the management level model. Thereafter, we proposed a common progress stage model for local governments.

Addressing Contextual Influences During ICT Innovation for Public Sector Reform

In recent years, ICT innovation is explicitly linked to deep structural reforms in public administrations. In this chapter, I examine the role of context, during the establishment of a minimal and accountable government apparatus, using the concept of negotiation space as my theoretical lens. The process of imbricating ICT innovation within the local context is viewed as a clash between local institutions and the ones carried by new Information Technologies. This clash is empirically examined in the case of TAXIS, the flagship Information Technology project of the Greek government in the mid 1990s. TAXIS’s implementation has been strongly supported by both the political system and Greek society. Nevertheless, ICT innovation did not trigger radical changes in taxation. Instead, it was infused by strongly engrained political practices which resulted in the implementation of an Information System functional yet unable to support radical tax reform.

ICT and eGovernance

One of the cornerstones of Democracy is the participation of citizens in decisions that affect their lives. This participation, traditionally, is exercised: a) through national elections and the body of representatives, and b) through binding procedures such as referendums. However, there are decisions that affect citizens’ everyday lives that require more frequent, day to day participation. Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) can create fast and secure communication channels, enabling politicians and citizens to engage in a mutually rewarding interaction leading to the development eDemocracy. However, lack of trust either between politicians and citizens or lack of trust of citizens towards ICT can raise barriers to this opportunity. In this chapter we discuss the issue of trust among government, citizens, and ICT. Our view is that it is nowadays possible to, at least, handle effectively the citizen-ICT facet of trust and provide the drivers for the convergence of eGoverment and eDemocracy realizing the concept of eGovernance. As a case study we present our experiences from the design and implementation of an eVoting system, which has the same strong relationship with eGovernance as traditional elections have with Governance.

An Examination of Global Municipal Government Privacy and Security Policies

This chapter highlights the research findings of a longitudinal study of online privacy and security practices among global municipalities conducted in 2005 and 2007. As cities worldwide implement sophisticated e-government platforms to increasingly provide services online, many barriers still inhibit the adoption of such strategies by the citizen users, and one such factor is the availability of a comprehensive privacy policy. The survey examines cities throughout the world based upon their population size, the total number of individuals using the Internet, and the percentage of individuals using the Internet. Specifically, we examined if the website has a privacy or security policy, does the website utilize digital signatures and if the website has a policy addressing the use of cookies to track users. Overall, results indicate that cities are increasingly emphasizing on privacy and security policies with major improvements in 2007, along with significant changes in the top ranking cities in when compared to the 2005 study.

Government and Inter-Organizational Collaboration as Strategies for Administrative Reform in Mexico

The use of Information Technologies in government as a strategy for public sector reform has increased in the last few years. Governments around the world are attempting to obtain the benefits of what is now called “electronic government.” However, Information Technologies are only one component of what should be a much more complex reform strategy involving changes in organizational characteristics, institutional arrangements, and contextual factors. Based on a survey of public servants from the federal Mexican government and using institutional theory as the analytical lense, this chapter presents descriptive results about the characteristics, objectives, results, and success of inter-organizational electronic government initiatives. Overall, the projects were considered successful, and some of these aspects could be considered important for administrative reform efforts. The areas identified with the greatest success were (1) improvement in the quality of service, (2) creation of a more transparent government, and (3) creation of the necessary infrastructure for the use of Information Technologies. In contrast, the areas with room for improvement were (1) fostering citizen participation, (2) cost reduction, and (3) increased agency productivity.

Guidelines for Successful Public Internet Access Points (PIAPs) Implementation

Keywords: Public Internet Access Points (PIAPs), digital divide, ICT services, e-transformation, e-government, telecenters, kiosk, mobile PIAP, multi-purpose PIAP, mini-PIAPs.

Transformation of Management in the Public Sector

Management is what makes e-government successful by coordinating the use of corporate resources, managing relationships, and empowering strategic alliances. However, current e-government methodologies and models used are only tailored to specific requirements. This restrains the ability to compare cases and draw valuable conclusions as to how to improve e-government and its performance measurements. Therefore, the authors are attempting to address the issues faced by surveying the models consisting of effective practices in e-government and Information Technology integration management and support. The study provides in depth overview of the current status of e-government models and links with emerging Information Technology.

Policy and Socio-Economic Contexts for IT Based Public Sector Reform in Postcolonial Developing Countries

IT based public sector reforms takes place within a contested policy and socio-economic context but one that often appears non-controversial since the pursuit of development is generally desirable. In this chapter we explore this context from two discursive perspectives, the dominant international ICT development dialogue associated with western institutions, and from postcolonial theory that emanates from reflections on the postcolonial condition found in most developing countries. They are presented as representing a contrived and an actual context respectively that give rise to policy-practice gaps. The discussion brings out the limitations of developmentalism when conceptualizing IT innovations and change in postcolonial developing countries, and suggests an approach that factors in postcolonial theory in bridging these gaps. This would strengthen existing innovative approaches and provide new analytical perspectives that factor in history, time, global geo-political structures, and the submerged potentially destabilizing voices in former colonies. Future research directions towards post-development and their challenges are also highlighted.

Which Digital State is Now at the Leading Edge?

As part of ongoing research about the transformative impact of Information Technology (IT) on politics and government, this chapter outlines developments over the last four years in the use of IT in the federal government of Canada and the Province of Ontario. Areas discussed include online political campaigning, politicization of government’s online presence, advocacy websites, online service delivery, and public consultation. While Canada and Ontario were previously considered to be at the leading edge and have made progress over the last four years, the 2008 Obama election campaign as well as online consultation and service delivery initiatives undertaken in the first year of the Obama Administration strongly suggest that the United States Government has surpassed Canada.

Data Mining Applications in the Service of e-Government

In this chapter we propose the exploration of text and data mining techniques for empowering e-government applications and services for the citizen’s benefit. In particular, we start by providing a field overview with respect to the current trends in e-government services and we demonstrate via proofs of concept the limited adaptation existing e-government applications entail. Stimulated by the need to transform e-government services to e-inclusion applications, we suggest the utilization of data mining techniques for processing the governmental data so as to extract and associate information fragments with real citizen needs and thus enable the encapsulation of the latter in future governmental decisions. To demonstrate the usability and added value of our proposed approach we have designed an interactive e-government infrastructure, the architecture of which we will present and discuss in our chapter. Moreover, we will elaborate on the system details, its adaptation capacity and we will discuss its usage benefits for both citizens and public sector bodies.