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E-Governance Developments in European Union Cities: Reshaping Government’s Relationship with Citizens
Abstract
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the challenge to governments is to improve citizens’ trust in governments. The Internet aids good governance by increasing transparency and customer-oriented service delivery. During the last few years, European Union local governments have expanded their presence on the Internet. This article presents empirical evidence on the nature of e-governance initiatives in cities across Europe. The findings could be of interest to cities interested in determining how their online presence compares with that of other cities. There are opportunities for information and communication technologies (ICT) to enhance governance in local governments, but the focus of the ICT applications concentrates technologies on the management and delivery of services rather than on other areas. The Internet is not yet running as an effective medium facilitating democratic inputs into the policymaking process. Our study shows that technology is behaving as an enabler within preexisting social and political structures.
... part of governments, while enabling citizens' participation in decision making (Ahn & Bretschneider, 2011). Other reported benefits include reduced corruption, greater transparency, increased convenience (Torres et al., 2006), direct citizen participation (Ahn & Bretschneider, 2011), and expanded the ability to reach larger numbers of citizens for improved service delivery (Alshehri & Drew, 2010). ICT helps make the interaction between government and citizens fast and efficient (Torres et al., 2006). ...
... Other reported benefits include reduced corruption, greater transparency, increased convenience (Torres et al., 2006), direct citizen participation (Ahn & Bretschneider, 2011), and expanded the ability to reach larger numbers of citizens for improved service delivery (Alshehri & Drew, 2010). ICT helps make the interaction between government and citizens fast and efficient (Torres et al., 2006). When accepted and correctly utilized, it also raises the level of citizen satisfaction. ...
... E-government is defined here simply as the use of ICT to provide government services. Torres et al. (2006) argue that e-government is not necessarily the same as e-governance, and the two terms ought not to be confused. They argued that both the public (government) and private sectors have governance components that could be enhanced through the utilization of ICT, and this is what e-governance refers to. ...
Urban agriculture remains a significant livelihood stratagem for most urbanites across Sub-Saharan African countries, yet the benefits of urban agriculture are usually modest. Urban food security scholars argue that the organisation of urban farmers is crucial in enhancing urban food production. However, the literature on urban farmer organisation in Sub-Saharan Africa is generally fragmented. This chapter adds to the literature by presenting an overview of the organisation of urban farmers and the implications on food resilience based on the experiences of Cape Town and Dar es Salaam. The overview shows the contrasting experiences of urban farmer organisation in the two cities and presents opportunities for learning from the best practices. Specifically, the experience of Dar es Salaam proves that urban farmer organisations can flourish despite a lack of an accommodative policy environment. Conversely, urban farmers in Cape Town engage in collective action despite the lack of formalised structures. Notably, the boundary between formality and informality of urban farmer organisation is not pronounced. As a result, it is essential to appreciate how urban farmers have organised themselves as a first step towards assisting them rather than expecting them to conform to typologies which may not be applicable.
... Overall, today's ICTs leverage the application and impact of the smart principles in street-level public service provision (Torres, Pina, & Acerete, 2006). As a result, higher-ranking public agents have become more able to respond to the complexities, dynamics, and interdependent factors that characterize diverse dimensions of public service and thereby better able to satisfy their citizen customers (Brignall & Modell, 2000;Chadwick & May, 2003;Torres et al., 2006). ...
... Overall, today's ICTs leverage the application and impact of the smart principles in street-level public service provision (Torres, Pina, & Acerete, 2006). As a result, higher-ranking public agents have become more able to respond to the complexities, dynamics, and interdependent factors that characterize diverse dimensions of public service and thereby better able to satisfy their citizen customers (Brignall & Modell, 2000;Chadwick & May, 2003;Torres et al., 2006). ...
... Although the public sector has developed and implemented a variety of smart principles, their value would be limited without the active participation of citizens in public policy decisionmaking processes (Torres et al., 2006). By responding spontaneously to the multidimensional aspects of the smart principles discussed above, citizens can affect work behaviors of street-level bureaucrats and contribute to promoting street-level accountability (Chadwick & May, 2003). ...
This article presents a novel theoretical approach that aims to enhance the accountability of streetlevel bureaucrats. The authors conceptualize changes and reforms in and around the public sector as a smart mechanism that is composed of two key dimensions; a) smart principles (i.e., institutions and technological tools that support citizen participation), and b) smart principals (i.e., citizens who adopt those smart principles in monitoring and evaluating street-level agents’ behaviors). Then the authors suggest a theoretical framework that explains how applying the smart mechanism can limit deviant behaviors of street-level bureaucrats and contribute to enhancing street-level accountability.
... Scholars have argued that a robust physical government infrastructure improves government function and can increase citizens' life satisfaction (Rothstein, 2011;Soifer, 2008;Steinberg, 2018). They have also maintained that, as it is dependent on the physical infrastructure, the state's virtual presence is unlikely to have an independent significant influence (Kraemer and Dedrick, 1997;Torres et al., 2006;Wong and Welch, 2004). In this contribution, we combined innovative measures of the state's presence with survey data to estimate how the local state's physical and virtual presence is associated with citizens' life satisfaction and how these associations differ between newly urbanised areas and potential sites of urbanisation in the context of China's urbanisation. ...
... By linking individual-level data from the 2018 Urbanisation and Quality of Life Survey and measures of the local state's presence in 40 carefully selected sampling sites undergoing rural -urban transition, this study assessed the association between the local state's physical and virtual presence and citizens' self-reported life satisfaction. Our results do not support prevailing views that a robust government infrastructure improves government function and can increase citizens' well-being (Rothstein, 2011;Soifer, 2008;Steinberg, 2018) and that the state's virtual presence is unlikely to independently correlate with citizens' wellbeing because of its dependence on the physical infrastructure (Kraemer and Dedrick, 1997;Torres et al., 2006;Wong and Welch, 2004). Conversely, our study demonstrates a marked difference between the local state's physical and virtual presence in terms of their associations with citizens' life satisfaction. ...
China’s rapid and ongoing urbanisation has led to the expansion of the local state. The state, traditionally exhibited as physical institutions of government, has emerged virtually in recent years based on intricate network infrastructure systems, such as social media platforms. Scholars contend that a strong physical state infrastructure enhances government function and can increase citizens’ life satisfaction; in contrast, the state’s virtual presence is unlikely to exert a substantial independent impact because of its reliance on the state’s physical infrastructure. In this research, we calibrated innovative measures of the state’s physical and virtual presence. Combined with data from the 2018 Urbanisation and Quality of Life Survey conducted in 40 sampling sites undergoing rural–urban transition, we further assessed how the local state’s physical and virtual presence is associated with citizens’ self-reported life satisfaction in the context of China’s national new-type urbanisation. Our results, based on three-level mixed-effects regressions, indicate that the local state’s bricks-and-mortar institutions do not correlate with citizens’ life satisfaction; rather, the establishment of a web-based, cost-effective, transparent, and coordinated virtual presence is associated with a higher level of life satisfaction among citizens. At a time when the Chinese central government emphasises its commitment to ‘people-centred’ urbanisation, the findings offer insight into the strategies that local governments could employ to improve governance quality and enhance citizens’ well-being.
... The adoption of digital government solutions by citizens, in turn, is impacted by the public's perception of their security and privacy protections, trust in the government, accessibility to digital services through internet and mobile devices, societal capacities for bridging digital divides, the quality of the information and services provided by the state, people's awareness of these services, and personality type (Venkatesh et al., 2014;Luna-Reyes and Gil Garcia, 2015;Gil Garcia and Flores Zuñiga, 2020;Cingolani, 2022). Digital government can often become lodged at simpler stages of development, such as the dissemination of information about government services, rather than advancing to more advanced stages, such as integrated service delivery and civic participation (Holliday and Kwok, 2004;Torres et al., 2006;The World Bank, 2016). ...
... Prior research notes how governments often face difficulties moving digital initiatives from informational to transactional and participatory stages (Holliday and Kwok, 2004;Torres et al., 2006;The World Bank, 2016). Researchers have offered more subdued assessments of Gosuslugi, in particular, based on its primary function being informational (Gritsenko and Zherebtsov, 2021) and for having a low number of authenticated users (Zherebtsov, 2019). ...
The penetration of digital technologies in government has been met with both optimism and caution. This study seeks to contribute to this field by examining how digital government evolved during the COVID-19 pandemic . Using media reports on Russia's government services portal (Gosuslugi), it finds that authorities made the portal a centerpiece of their pandemic response by enhancing its communicative, transactional , and participatory functions. These efforts aimed to not only house public health services on Gosuslugi, but to channel financial, commercial, and communication services through it, expanding Russia's digital corporatist state . While pandemic governance infused Gosuslugi with the qualities of a surveillant assemblage, it also made the portal into a space for novel forms of civic participation. Gosuslugi's evolution in this direction was limited, however, by security concerns as well as apprehension about digital participation. These findings highlight the importance of attending to political and cultural contexts in understanding digital government. In Russia, ruling elites' unwillingness to hold competitive elections and the public's lack of confidence in the political system limit the potential of digital government, regardless of its potential to manage crises.
... Governance includes formal and informal processes and institutions in public as well as private and nongovernmental organizations to guide collective activities of a group (Keohane & Nye, 2000) and e-governance is the performance of this governance via the electronic medium for an efficient, speedy and transparent information dissemination to the public, and other agencies, and for performing government administration activities (UNESCO, 2005). Torres et al. (2006), argue that "e-governance includes e-government plus key issues of governance such as online engagement of stakeholders in the process of shaping, debating, and implementing public policies" (p. 277). ...
... Apart from these, e-government stages include activities of cataloguing, vertical, and horizontal integration of government activities (Layne & Lee, 2001), and all G2B, G2C, G2G, and G2E activities using a range of information technology (Fountain, 2001;Moon, 2002) that overlaps with e-governance and digital government definitions. Even Torres et al. (2006) argue that "e-government has become an umbrella term covering almost all information and communication technology (ICT) applications" (p. 277). ...
The purpose of the current article is to identify the frequently used terms for the field of study that deals with the information and communication technology usage in the government and explore the difference and relationship, if any, between these terms. This field of study is inundated with old and new terminologies that lack clarity of usage leading to opportunistic usage, confusion, and impacting accumulation of knowledge. A three-stage search was followed to: (1) identify key terms used to refer to the field of study; (2) identify top ranked journals across social science, computer, and business management that publish in this field; and (3) identify the most frequently used terms in these select journals. The seven terms thus identified are smart government, e-government, e-governance, digital government, open government, e-democracy, and e-participation. The origin, definitions, and models of these terms is further explored, and their relationship is illustrated in diagrams of concentric and overlapping circles. The current study is a step toward developing a stable and dependable vocabulary that may benefit scholars in operationalizing the terms and practitioners in policy implementation and assessing policy effectiveness.
... The studies in this period are more stereoscopic, dynamic, and holistic. The benefits of digital government construction include support for good governance [12], cost savings, and efficiency improvements [13], as well as improvements in the quality of decision-making. Meanwhile, the challenge lies not in the technology utilization capacity but in overcoming the differences between government departments and hierarchies [14]. ...
Green innovation provides powerful incentives to achieve sustained social progress. However, the available research examines the financial drivers of green innovation, overlooking the impact of digital government development and the institutional environment. The integration of digital government construction with the institutional environment, and the coupling of the two with green innovation, will paint a picture of the future that promotes sustainable social progress and the modernization of governance. This research utilizes data from 31 provinces in China from 2018 to 2022 to study the impact of digital government construction and the institutional environment on the provincial green innovation efficiency. An empirical analysis is conducted on the basis of analyzing the spatiotemporal evolution and pattern of digital government construction, the institutional environment and the provincial green innovation efficiency. Firstly, digital government construction emphasizes data openness and sharing, and data become a key link between those inside and outside the government. The digital platform becomes an important carrier connecting the government and multiple subjects in collaborative innovation to continuously shape a new digital governance ecology. The netting of digital ecology is conducive to the institutional environment, serving to break the path dependence and create a more open, inclusive and synergistic institutional environment. Based on this, we consider that digital government construction positively affects the institutional environment, and this is verified. Secondly, a good government–market relationship, mature market development, a large market service scale, a complete property rights system and a fair legal system brought about by the improved institutional environment provide macro-external environmental support for enhanced innovation dynamics. Based on this, it is proposed that the institutional environment positively affects the provincial green innovation efficiency. Meanwhile, building on embeddedness theory, the industrial embeddedness of the institutional environment for green innovation highlights the scattered distribution of innovation components. Geographical embeddedness stresses indigenous resource distribution grounded in space vicinity and clustering. The better the institutional environment, the greater the forces of disempowerment at the industrial tier and the easier it is for resources to flow out. This may potentially have a detrimental role in improving the local green innovation efficiency. In view of this, it is proposed that the institutional environment negatively affects the provincial green innovation efficiency, and this is verified. Thirdly, digital government construction, as an important aspect of constructing a digital governance system and implementing the strategy of a strong network state, can effectively release the multiplier effect of digital technology in ecological environment governance and green innovation, continuously enhancing the provincial green innovation efficiency. In view of this, it is proposed that digital government construction positively affects the provincial green innovation efficiency, and this is verified. When the institutional environment is used as a mediating variable, digital government construction will have a certain non-linear impact in terms of provincial green innovation efficiency improvement. Building on the evidence-based analysis results, it is found that the institutional environment plays a competitive mediating role. This study integrates digital government construction, the institutional environment and the provincial green innovation efficiency under a unified analytical structure, offering theoretical inspiration and operational directions to enhance the provincial green innovation efficiency.
... In this context, existing top-down approaches (where strategies and policies are defined by the government or central administrations) have failed to accomplish their purpose as they do not consider many stakeholders' views and the vast diversity of local assets that go far beyond 'objectively recognized heritage'. On the contrary, bottom-up approaches, based on stakeholder participation, can be successful as they allow jumping from administrative-oriented organizations towards user-oriented organizations [13]. ...
Urban resilience must consider the ability of cities to cope with the effects of climate change. Community awareness raising and sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDs) are often mentioned in the literature as effective adaptation actions while the success of these solutions is highly context-dependent and improved planning procedures are urgently needed. In this framework, the URCA! project represents a good practice aiming to strengthen the resilience of urban areas by promoting the implementation of SUDs in territorial planning. The main objective of the present research deals with the role of participation in promoting the use of SUDs and their uptake in town planning and land management involving local communities, students, experts, local authorities, and enterprises. To this end, the research adopts a participatory approach to SUDs urban planning for three case studies in Italy selected under the criterion of maximum variation (Brescia, Genoa, and Matera). For the three case studies, participatory approaches are at different stages of development thus requiring appropriate ways of interacting and resulting in different impacts on decisions. Preliminary results, drivers, and barriers in the application of the participatory approach are discussed and compared in order to bring innovation into planning practices, stimulating a revision of typical governance mechanisms.
... Recent years have witnessed an expansion of European Union local governments' online presence, reflecting a shift towards customer-oriented service delivery. Torres et al. (2006) offer empirical insights into e-governance initiatives in European cities, providing valuable benchmarks for cities seeking to assess and enhance their online governance strategies. Recent research by offers a comprehensive analysis of human factors in cybersecurity, elucidating the intricate interplay between human behavior, cognition, and technology. ...
In the era of digitalization, this study comprehensively reviews e-government practices, focusing on the European Union member states, with a particular emphasis on Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The purpose of this research is to analyze the impact of public administration digitalization on corruption, utilizing a comparative and correlative research analysis. The study also investigates the clustering of e-government practices in the EU using Gaussian Mixture Models. The methodology employed includes an extensive review of existing literature on e-government maturity models, benchmark frameworks, and national concepts of public administration informatization. Data from authoritative sources such as the Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), E-Government Benchmark reports, and national reports, including Slovakia's National Concept of Public Administration Informatization, contribute to a robust analysis. Results reveal the nuanced relationship between public administration digitalization and corruption levels in EU member states. Clustering based on Gaussian Mixture Models provides insights into the diverse landscape of e-government practices. Furthermore, the study compares the digitalization progress of Slovakia and the Czech Republic, shedding light on the challenges and successes of these nations in implementing e-government services. In conclusion, the findings underscore the significance of e-government in shaping transparent and efficient public administrations. Recommendations include fostering international collaboration to share best practices and addressing shortcomings in e-government policy implementation. The research implications extend to policymakers, researchers, and practitioners, offering valuable insights for advancing e-government development. This study contributes to the ongoing discourse on e-government, aligning with the global effort towards sustainable development and digital governance. As governments strive to provide citizen-centric digital services, understanding the intricacies of e-government practices becomes imperative for informed decision-making and policy formulation.
... An essential overview that emerged from the EU historical and institutional analysis is the advance explored by the scientific literature developing: (i) the participatory actors, social sustainability and processes of a resilient society (Ayoko, 2021); (ii) the role of social movements and assessment of behaviour support, citizens' initiative and participation (Battista, 2023: 117-142); (iii) the role of social norms, public policies and social capital occurred at local and urban participatory levels (Christoforou, 2010); (iii) the institutional arrangements geared towards human development, solidarity and social dialogue in multilevel governance (Sørensen, Würtzenfeld & Hansen, 2022). Other recent historical and analytical research trends the ongoing emerging topics associated with participatory democracy and citizens' engagement and personality factors (Hügel & Davies, 2015;Zanbar & Ellison, 2019) retaining the support for four participatory processes of the resilient communities: (1) advocacy of citizen and community-based choices and initiatives (Mini, Nair & Poulose Jacob, 2019); (2) statement of democratic values and citizens' engagement in local government (Ramaswamy, Ramaswamy, Holly, Bartels & Barach, 2023); (3) acknowledgement of digital government, e-participation, e-democracy and political communication (Baranowski, 2022: 145-155;Torres, Pina & Acerete, 2006;Mourao, Rachel, et al. 2015); (4) scaling socialization and social sustainability for citizen empowerment (Beyers, 2005). Most recent articles underscore the essential contribution of the decision-making processes in mobilizing citizens, requiring social sustainability and social progress (Alarabiat & Wahbeh, 2021). ...
Resilient society and social dialogue are core topics for monitoring citizens’ initiative in participatory democracy as an engaged citizen often empowers governance facilitating active social engagement and democratic. (1) Background: The intent of the current research is to document and monitor the notion of “resilient society” and twenty associated topics in order to provide the latest emerging illustrations of the impact of social media on citizens’ initiative and participation levels in the European Union (EU); (2) Methods: Based on the Brand24 media monitoring tool, the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the social media reach focuses a period of one month (June-July 2023) with the aim to assess a better understanding of the resilient society and citizens’ participation; (3) Results and findings: The results of the research emphasize the role of citizens’ engagement and social dialogue for a resilient society by scaling the linkages between the historical, institutional and participative levels; (4) Discussion: The article shows how policy agenda and decisions, historical facts and social realities influence the social media reach and highlights the outcomes of the sentiment analysis and influence score of the selected topics.
... The approach is based on the principles of collaboration, transparency, and participation, operating within an open governance framework. It is also about opening government processes and decisions to boost citizens' engagement and trust (Torres et al., 2006;Meijer, 2015;Rahman et al, 2016). The year 2022 is the deadline for the European Commission to become a digitally transformed, user-oriented and data-driven administration. ...
... Overall, the scope of the reviewed articles revealed that currently, with the rapid development of technology, relationships among stakeholders can be facilitated through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) not only in states level such as the EU (Torres et al., 2006) but also in government relationships with its different stakeholders, representing both public and private sector (Adukaite et al., 2014). It was also found that the development process of the internet and ICT have had profound effects on the relationships among tourism stakeholders. ...
The aims of the present paper are to identify the gaps in the current literature on tourism governance and to propose an ICT-led model of tourist destination governance. By utilizing a systematic literature review of existing literature on the issue of tourism governance, the present paper reviews 85 articles from 419 refereed articles published from the period of 1994 to 2019, employing thematic analysis to examine the data. The review reveals the gap in an ICT-based model of tourist destination governance. Based on a systematic review of recent articles, the results display elements through which effective destination governance is ensured have been identified.
... Overall, the scope of the reviewed articles revealed that currently, with the rapid development of technology, relationships among stakeholders can be facilitated through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) not only in states level such as the EU (Torres et al., 2006) but also in government relationships with its different stakeholders, representing both public and private sector (Adukaite et al., 2014). It was also found that the development process of the internet and ICT have had profound effects on the relationships among tourism stakeholders. ...
The aims of the present paper are to identify the gaps in the current literature on tourism governance and to propose an ICT-led model of tourist destination governance. By utilizing a systematic literature review of existing literature on the issue of tourism governance, the present paper reviews 85 articles from 419 refereed articles published from the period of 1994 to 2019, employing thematic analysis to examine the data. The review reveals the gap in an ICT-based model of tourist destination governance. Based on a systematic review of recent articles, the results display elements through which effective destination governance is ensured have been identified.
... Mobile applications are generally aimed at fast delivery to users of public services, so they are built on a techno-centric approach. The usage of ICT applications is focused on the speed of public service delivery (Torres et al., 2006), reducing operating costs, although the experience of developed countries proves the lack of planned benefits after integration (Saxena, 2005). Quantitative evaluation of the effectiveness of e-government was conducted in a number of studies (See Table 1). ...
Technological solutions within the concept of m-governance accelerate the provision of public services to citizens under certain conditions. The main prerequisites for efficiency are the expected perception of technology, trust in the government's actions, the expected efficiency and quality of electronic communications. The purpose of the research is to study the trends and problems of e-governance development in Ukraine on the basis of the concept of m-governance through the assessment of the usability of the mobile application of the government "Diia" ("Action"). This study is based on the concept of m-governance, a technocentric approach to quantifying the usability of mobile applications within the digital concept of Ukraine "Country in your smartphone". Based on a survey of 800 users, the usability of the mobile application "Diia" was assessed. The article is based on a comparison of the practice of developed and developing countries. It has been revealed no differences in the effectiveness of the integration of the concept of m-governance. The results prove the importance of usability criteria in the use of mobile applications, but there is no connection between the socioeconomic characteristics of users and usability. The study proves the importance of emotional components in the integration of the concept of m-governance: trust, perception, expectations of citizens. Integration strategy and tactics are important, as digital user skills and application specifications (visibility, user control and freedom, consistency and standards, error prevention, recognition, flexibility and efficiency of use, aesthetic and minimalist design, help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors, help and documentation). Both the government and citizens are responsible for the effectiveness of technological interaction solutions. The study proves that the government should ensure the formation of confidence in the effectiveness of technology, develop a strategy, tactics of integration based on best practices. On the other hand, citizens are responsible for their own technological readiness through an objective assessment of digital skills.
... At the same time, social science research has been somewhat fragmented, with the impact of big data, surveillance and cyber security (e.g. Dinev et al., 2008;Ju et al., 2018;Weiss and Jankauskas, 2019;Percia David et al., 2020;Vishwanath et al., 2020) being studied separately from research on e-governance (Torres et al., 2006;. Where the former literature focuses on risks (e.g. ...
Exploring academic and policy thinking on e-participation, this book opens up the organizational and institutional 'black box' and provides new insights into how public administrations in 15 European states have facilitated its implementation.
... At the same time, social science research has been somewhat fragmented, with the impact of big data, surveillance and cyber security (e.g. Dinev et al., 2008;Ju et al., 2018;Weiss and Jankauskas, 2019;Percia David et al., 2020;Vishwanath et al., 2020) being studied separately from research on e-governance (Torres et al., 2006;Porwol et al., 2013;Kubicek and Aichholzer, 2016). Where the former literature focuses on risks (e.g. ...
This chapter provides a case study of the use of online platforms for national consultations in Hungary. The Hungarian government, since 2010 led by the national-conservative populist party Fidesz, has carried out the most extensive series of consultations in contemporary Europe. The consultations are dominantly conducted by questionnaires mailed to households, but recent consultations have also offered an online platform. Drawing on previous research on what happens when populist actors employ and institutionalize participatory methods (Batory and Svensson, 2019c), we extend the inquiry to include the use of an electronic platform. We find that the online component has so far not led to new dynamics, and to the limited extent that it had any effect, it has largely been negative in terms of procedural guarantees. Due to the weakness of technology to prevent abuse, the online version of the consultation eroded rather than enhanced the credibility of the consultation process. The case study serves as a cautionary tale to those believing that e-participation practices ‘by default’ lead to superior normative and/or policy outcomes.
... At the same time, social science research has been somewhat fragmented, with the impact of big data, surveillance and cyber security (e.g. Dinev et al., 2008;Ju et al., 2018;Weiss and Jankauskas, 2019;Percia David et al., 2020;Vishwanath et al., 2020) being studied separately from research on e-governance (Torres et al., 2006;Porwol et al., 2013;Kubicek and Aichholzer, 2016). Where the former literature focuses on risks (e.g. ...
... According to Ozga (2013), strong government focus on instrumental considerations has a lot to do with erosion of public trust. The problem is that application of digital technologies, such as AI, are seen by the public as being too focused on management and efficiency but not democratic inputs by being an enabler in existing social and political structures (Torres et al., 2006;West, 2004). These concerns about AI may in many cases only be a matter of perception by citizens. ...
en Using a survey experiment on the topic of tax auditing, we investigate artificial intelligence (AI) use in government decision making through the lenses of citizen red tape and trust. We find that individuals consider an AI-led decision to be lower in red tape and trustworthiness than a decision by a human. We also find that highly complex tasks produce decisions with higher levels of perceived red tape, but that this effect does not vary according to whether the task is AI- or human-led. We argue that researchers and practitioners give more attention to the balance of instrumental and value-based qualities in the design and implementation of AI applications.
Abstract
zh 通过使用一项关于税务审计主题的调查实验，我们透过公民官僚程序和信任的视角，研究了政府决策中人工智能（AI）的使用。我们发现，个体认为基于AI的决策与人工决策相比，前者的官僚程序更少，可信度更低。我们还发现，高度复杂的任务所产生的决策具备更高程度的感知官僚程序，并且无论任务由AI完成或由人工完成，这一效果都不变。我们主张，研究者和从业人员应更多地关注AI应用程序设计和执行过程中工具性质和基于价值的性质之间的平衡。
Abstract
es Utilizamos un experimento de encuesta sobre el tema de la auditoría fiscal para investigar el uso de la inteligencia artificial en la toma de decisiones del gobierno a través de los lentes de la burocracia y la confianza de los ciudadanos. Descubrimos que las personas consideran que una decisión impulsada por la inteligencia artificial tiene menos trámites burocráticos y confiabilidad que una decisión de un ser humano. También encontramos que las tareas muy complejas producen decisiones con niveles más altos de burocracia percibida, pero que este efecto no varía según si la tarea está dirigida por IA o por humanos. Argumentamos que los investigadores y los profesionales prestan más atención al equilibrio de las cualidades instrumentales y basadas en valores en el diseño y la implementación de aplicaciones de IA.
... E-governance is best described as "government-owned or operated systems of information and communications technologies (ICTs) that transform relations with citizens, the private sector and/or other government agencies so as to promote citizen empowerment, improve service delivery, strengthen accountability, increase transparency, or improve government efficiency" (World Bank, 2001) Thus, egovernance strives to rationalise transactions within government (G2G), between government and citizens (G2C) and between government and business (G2B). There is a growing body of literature suggesting that e-governance has several benefits (Twizeyimana and Andersson, 2019;Wang et al., 2018;Pereira et al., 2017;Cho, 2017;Torres et al., 2006). E-governance is adopted for the purpose of good governance. ...
... Enfin, les TICs dans les pays en développement renforcent le management, sans créer de possibilités de participation des citoyens à l'élaboration des politiques (Chadwick & May, 2003;Shiang, 2009;Torres, Pina, & Acerete, 2006). (2009) ; ces derniers seront donc exclus de la vie politique. ...
Waterfronts are strategic spaces because their development has a great influence on the whole city in several disciplines, especially its economy, as their redevelopment attracts many more investors and tourists. It should be noted that several waterfront cities have opted for "waterfront revitalization" operations, as this type of operation has found a very good echo throughout the world. Following the example of these cities, Algiers wished to participate in the operations for
the enhancement of its waterfront.
Indeed, this study aims to regenerate waterfronts. To carry out this work, we have taken the strategic site of the Bay of Algiers as a case study. To achieve this objective, we used the multi-criteria analysis method. This method makes it possible to evaluate and prioritize the different municipalities under evaluation, thus helping decision-makers to make the best decisions.
This work presents three types of results:
- A decision-making model that helps decision-makers to make the best decisions.
- A ranking of different municipalities of the Bay of Algiers according to the indicators chosen for the analysis.
- The extraction of barriers to the development of the strategic site of the Bay of Algiers.
To conclude, we tried to build a decision-making model that serves as a decision support tool, to see, which municipality must be taken into account in priority to achieve the desired objectives. Moreover, this model has the advantage of being transformed into a software or an application to facilitate its use by the local authorities in order to have the results in a short time to be able to act as quickly as possible.
Key words: Algiers bay, waterfront, revalorization, multi-criteria analysis, evaluation, decision making model.
... Majority of these researches focus on the users' adaptability and acceptance of egovernance (Tan et al., 2003;Venkatesh et al., 2003;Carter and Bélanger, 2004;Choudrie and Dwivedi, 2005;Sahu and Gupta, 2008;Williams et al., 2009;Delopoulos, 2010, pp.623-627;Almahamid and Arthur, 2010;Al-Badi et al., 2011;Alshehri et al., 2012;Mishra and Sharma, 2013, pp.136-142;Rabaai et al., 2015;Dahi and Zoheir, 2015;Kariuki, 2015;Abdel-Fattah, 2015;Yaw et al., 2017, pp.7-11), awareness (Choudrie and Dwivedi, 2005;Peña-López, 2007;Belwal and Al-Zoubi, 2008;Asaduzzaman et al., 2011;Al-hashmi and Suresha, 2013;Alloghani et al., 2017, pp.176-181), quality and interoperability of e-government services (Choudrie et al., 2004;Scholl, 2005, p.123;Klischewski and Scholl, 2006;Charalabidis et al., 2010;Bonacin et al., 2010;Kiu et al., 2010;Herbert et al., 2011;Alshehri et al., 2012;Konstantinos et al., 2014) and citizens readiness and attitude towards e-governance services (Torres et al., 2006;Akther et al., 2007;Kolsaker and Liz, 2008;Al-Hujran, 2012;Anastasopoulou and Kokolakis, 2013;Mohammed and Bin Ibrahim, 2015;Sánchez and Zuntini, 2019). ...
Abstract: E-governance transformation is not only about providing the services using ICT but it also entails building external interactions with citizen and businesses, enhancing democracy and enhancing the trust of the political institutions of government. It embraces among other principles, transparency, accountability and citizen participation in the public policy process. This study aims at finding users' perception towards the three chosen dimensions of e-governance, namely: transparency, accountability, and participation, in the Lucknow urban Agglomeration of India. It also tends to find out how the demographic variables affect the level of satisfaction towards the e-government services. These dimensions of e-governance are neither studied before in the Indian context nor explored earlier concerning some demographic variables. The overall level of satisfaction with the three attributes was less favourable for e-government's dimension transparency and favourable for e-government's dimension accountability and participation.
... A nivel académico autores como: Magdaleno [2014], Camaño-Alegre et al. [2013], I Vila [2013], Sol [2013], Esteller-Moré y Polo Otero [2012], Guillamón et al. [2011], López et al. [2011], Lizcano [2009], Serrano-Cinca et al. [2009], García y García [2008], Torres et al. [2006] entre otros, han abordado estudios de transparencia que han dado lugar a varias líneas de pensamiento, en las que se entiende la transparencia de los organismos públicos como: un derecho de los ciudadanos; como una forma de participación en la gestión pública, que refuerza los procesos democráticos; como la puesta a disposición de la información para todos los interesados; como el acceso a la información; como rendición de cuentas; ...
This work consists of two important parts, the first in which an exhaustive review of the literature on the subject is carried out, complemented with an analysis of the regulatory framework on the municipal treatment of social services in Spain. In the second part, a transparency model is designed and applied by means of sampling techniques to the web pages of 38 Spanish city councils, trying to find out the transparency of the organizations and the accessibility of citizens to information on the management of social services. Among the most important conclusions of the study is the difficulty in accessing this information and the lack of homogeneity in it.
... Ferreiro Yazigi (1999), Florini (1999), Florini et al. (2000), Matheson (2002), Islam (2003), Escudero and Llera (2004), Loya (2004), Baragli (2005), Guerrero (2005), Kaufmann (2005), López Ayllón and Ruiz (2005), Curtin and Meijer (2006), Hood and Heald, (2006), Florini (2007), Piotrowski and Van Ryzin (2007), Vergara (2007), Rivera (2008), Navarro et al. (2010), Cerrillo-I-Martínez (2012), Magdaleno and García-García (2014) and Fariña (2015). Transparency = "Access for Citizens to Information" Wallin and Venna (1999), Kaufmann and Kraay (2002), Abramo, (2002), Frost (2003, Emmerich (2004), Armstrong (2005, Cunha (2005), Kaufmann (2005), López Ayllón andRuiz (2005), Curtin and Meijer (2006), Torres et al. (2006), Piotrowski andVan Ryzin (2007), Naessens (2010), Bonson, Torres, Royo and Flores, (2012), Grimmelikhuijsen and Meijer (2014), Magdaleno and García-García (2014), Navarro et al. (2014), De Miranda andCañavete (2015), Fariña (2015), Rebolledo, Zamora-Medina and Rodriguez-Virgili (2017), Alcaraz-Quiles et al. (2018) and Avidan, Etzion and Gehman (2018). Transparency = "Accountability"à Decision Making Kopits (2000), Matheson (2002), Frost (2003), Meijer (2003), Emmerich (2004), Escudero and Llera (2004), Loya (2004), Schedler (2004), Baragli (2005), Guerrero (2005) Table 1 presents the seven clear theoretical trends identified in the analyses to date of the theoretical framework on the concept of transparency: fundamental citizen rights, citizen participation or democratic reinforcement, information availability, citizen access to information, accountability or decision making, best practices or fight against corruption, and finally, transparency in both the public sector and the private sector market. ...
This paper aims to design and propose a new measurement model for social services transparency in municipalities. The model includes an empirical study of 38 municipalities in Spain. The information published on these municipalities’ websites is evaluated through experimental quantitative methods using multivariate analysis. The municipalities chosen were those with the highest population that also disclosed the largest amount of information and provided the easiest access to their websites. The paper's conceptual framework was constructed by combining the Spanish legal context with a bibliographic review based on the latest transparency models. The research proposes a new Transparency Evaluation Model for Social Services to measure transparency in municipalities using the social services information published on the websites. Factors considered include degree of ease and amount of time spent by citizens in accessing the website. Some conclusions indicate that transparency remains difficult to achieve, information is less accessible to citizens than it should be, and transparency differs among the municipalities due to the legal changes implemented in recent years, as well as to other economic and social variables.
... As key information is primarily provided by financial reports, the adoption of accrual accounting and IPSAS is expected to accompany e-government initiatives (Torres et al., 2006). Accordingly, the following hypotheses are proposed: ...
The paper investigates the relationship between two central features of public-sector financial management reforms: accounting innovations and e-government. It focuses on the quality and ease of access to information provided by different accounting systems and e-government strategies. Based on a sample of 33 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries, the findings underscore the need to adopt a holistic perspective that considers not only technological issues but also the quality and integrity of information, its international comparability, and the socioeconomic context. The results suggest that both technical and social factors should be considered in adopting e-government.
... Finally, Chadwick and May (2003), Torres et al. (2006) and Shiang (2009) argue that ICT in developing countries strengthens management without creating opportunities for citizen participation in policy making. Shiang (2009) argues that ICT can lead to the emergence of new forms of segregation between the information rich and the information poor; the latter will therefore be excluded from political life, while coordination between different stakeholders is strongly recommended in e-governance policy as it plays an important role in improving delivery services (Kunstelj andVintar, 2004, Špaček, 2014). ...
One of the main problems of urban governance in Algeria is bureaucracy. Based on the experience of other countries, the concept of smart cities is becoming increasingly important, including urban e-governance which is considered as an important corner stone of smart cities. Hence, e-governance is proposed as a new tool to solve urban governance problems. Its main objectives are focused on strengthening credibility and accountability. This paper tried to assess the ability of Algiers bay municipalities to adopt urban e-governance policies and to see strategies to be deployed to solve urban related problems. To achieve this goal, the work presented in this paper describes the development of a Smart Synthetic (SS) model that could serve as a tool for policy makers to assess their policies and to identify ways to solve urban problems. This ‘SS model’ is based on the findings of relevant, locally based case studies from the bay area, to which the model is later applied. In order to achieve this, the authors opted for a Multi-Attribute Value Theory method. The application of the model revealed that of a total of nine municipalities, four are in a position to adopt an urban e-governance policy. However, the remaining ones have not yet been able to adopt such a policy, due to several barriers which are mainly related to the governance policy. The advantage of this model is therefore its flexibility. It could even be adapted to evaluate urban e-governance in other cities.
... Not all of these relate to the collection and algorithmic processing of data, as is the focus of this special issue; some are rooted in earlier digitization projects. There have, for example, been policy-led attempts to improve state-citizen relations with the help of digital infrastructures through so-called e-governance initiatives (Chadwick 2006;Chadwick and May 2003;Dawes 2008;Lember, Kattel, and Tõnurist 2018;Torres, Pina, and Acerete 2006). Recent technological developments, however, have initiated a new kind of digitization in the welfare sector. ...
... It is argued that incorporating new technological developments into existing services can lead to more efficient, effective and transparent ways of working (Berthet & Bourgeois, 2012;Bimrose, Kettunen, & Goddard, 2015;Cedefop, 2018;Hooley, Hutchinson, & Watts 2010;. However, caution is required to ensure that services and service delivery remain relevant to users' needs (Torres, Pina & Acerete, 2006), function effectively and maintain quality. Bimrose and colleagues (2015) emphasised that the successful integration of ICT into guidance practice depends on three key factors: policy support at both the macro and micro levels, workforce development to ensure that guidance practitioners feel confident and competent in this aspect of their work, and an ICT system design that fits the specific purpose. ...
Local government finance has a critical impact on regional sustainability and governance. This study seeks to conduct comprehensive analyses of evolving trends and future directions in municipal finance research. It aims to address the insufficient longitudinal studies and fragmented understanding of how municipal finance practices and policies evolve by providing systematic evidence on dynamic trends and potential future trajectories. The study employed bibliometric analysis using Scopus and Google Scholar databases and Publish or Perish (PoP) software to analyze literature dynamics and associated topics and research trends and improve understanding of local government financial research. The results show a strong focus on local governance. Key themes included transparency, accountability, and financial sustainability, highlighting the critical need for good governance and fiscal prudence. The promising directions are technology (e-government) and comprehensive actions on the economic side through public-private partnerships and financial sustainability. Critical themes are fiscal stress, budgeting, and local government finance. However, new trends in sustainability, public-private partnerships, financial resilience, municipal bonds, and land finance are emerging as significant research areas. It highlights the field’s adaptability to evolving social and economic conditions. Through a thorough synthesis of these insights, stakeholders are better positioned to gain a deeper understanding of the current landscape of local government finance studies and their broader implications within a constantly changing global environment. AcknowledgmentsThe authors would like to express their sincere gratitude to the Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Business, Hasanuddin University, for their invaluable support and assistance in this research. Their unwavering commitment to advancing academic research and community service has been the key to completing this study.
Special Economic Zones (SEZs) aim to boost the economy of a region or even a country. In Indonesia, as of 2022, eighteen regions belonged to SEZs, and Singhasari is among those regions—the only SEZ with a digital economic concept. In its implementation, a Good Governance concept is needed to allow for the organisation of management and the achievement of the goals of the development of the SEZ. Concepts such as Community Participation, Stakeholder Involvement, and Local Ownership will be discussed in this research. On the other hand, technology can be utilised to give value to SEZ. The digitalisation of the SEZ can be used in the implementation of Good Governance concepts as well as attracting people and investors to participate. The concept of digitizing the SEZ Singhasari area utilising Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality can be used to introduce the SEZ of Singhasari. Besides, there are also other features such as legal materials underpinning the development of SEZ Singhasari. This study used the principle of Good Governance that underlies SEZ governance. Meanwhile, the concept of digitalisation with the addition of augmented and virtual reality will be used as one of the breakthroughs to harmonize development in the current technological era. Keywords: Special Economic Zone, Singhasari, Digitalisation, Good Governance.
This literature review examines empirical research on smart technologies in eight domains and seeks to analyse implications for smart rural communities research. The development and implementation of smart technologies has the potential to improve various aspects of life in rural areas, including healthcare, mobility, and governance. However, the adoption of these technologies also raises important questions about their relation to communities. The existing literature is reviewed to examine the key findings and knowledge gaps. By using a sociotechnical perspective and considering the specific characteristics of rural communities, the discussion is focused on how smart technologies can contribute to rural contexts. Further, policy implications are considered, encompassing the requirement for a holistic and inclusive approach to the implementation of smart technologies in rural areas. Implementation should address the specific needs, challenges, economic and infrastructural conditions, social structures, and cultural contexts of the respective communities. Future research and exploration of smart community concepts in rural contexts are suggested to improve smart technology implementation.
This paper explores the relationship between the United Nations (UN) e-government index (EGDI) and egovernment development in Africa from 2010 to 2020 and forecasts the effect of e-government on the actualization of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) in Africa by 2030. To achieve the objectives, secondary data were collected on EDGI, online service delivery index (OSI), telecommunication infrastructure index (TII) and human capital index (HCI) from UN e-government survey spanning 2010-2020. The study utilized an improved modelled technique of panel data regression for cross-sectional observations. The finding indicates that there exists a positive and significant impact of the OSI, TII, and HCI on the overall EGDI in Africa. The study also revealed that there is a strong and positive relationship between E-government Development Indicators and the achievement of UN SDGs in Africa. This implies that African nations will experience a slow and insignificant increase from 2022 with an EGDI value of 0.4208 to 0.4331 in 2024, implying a 2.9% slight increment. The predicted value further shows that there will be a decrease from the EGDI value of 0.4331 in 2024 to 0.4330 in 2026, while the average EGDI value will increase slightly to 0.4346 in 2028 and finally to 0.4369 in the year 2030, which is equivalent to a 0.5% increment. EGDI value obtained predicts that Africa may not attain UN SDGs by 2030. Accordingly, the study recommends that drastic measures be taken to improve the three indices.
This chapter outlines findings of the research that focused on how ICT are used in municipal PB in Czechia. As such it connects participatory budgeting and e-participation. We looked at web pages dedicated to PB of all 66 municipalities that implemented PB in 2020 (using the same research protocol, we mapped situation either on official web pages of the municipalities or on their special web pages dedicated to PB). We found that ICT were clearly supporting PB processes in Czech municipalities and the analysis highlighted several interesting features of ICT in municipal PB in the country. Municipalities not only use the web pages for informing about PB; most of them also use online tools for voting. On the other hand, public hearings are organized online only scarcely.
The pandemic dramatically altered the lives of people in their cities of residence and caused profound effects on both. The urgency to mitigate the pandemic has generated severe effects on society in general, such as economic paralysis, the annulment of social conviviality, the threat to employment and the non-existence of various accessibilities. However, cities should not disappear and have seen a huge adaptation to technologies and an unprecedented digital transformation coupled with good governance practices in order to minimise the effects of these disruptive blockages. Thus, the objective of this study is the measurement of smart performance in cities in pandemic times. To respond to this objective, the composite index of Rodrigues & Franco (2019) for city intelligence based on the subdimensions governance and ICT was adopted, thus following the quantitative methodology and resorting to secondary data. Moreover, this index measures the adjective smartness distinct from smart, whose adoption by cities provides a smart way to solve their daily problems. The sample covered the 308 Portuguese cities and towns, commonly known as municipalities. The results obtained still show some weaknesses to be overcome by municipalities in the future, if they opt for a continued commitment to governance models based on ICT, although the future path is challenging, so that the returns of these strategies are converted into effective offers of hard and soft amenities to citizens, in which urban networks play a key role, with exponential effects on the new demands of citizens regarding their quality of life, given that the pandemic has manifestly changed their behaviours and lifestyles. Finally, the final considerations, implications for theory and practice, limitations and future research agenda are presented.
Using the panel data of China from 2007 to 2016, this paper explores the relationship between environmental regulation and industrial structure upgrading. The results show that environmental regulation has a causally positive impact on the upgrading of industrial structure. To explain the positive causal effect of environmental regulation, we adopt the mediation effect method and then confirm that allocated labor rather than technological innovation is a significant channel by which such regulation affects industrial structure upgrading. Ultimately, this paper complements the existing economic literature by justifying that labor allocation is a key mechanism to upgrade industrial structure in China.
The effect of transparency indicators on corruption such as budget transparency, e-government, and regulation quality has received considerable attention in recent years. This paper gives some new evidence on this issue using an indicator of open budget index, e-government index and, regulatory quality as transparency indicators. From this perspective, this paper estimates the impact of regulatory quality, e-government index and, open budget index on corruption using unbalanced panel data analysis for selected 48 countries over the period of 2004 to 2015. The results of the analysis reveal that regulatory quality, budget transparency, and e-government indexes have positive and statistically significant effect on corruption.
What are the relationships that exist between Information and Communication technologies (ICT)-enabled citizen-government collaboration and sustainable urban development? And, how do contextual circumstances influence these relationships? This chapter is focused on answering the preceding questions in four phases.
The first phase of the chapter covers how smart governance, in the sense of ICT-enabled government-citizen collaboration to advance urban sustainability, is still rare; despite the fact of increasing a variety of collaboration-based digital instruments and the dominance of a one way information supply in citizen-government interactions. In other words, although governments promote online and offline citizen engagement and civic empowerment, in practice, they do not encourage deliberation or any broad based public-civil interactions. Therefore, ICT-supported government-citizen cooperation for collectively shaping public matters seldom occurs.
Second, this chapter explains why the evidence that smart governance contributes to sustainability is sparse and mixed. The second phase also explains why smart governance activities lead to more livable cities–cities with less social deprivation, more ecological diversity, and enhanced economic prosperity.
The third phase of the chapter covers why there is more evidence for the process effects of smart governance. In other words, this phase focuses on the solitary–particularly the social aspects, instead of assessing the sustainability in its integrated economic, social, and environmental outcomes.
Finally, the fourth phase of the chapter concludes as to why context matters: We identified specific contextual factors such as the policy domain, political-institutional (e.g., democracy, innovation, administration styles), societal (e.g., Internet reach and use in the society, trust), and socio-spatial (e.g., topography of the city, local-specific social cohesion) dimensions. These contextual factors influence the distinct components of smart governance (the role of governments and citizens as well as ICT use); and, define how local governments and citizens collaborate through new electronic resources--which in turn, determine the potential of advancing urban sustainability.
Digitalisation and adaptation of governance to the digital age arguably transform the relationship between agents (i.e., public institutions) and clients (i.e., citizens) in policy-making. E-governance is the most widely used term for the result of this digital transformation in view of the changing nature of politics. This special issue zooms into digitalised public services by discussing practices and challenges in their provision, usage and evaluation. In doing so, it highlights interaction of e-governance (relationship among citizens, government, public and private actors notably in the context of digitalisation and innovation) and e-government (public services enabled by ICT). Contributions to the special issue identify challenges and pitfalls in implementing and evaluating e-governance by analysing different policy areas and geographical regions. The findings of the contributions suggest that factors of e-governance performance that potentially serve as evaluation criteria tend to be (overly) sensitive to context, i.e. policy area, systemic constellations, institutional settings, and administrative traditions in question. Consequently, attempts to evaluate e-governance, at least based on the empirical insight demonstrated in this special issue, remain limited to specific tools, instruments and contexts through which e-governance is operationalised and delivered (e.g., websites, projects and policy initiatives).
Governments around the world have been pressured to implement e-Government programs in order to improve the government-citizen dialogue. The authors of this article review prior literature on such efforts to find if they lead to increased democratic participation (“e-Democracy”) for the affected citizens, with a focus on the key concepts of transparency, openness, and engagement. The authors find that such efforts are a starting point toward e-Democracy, but the journey is far from complete.
This chapter explores the opportunities, limitations, and risks of integrating multiple channels of citizen engagement within a democratic innovation. Using examples and case studies of recent face-to-face and online multichannel democratic innovations, the authors challenge the emerging consensus that redundancy and diversification of venues of participation are always positively correlated with the success of democratic innovations. Applying their concrete experience in areas of the world in which a systemic organization of different channels of citizen participation exists, the authors provide guidelines for achieving better integration of multiple channels of social dialogue.
The rapid growth of cities and the high frequency of crises have prompted local governments and municipalities to use evolving technologies, especially information and communication technologies, to serve citizens and attract public participation. Therefore, smart governance, one of the foundations of the smart city, was introduced as "a comprehensive socio-technical approach, which aligns the potential of technology with new styles of local government and citizen interaction, to tackle urban issues based on the principles of sustainability." However, empirical reports have contradicted theoretical studies, proving that establishing a model of smart urban governance and realizing sustainability is not as easy as writing them. Excessively optimistic attitudes about the sustainability results of the citizens' and municipalities' participation through technology, along with the available empirical evidence, led the authors to review the literature. The purpose of this study was to fill the research gaps in the scientific and experimental literature and answer the main question of the article; What is the relationship between citizens' participation through ICT, with sustainable urban development, and what are the contextual factors affecting this relationship and outcomes? In this regard, we have systematically reviewed and analyzed 90 scientific studies and practical reports in CMA 3.0 software. The results indicate that although realizing sustainability through smart governance is possible, but this requires the coordination of elements of smart urban governance (municipalities, public participation, and technology), taking into account the impact of contextual factors on the formation of this process. Because if the urban management can not direct the participation of citizens through technology based on contextual factors and towards sustainable development, smart governance will have no result other than wasting resources and imposing costs on the city's management.
Web accessibility has become important as more governments leverage technology to provide digital services to their citizens. Making governmental services available online has the potential to improve public service delivery, while at the same time improving processes and thus optimizing public administration. The basic purpose of e-government is to make services easily accessible to citizens and businesses at local and national levels. However, accessibility of e-government remains a challenge for people living with disabilities. As recommended by the United Nations, e-government deployment must not leave anyone behind if it is to ensure sustainability and develop resilience of societies.
This research work developed a framework for trust management in mobile ambient home network with a view to secure the home devices and channel against attacks. The proposed framework called mobile ambient social trust consist of mobile ad hoc network to provide network for the home devices, the remote user devices that connect to the home using social network platform through the Internet, the application server that coordinates the activities of the home network and the home services such as communication services, entertainment, home control and home networking. The trust management, global reputation aggregation which considered the direct and indirect communication of home devices and remote devices was employed for device attacks. While real time dynamic source routing protocol was employed for
channel attacks to prevent selfish and malicious nodes. The prototype of the framework was implemented
using Java 2 mobile edition (J2ME).The framework will enhance the activities in the home by securing
the home network against unforeseen network disruption and node misbehavior due to the distributed
nature of the environment.
Bu çalışmada, yurttaşların kamu yönetimine güveninin, e-devlet çabalarından nasıl etkilendiği sorusu yönetsel açıdan yanıtlanmaya çalışılmıştır. Bu bağlamda, güven ve e-devlet olguları tanımlanmış, e-devletin güvenle ilişkisi açıklanmış, güven açısından e-devletin geleneksel ve yeni kamu yönetimi yaklaşımları karşısındaki yeri ve önemi açıklığa kavuşturulmuştur.
Anahtar Sözcükler: Güven, E-Devlet, Geleneksel Kamu Yönetimi, Yeni Kamu Yönetimi.
In this study the question on how the trust of citizens in public administration is influenced by the e-government efforts is tried to be answered from an administrative point of view. In this connection, trust and e-government phenomena are defined, the relation of e-government to trust is explained and, concerning confidential attitudes, the role, place and importance of the e-government in relation to the traditional and the new approaches in public administration are clarified.
Keywords: Trust, E-Government, Traditional Public Administration, New Public Management.
This chapter provides an overview of the government characteristics relevant to smart urban governance. A systematic literature review was conducted and merged with the existing e-government literature on critical success factors for adopting IT in the public sector. Identifying the government characteristics of smart governance sheds light on key organizational attributes that can pave the way for the transition from government to smart urban governance. The qualitative analysis of 96 articles on the governance of smart cities identified three main characteristics. The first is local government governance, related to the nature of the relationship among individuals, interest groups, institutions, and government. The second is government assets, which we believe are useful for providing support to smart urban governance in the form of funding, technology, and human capital. The third includes local government management, involving elements of strategy and the positioning of local public administration. Compared to literature in e-government, the governmental characteristics are quite similar, however, the focus of e-government is to transform the organization internally, while in smart urban governance literature, the focus is to transform both internally and externally. Future research should focus on understanding how governments could develop organizational capabilities to achieve internal and external transformation.
E-governance is a technological innovation that brings governance to the fore of integrity and accountability. It requires high technological commitment so as to bring the government closer to the people. Corruption on the other hand is a bane to growth and development in any country. E-governance is a corrective measure to corruption which prevents government officials from shady activities due to its transparency nature. The connection between e-governance and corruption is analyzed in this chapter, and Nigeria is selected as a case study in developing countries. The chapter concludes on the premise that e-governance reduces the strength of corruption in any country and more investment is needed to enhance this development.
Smart governance is one of the characteristics of smart cities, having its roots in e-government, in the principles of good governance, and in the assumptions of citizens' participation and involvement in public decision-making. This chapter aims to answer the question: “What smart governance practices are being implemented in smart cities” through an extensive literature review in the areas of e-government, good governance, smart cities and smart governance, and content analysis of the websites of seven smart cities: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Lisbon, Manchester, Singapore, and Stockholm. The objective was to identify the presence of factors related with e-participation; e-services; and public administration functioning on the cities' websites. The chapter ends with directions for future research and the conclusion that all the smart cities analyzed presented some factors related with smart governance, but with different levels of development and application.
Developing countries face numerous problems in the planning process for EG development which makes using linear processes difficult for them, and forces them to consider a specific plan for implementing plans of EG development, using nonlinear complex processes. Era-based cellular planning system (ECPS) provides the possibility for developing countries to follow EG development using non-linear processes to plan, establish, and implement it.
In a virtual space conveniently chosen, citizens of the Web can interact and develop social capital and empowerment, intended as the consciousness of possibilities to influence the social context and to improve it, by increasing capacity of taking reasoned decisions on problems and of adopting adequate behaviour to face them. The Web can be seen in this sense as an innovative decisional system where it is possible to activate processes of electronic governance (e-governance) to make notions and expectations appear for a self-promoted and self-sustained local development. From this basis, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei has taken part to the research project ISAAC (Integrated e-Services for Advanced Access to Heritage in Cultural Tourist Destinations)1, with the objective of designing, experiencing, and testing innovative forms of participation by taking advantage of the potential of the New Technologies for Information and Communication (NTIC) to support and promote e-governance processes.
Researchers in the discipline of electronic government (e-Government) have historically presented several factors impeding the adoption and implementation of these systems. This paper is uniquely aimed at investigating the factors inhibiting e-Government adoption in a developing country – Pakistan. The literature indicates that the move towards integrated service provision and transactional e-Government is considered as an immense challenge for developing countries as compared to developed regions. Moreover, the progress towards realising the full potential of e-Government using digital technologies to improve public services and government-citizen engagements has been slower and less effective in the developing countries. Pakistan, over many years, has experienced similar lethargic e-Government growth due to economic and political instability, poor governance and deteriorating government institutions. Thus, the ever increasingly weakening state of government structures in Pakistan calls for the need to deliver end-to-end ‘joined-up’ public services to key stakeholders (i.e. citizens, businesses, government employees and other government agencies). The contribution of this research is twofold – firstly, identifying factors inhibiting e-Government adoption in Pakistan – here the focus is to identify the significant problems of meeting demands which are attributed to several issues within organisational, strategic, technological, political, operational, stakeholders and social structures. Secondly, the authors propose an achievable approach to enacting e-Government enabled delivery of services. The conceptual findings, as noted, are validated through qualitative based research in the context of Pakistan government organisations.
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) offer a promising technology for citizens with disabilities to participate in local e-governance planning and implementation, provided that underlying issues of social exclusion and technology accessibility are properly addressed. Existing research suggests that for citizens with disabilities gateway issues such as technology access, usability, community- and government-receptivity are barriers to participation in local e-governance. Results from a pilot study indicate that the e-governance landscape for people with disabilities is heterogeneous; likely reflecting both differences within the disability community, as well as among the online governance entities. Systematic changes to the development, implementation, and evaluation of local e-governance for people with disabilities are recommended, informed by an analytical model suitable for empirical testing.
This article identifies existing gaps of theory and practice in public administration between Western and non-Western nations. By placing national bureaucracies within a global context, the article develops a framework that can be applied to bridge the gaps, improve the cumulation of knowledge in public administration, and enhance the relevance of theory for practitioners. Based on the framework, the article hypothesizes ways in which global pressures such as continuously advancing information technology, the impact of global institutions, and demands for public-sector efficiency influence public bureaucracies. It concludes with guidance for future research and implications for practice.
One of the emerging changes in structures of governance is the growth of intragovernmental structures. This growth occurs within levels of government, such as the 'one-stop shops ' that seek to unite a range of local government service delivery functions. It also occurs across levels of government, such as linkages between the levels of local, regional and central government. This trend of inter-level initiatives will be strengthened by the growing agenda for regional government in the UK, other countries of Europe and beyond (Liddle et al 2000). It will also be strengthened by growing diffusion of information and communication technologies (ICTs) which can help deliver this "new mode of governance " (Haque 2002:232). ICTs do this by changing some of the parameters of governance; particularly by enabling networked forms of governance, of which intra-governmental structures are one example. ICTs decrease the costs of building, sustaining and enrolling in networks. Costs are reduced further, and networks made more accessible, as physical, financial and human capital barriers to ICT usage fall over time.
This paper presents the detailed results of an empirical survey on tele–democracy in 31 European cities covering 14 states. It shows that progressive city–administrations in Europe are early adopters of tele–democracy with a diffusion rate of 72 per cent. Analysis of the survey results illustrates that cities are using tele–democracy to improve service access and the quality of services. This research shows that electronic or Internet voting is a priority for only a minority of cities. The paper suggests a typology of tele–democracy and makes wide–ranging policy suggestions. In the debate over whether information and communications technologies will have a beneficial or detrimental effect on the quality and legitimacy of local government, this paper takes an optimistic stance based on the evidence of the survey.
Under the global pressure of information technology, the adoption of web-based technologies in public administration has created a new government-and-citizen interface. However, whether e-government will unambiguously lead to a more transparent, interactive, open and hence, accountable, government remains a central question. Applying a framework of global pressure effects on bureaucratic change, this paper conducts an empirical study on website openness and accountability in fourteen countries. Even when overall accountability levels rise, the accountability gap between different national bureaucracies often remains intact as web-based technologies typically maintain or reinforce the existing practices. The question of whether e-government promotes accountability depends on what kind of bureaucracy one is referring to in the first place. In the current debate about global convergence and national divergence on the effect of globalization on public bureaucracies, the spread of e-government provides a case of convergence in practice rather than in results.
Book synopsis: `Its strength lies in combining theoretical insights with an impressive range of empirical material. The analysis is subtle and multi-layered.... This is a timely and important book' - Political Studies `Local governance have gained massive attention among scholars and practitioners during the past several years. Peter John's book fills a void in the literature by tracing the historical roots of local governance and by placing his findings in a comparative perspective' - Professor Jon Pierre, University of Gothenburg, Sweden `Peter John has produced a fascinating and stimulating book in which he assesses current developments in urban politics and local government in Europe and suggests how these changes are leading to different patterns of sub-national territorial politics in the EU today. What he has to say is of important interest to all students of local government; comparative politics and of territorial politics more generally' - Michael Goldsmith, University of Salford `this book offers a fascinating comparative analysis... themes such as New Public Management, globalisation, regionalism and privatisation will be relevant to numerous courses in government, politics, public administration and public policy' - West European Politics This text provides a comprehensive introduction to local government and urban politics in contemporary Western Europe. It is the first book to map and explain the change in local political systems and to place these in comparative context. The book introduces students to the traditional structures and institutions of local government and shows how these have been transformed in response to increased economic and political competition, new ideas, institutional reform and the Europeanization of public policy. At the book's core is the perceived transition from local government to local governance. The book traces this key development thematically across a wide range of West European states including: Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom.
Computers are affecting public organizations through their impact on decision making, employment, structure, organizational politics and worklife. Research on computing in government has gone down as a result. The net effect of computers on employment is controversial, but their increased use in some jobs has had a decisively negative impact on employment. Computers have altered work experience by changing the quality of social interaction, and the nature of job skills within the organization. Computers aid managers in decision-making process by helping in monitoring organizational activities. © COPYRIGHT 1997 University of Kansas This survey of empirical research on computing in government updates a review that appeared ten years earlier in Public Administration Review. It focuses primarily on research related to the management of computing and on differences between public and private sector management of computing because the bulk of the new research and findings are here. The impact of computing on employment, structure, worklife, decision making, organizational politics, and constitutional issues is treated briefly because there is little new research and few new findings. The authors conclude that although the use of computers in government at all levels of the federal system has increased greatly over the last decade, research on computing in government has declined precipitously.
Given the spread of e-governance during the last decade, have new information and communication technologies actually served to strengthen good governance and deepen democracy, as proponents claim? To consider these issues, Part I discusses the appropriate normative standards derived from democratic theory for evaluating the role of new information and communication technologies in the public sector. Part II describes the data. This study compares evidence derived from content analysis of national government departmental websites conducted in 191 nations worldwide by CYprg from 1997 to 2000. Part III analyzes how far the content of government websites in these countries fulfill the information, communication and action functions. Part IV focuses upon specific case studies of how e-voting works in practice, based on pilot schemes conducted in recent UK local elections. The conclusion summarizes the findings and reflects on the lessons for good practice in e-governance. The last decade has witnessed growing use of new information and communications technologies (ICTs) designed to strengthen good governance and deepen democracy around the world. E-government can be understood as the use of new ICTs -- particularly the Internet and the World-Wide-Web -- as channels of interactive communication connecting citizens and the state, facilitating both the delivery of government information and services 'downwards' to citizens and also public feedback 'upwards' to government. The expansion of e-governance has moved most rapidly in affluent postindustrial societies; the UN/APSA Benchmarking E-government 2001 survey of 190 member states demonstrated that countries at the forefront of this movement included the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Norway, Canada, and the United
The aim of this article is to study key New Public Management (NPM) transformations undertaken at central level in the European Union public administrations of Germanic, Nordic and Southern European countries. Our study shows that there is no global tendency towards the same NPM model, although, within public administration models, there are strong similarities. Although some NPM initiatives have been taken as steps towards implementing these reforms, in other contexts they could have been adopted in order to ward off deeper reforms.
The impact of new technology on public-sector service delivery and citizens' attitudes about government has long been debated by political observers. This article assesses the consequences ofe-government for service delivery, democratic responsiveness, and public attitudes over the last three years. Research examines the content of e-government to investigate whether it is taking advantage of the interactive features of the World Wide Web to improve service delivery, democratic responsiveness, and public outreach. In addition, a national public opinion survey examines the ability of e-government to influence citizens' views about government and their confidence in the effectiveness of service delivery. Using both Web site content as well as public assessments, I argue that, in some respects, the e-government revolution has fallen short of its potential to transform service delivery and public trust in government. It does, however, have the possibility of enhancing democratic responsiveness and boosting beliefs that government is effective.
Information technology has become one of the core elements of managerial reform, and electronic government (e-government) may figure prominently in future governance. This study is designed to examine the rhetoric and reality of e-government at the municipal level. Using data obtained from the 2000 E-government Survey conducted by International City/County Management Association and Public Technologies Inc., the article examines the current state of municipal e-government implementation and assesses its perceptual effectiveness. This study also explores two institutional factors (size and type of government) that contribute to the adoption of e-government among municipalities. Overall, this study concludes that e-government has been adopted by many municipal governments, but it is still at an early stage and has not obtained many of expected outcomes (cost savings, downsizing, etc.) that the rhetoric of e-government has promised. The study suggests there are some widely shared barriers (lack of financial, technical, and personnel capacities) and legal issues (such as privacy) to the progress of municipal e-government. This study also indicates that city size and manager-council government are positively associated with the adoption of a municipal Web site as well as the longevity of the Web site.
The Internet provides a powerful tool for reinventing local governments. It encourages transformation from the traditional bureaucratic paradigm, which emphasizes standardization, departmentalization, and operational cost-efficiency, to the “e-government” paradigm, which emphasizes coordinated network building, external collaboration, and customer services. Based on a content analysis of city Web sites and a survey of Web development officials, this article shows that many cities are already moving toward this new paradigm. These cities have adopted “onestop shopping” and customer-oriented principles in Web design, and they emphasize external collaboration and networking in the development process rather than technocracy. The article also analyzes the socioeconomic and organizational factors that are related to cities' progressiveness in Web development and highlights future challenges in reinventing government through Internet technology.
In emerging structures of local governance the institutions of elected local government have the potential to fulfil three complementary roles: those of local democracy, public policy making and direct service delivery. Although ICTs (information and communication technologies) could effectively develop all three roles there is a systemic bias which favours service delivery applications and ignores others. This bias can be explained by reference to a network of actors who determine ICT policy in relative isolation from the other policy networks active at the local level. The ways in which this bias is perpetuated are explored through a case study of ICT policy making in UK local government. The implications of the systemic bias for the long-term future of local government, and indeed public administration, are both severe and profound. They suggest an over-emphasis upon performance measurement, a decline in democratic activity and a diminishing capacity among elected bodies to effect broad public policy initiatives.
Since its publication in 2000, Public Management Reform has established itself as the standard text in the field, presenting a comparative analysis of recent changes in Public Management and Public Administration in a range of countries in Europe, North America, and Australasia. This completely rewritten second edition radically expands, develops, and updates the original. Two countries have been added to the comparison (making twelve countries in all) and a much fuller treatment has been provided of the European Commission (including a commentary on the recent reforms led by Vice-President Kinnock). Empirical data has been brought up to date, so as to cover many key developments of the last few years. The theoretical framework of the book has been further developed, including a challenging new interpretation of the trends in continental Europe, which are seen here as markedly different from the Anglo-American style 'New Public Management'. This second edition provides an unparalleled synthesis of developments in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, the UK, the USA, and the European Commission. It is organized in an integrated format, within an overall theoretical framework that identifies the main pressures for, and trajectories of, change. It includes a multi-dimensional analysis of the results of reform, and a chapter reflecting on the dynamic relationship between management reform and politics. Extensive appendices provide an invaluable information resource for students.
Literature reports the experiences with e-government initiatives as chaotic and unmanageable, despite recent numerous initiatives at different levels of government and academic and practitioners’ conferences on e-government. E-government presents a number of challenges for public administrators. To help public administrators think about e-government and their organizations, this article describes different stages of e-government development and proposes a ‘stages of growth’ model for fully functional e-government. Various government websites and related e-government initiatives help to ground and explain this model. These stages outline the multi-perspective transformation within government structures and functions as they make transitions to e-government through each stage. Technological and organizational challenges for each stage accompany these descriptions. At the same time, this paper describes how the e-government becomes amalgamated with traditional public administrative structure.
Municipalities face a dilemma as they pursue technologically enabled modes of providing traditional services. The planning stages of e-government amount to triage: which specific municipal functions and services can a municipality afford to implement (or which services can they afford not to implement) given the costs of technology and technological capability? Little in the way of defining the leading edge of innovation among cities exists. To date, the literature on e-government “best practices” tends to stress creating standards for evaluating web-enabled services rather than for benchmarking the actual status of e-government implementation. In other words, a well-developed literature is emerging around standards by which municipal websites can be evaluated such as navigability and content standards. These standards do not give us insight, however, into the specific functions and services as they emerge on municipality websites. As a means toward addressing this lacuna, the authors created a rubric for benchmarking implementation among cities nationwide using a broad range of functional dimensions and assigning municipalities “e-scores.” In this paper, the authors describe these efforts, their approach and their findings.
This paper analyses the different public-private partnership initiatives carried out by EU and Spanish local governments in the framework of public sector reforms. In the first part we analyse the degree of externalization in the public services delivered by the most important EU cities and the kind of organization chosen to provide them. In the second part we study the different methods of PFI applied in Spain and the accounting, auditing and monitoring of these kinds of contracts. The results of our survey show that almost all EU local governments provide similar services, that there is a high degree of PPP initiatives in the delivery of local government services, and that PPP is concerned with those activities which do not constitute the core of public administration. This means that an important part of the activity controlled by the local governments, which are responsible, are not reflected in their individual annual accounts. Because of this, local governments will have to implement accountability and monitoring tools, such as PPP and PFI accounting standards, consolidation of annual accounts, regulatory bodies and value-for-money audits in order to assess the performance of local services delivered under PPP initiatives, and to prevent monopoly abuses.
Structural Indicators
- Thessaloniki
- Cedefop Greece
- Eurostat
Thessaloniki, Greece: CEDEFOP. Eurostat. 2004. Structural Indicators. 〈http://europa.eu.int/comm/eurostat〉. (Feb-ruary 15, 2006).
Current Initiatives and Central Actors in the Austrian Administrative Reform Process
- Gerhard Hammerschmid
- Renate Meyer
Hammerschmid, Gerhard, and Renate Meyer. 2003. " Current Initiatives and Cen-tral Actors in the Austrian Administrative Reform Process. " Presented at the EGPA Annual Conference, Oeiras, Portugal, September 3–6.
E-Government and Policy Innovation in Seven Liberal Democracies Presented at the Political Studies Association's Annual Conference
- Dunleavy
- Hellen Patrick
- Simon Margetts
- Jane Bastow
- Tinkler
Dunleavy, Patrick, Hellen Margetts, Simon Bastow, and Jane Tinkler. 2003. " E-Government and Policy Innovation in Seven Liberal Democracies. " Presented at the Political Studies Association's Annual Conference, Leicester, UK, April 15–17.
The Administrative Modernization Policy in France ICTs and Intra-Governmental Structures at Local, Regional and Central Levels: Updating Conventional Ideas
- Lourdes Torres
- Vicente Pina
- And Basilio Acerete Rouban
- Luc
- Elgar
- Richard Heeks Santos
LOURDES TORRES, VICENTE PINA, AND BASILIO ACERETE Rouban, Luc. 1997. " The Administrative Modernization Policy in France. " In Public Management and Administrative Reform in Western Europe, ed. Walter Kickert. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. Santos, Rita, and Richard Heeks. 2003. ICTs and Intra-Governmental Structures at Local, Regional and Central Levels: Updating Conventional Ideas. Manchester, UK: IDPM, University of Manchester. Swedish Association of Local Authorities (SALA) and Swedish Federation of County Councils and Regions. 2003. E-democracy in Practice. Swedish Experiences of a New Political Tool. Stockholm: Author.
The Adoption and Implementation of E-Government: The Case of E-government in New Jersey
- James Melistki
Melistki, James. 2002. " The Adoption and Implementation of E-government: The Case of E-government in New Jersey. " Ph.D. diss., Rutgers University. Mindforest. 2004. Tendances de l'Internet au Luxembourg en 2003 [Internet trend in Luxembourg in 2003]. Luxembourg: Mindforest.
What Is E-Governance? " E-Governance Workshop, Stras-bourg
- Oakley
- Kate
Oakley, Kate. 2002. " What Is E-Governance? " E-Governance Workshop, Stras-bourg, June 10–11.
What Is E-Governance
- Kate Oakley
Public Management and Administrative Reform in Western Europe
- Walter Kickert
Presented at the Political Studies Association's Annual Conference
- Patrick Dunleavy
- Hellen Margetts
- Simon Bastow
- Jane Tinkler