practice Government 2.0 - Truly new for government?
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29 April 2009 | 1085 Visits | Rating: 4 (maximum:5)
Government 2.0 - Truly new for government?
In the late 1990s everything connected to the Internet got an "e"–say eGovernment or eCommerce. With the evolution of mobile technology we saw the "m" appear by 2002–say mGovernment. Eventually we also saw the rise of "i" a little later. Now its a "2.0" frenzy every time ideas and principles of Web 2.0 are applied to a subject matter. To name a few: War 2.0, Politics 2.0 or Cyberlawyer 2.0. Of course there is also Government 2.0. A little research reveals that O'Reilly who coined the term Web 2.0 had briefly addressed this topic in May 2006. Though NYT's David Pogue stated in May 2007 that we have only picked the "low hanging fruit" of Web 2.0 ideas. Among his suggestions of what had been missed were applying Web 2.0 to government. Further research gave me the impression that with a few exceptions, the discussion of Government 2.0 has not been truly connected to work in eGovernment, political or administrative science. David Osimo has of course contributed to the discussion with his paper and recent workshop but the hype is dominatig the discussion. While I am still working on a paper to address this issue, I would already like to put one of my arguments out for discussion, that is the philosophy of Web 2.0 was more revolutionary for the business world than for government.
A fundamental aspect of Web 2.0 is user empowerment. In Web 2.0 this is done in different ways. Information that was formerly rated as proprietary, is now openly available. Users may rate or comment on products or firms in general, whether facilitated through an enterprise or by using their blogs. Moreover, firms make various resources available to the users so that they can satisfy their individual needs or create something new. In the early 90s, enterprises recognized the need to build closer relationships with their customers. While many companies have not lost control, they have significantly opened up. If they did not, the public had the chance to strike back. They have also followed public expectations and are active in government domains (e.g. Multi-nationals lobbying against child-labor and the like) We could, therefore, say that there has been a democratization of the consumer which has been a more radical experience for the private sector than the public sector. The individual and collective power of the voice option increased.
Shouldn't governments do the same? Well, yes you might say. However, let me ask you the following question: Haven't they done so in the past? For centuries political philosophers have discussed the obligations of government and citizens and the relationship of the two sides. For hundreds of years it has been a common practice to offer citizens (offline) alternatives of participation/ empowerment at various stages in the policy process. For hundreds of years we have also seen many ways of disempowerment. Today, there are citizen consultation groups, commentary sections on websites, virtual/real town hall meetings and many more ways of participation. The means of participation have improved. Knowledge about how far participatory action influences policy makers are scarce.
Of course there is also a lot of information government does not want to share with the public for other reasons than national security. Government could do better by including Web 2.0 ideas into their eGovernment offerings/culture - internally and externally. In particular, in the field of public participation which is still rated at a low maturity stage in the latest eGovernment survey be the UN.
In conclusion, a government's experience in integrating the "Citizen 2.0" should not be forgotten when talking about Government 2.0.
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Showing 3 comments
Truly new: full process integration and policy participation
It is true that “Government 2.0 has not been truly connected to work in eGovernment, political or administrative science†– The Web 2.0 has little to do with traditional e-government. In many areas, traditional e-government so far has failed to deliver what it promised, partly due to over-optimistic expectations. The drop in uptake of traditional e-government is a warning market indicator that cannot be discussed away.
It is true that “For centuries political philosophers have discussed the obligations of government and citizens†but philosophers seldom constituted the rulers or governments – as you are suggesting. In our introduction to the article for the International Conference on Digital Government, we cite numerous sources that attest to the opposite – that governments have failed to use ICT intelligently for integrating processes service fulfillment as well as multiple stakeholders into the policy process.
Meanwhile, citizens’ involvement in party politics and formal elections is deteriorating across Europe. Some may conclude from this that citizens have no interest in how their lives are governed. I would argue that citizens are more than ever interested in taking control. Rather, they simply ignore government – which may or may not be healthy for the democratic foundations of Europe.
@ Michael
> It is true that “Government 2.0 has not been truly connected to work in eGovernment, > political or administrative science†– The Web 2.0 has little to do with traditional e-> government.
I am still wondering why people would still want to differentiate Web 2.0 from eGovernment. Web 2.0 has two components. The first one is the technical aspect. Using any of these applications in the government domain is eGovernment. Simply said eGov is the use of ICT in government. The second aspect of Web 2.0 are new ideas introduced either as business model or facilitated through technology, that is networking, crowdsourcing, etc. etc. Many have written about them so I don't need to repeat them. You are right, governments should take advantage of those things. Talking definition even those things could be seen as eParticipation/eDemocracy.  Furthermore, on a certain level of abstraction these things are not new to government and those researchers writing about it. Check Vigoda 2002 for example. Back then he called the next era of the citizen government relationship the "collaborative mutual value era" [...] "a relationship that must rely on the conception of collaboration and partnership, if not citizenry ownership and control" Sounds like Gov 2.0 to me...and we could even go back to Aristotle who once wrote about "active citizenship" except that he did not have ICT/Web 2.0 apps in mind of course.
> In many areas, traditional e-government so far has failed to deliver what it
> promised, partly due to over-optimistic expectations. The drop in uptake of
> traditional e-government is a warning market indicator that cannot be discussed
> away.
I don't think eGov has failed what it has promised to deliver. What is your reference? A specific country or region? If you review the early years of academic papers on eGovernment you will see that everyone joined the hype and was describing a brave new eGovernment world. I see a similar trend with Gov 2.0 because they mostly take into account research on participation, public management or the relationship between administration and politics. Obama's efforts of course help that trend. In fact, what you are doing here is limiting eGovernment to the supply side of it. It might not be participatory in nature but a general obligation of the citizen: electronic filing of taxes. It is a success as numbers are going up. Yes it is Web 1.0 but in most governments it is working better every day. The "digital natives" will also take advantage of it thus bringing up demand. Also, think of all the applications that are invisible to most citizens. Databases, eVergabe (Germany), knowledge bases and the like. There is always room for improvement or opening up the electronic data mounds to others (be that agencies or the public) but eGov has not failed but the transformation is either not happening or happening almost invisibly.
> It is true that “For centuries political philosophers have discussed the obligations
> of government and citizens†but philosophers seldom constituted the rulers or
> governments – as you are suggesting. In our introduction to the article for the
> International Conference on Digital Government, we cite numerous sources that
> attest to the opposite – that governments have failed to use ICT intelligently for
> integrating processes service fulfillment as well as multiple stakeholders into the
> policy process.
eParticipation still needs a lot of improvement you are right but that is only one part of Digital Government. Other than that there are many "intelligent" ICT apps in government. The failure is not in technology but first and foremost change needs to start inside public admin and politics.
> Meanwhile, citizens’ involvement in party politics and formal elections > is deteriorating across Europe. Some may conclude from this that
> citizens have no interest in how their lives are governed. I would argue
> that citizens are more than ever interested in taking control. Rather,
> they simply ignore government – which may or may not be healthy for
> the democratic foundations of Europe.
The trend of deterioating trust and involvement of citizens in elections can not be solved by ICT. Parties and members need to change. Citizens need to change. Citizens need to be educated. Yet, also check for example, a study by Verba/Schlozman/Brady 1995 they estimate that the proportion of the "willing" (to participate a lot) is less than 10% of the population. The system has to provide the means and openness for participation. eParticipation is only one side of the story to tackle a complex issue.
That being said, I like to restate that Web 2.0 was in its essence more radical to democratization of the consumer corporate relationship. Governments always had to deal with the voice of the citizens. They could do much better at listening and reacting of course. Moreover, a simpler form of participation can be of value to public managers (e.g. 311).
New: people and open standards drive e-gov
I agree that Web 2.0 is not really new technologically. What drives Web 2.0 is people and open standards. A Teenager can assemble a terrific social network site. The simplicity creates the unprecedented uptake. Then you have open standards, which allow networking across sites and mashing-up information. People and open standards power social interactions and economic transactions.
The infrastructure of social and economic exchange are not built by the State as previously. It’s a huge collective effort involving free individuals, large corporations, and CSOs (civil society orgs). If people are able to coordinate each other to create an institutional infrastructure previously the job of governments, then they will also be able to govern it. So from a strategic perspective, governments must redefine their role in order to play a role in that development.
Traditional e-government is about developing a proprietary more or less isolated solution following the existing template. But using the existing template and simply providing the same processes in “electronic†form means wasting money. Much of traditional e-government falls into this category. A sustainable approach would *understand* *shape and influence* and then link into the emerging infrastructure. Otherwise there is a danger of producing very temporary solutions at very high costs.
I think we agree that a culture change is important and that it is not e-gov as such that is behind expectations but also the degree of receptiveness to change in governments and public services. Concerning Verba, Schlozman & Brady 1995, their aim is to prove that people engage in voluntary work contrary to what rational choice models suggest. They find that influencing policy and civic gratification are strong incentives for participation. Of course, if the system does not allow for participation than ICT will not do the trick.