Ambiguous Confusions andNew Directions in Electronic

Government 

JA Taylor, Caledonian Business School and Oxford Internet Institute;

19th July, 2004.

 

The E-Government Paradigm: Policy

Orthodoxy “the use of technology to enhance access to and delivery of government services to benefit citizens, business partners and employees. It has the power to create a new mode of public services where all organisations deliver a modernised, integrated and seamless service for their citizens” 

• From provider-led to citizen-centric services• From universalism to CRM and personalised

services• From information provision to integrated on-line

transactions;• From ‘fat’ to ‘lean’ cost/performance ratios.

The E-Government Paradigm: An Uncritical

Research Orthodoxy “The first step is to measure what can easily be measured…The second step is to disregard that which cannot be measured or give it an arbitrary quantitative value….The third step is to presume that which cannot be measured easily is not really very important…The fourth step is to say that what cannot be easily measured really does not exist”.

• Positivist;• Measurement oriented;• Comparative/benchmarking focus;• Atheoretical;• De-contextualised

Dominant Perspectives on Governance: ‘Networks & Markets’ or ‘Hierarchies & Markets’:

‘Governing without government’

‘Multi-level and horizontal governance’

“The prospect is that hierarchical control will be replaced by continuing processes of bargaining among interested parties

within most fields of Public Admin” [Bogason et al, 1998]

Dominant Perspectives on Governance: An emergent revision?

“Governance takes place in the shadow of hierarchy” [Jessop, 2004]

“The erosion of central power should not be assumed” [Bache & Flinders, 2004]

“British society is marked by continuing patterns of structured inequality”

[Marsh et al, 2003]

“Camouflaged centralism” and “The Decline of the Public”

[Marquand, 2004]

• Perceived failure of e-government;

• Continuing critique of management and organisational failures in the public services;

• Low trust government, high trust alternatives;

• Communitarianist thinking in HMG;

• The ‘democratic deficit’ v ‘alternative political engagement’;

• CRM, personalisation and public service improvement

New Directions in e-Government: The Policy Backdrop

New Directions in e-Government: Getting closer to the ‘Third Sector’

• Compacts between government and the Voluntary Sector;

• Legal promise for the Voluntary Sector – Campaigning & Charitable Status;

• Enhanced financial independence for the Voluntary Sector – Securing longer term funding; Charity Banks and ‘Venture Philanthropy’;

• Developing the ICT infrastructure of the Voluntary Sector;

• Implementing the ‘Electronic Mixed Economy’;

• CRM and ‘Identity Management’.

New Direction 1: The Electronic Mixed Economy

• Delivering e-government through voluntary and private sector ‘intermediaries’;• Exploiting information and knowledge: joining up services

to the citizen; customising/personalising services for the citizen; enhancing uptake;• Data sharing for planning and implementing e-services;• Identity Management• Intermediaries in a virtual policy environment:o partners of government?; o agents of the citizen?; o agents of the government?

New Direction 2: Customer Relations Management, Personalisation and

Identity Management

• CRM – the idealised consumer/government relationship in a low trust environment;

• Personalisation – Orwell or Amazon?

• Identity Management – affording ease of access; delivering differentiated services; social categorization, subjugation or citizenship?

New Direction 2: Customer Relations Management, Personalisation and

Identity Management

• Identification and third party authentication;• Layered citizenship;• Personalising the web – MyVirginia;• [C]overt collection of personal data;• RFID;• Location based services;• Biometrics – the Privium Smartcard;

Critical e-Government in the Information Polity

Informatisation as x-ray; Information flows, resource dependencies and power

relationships; Information capabilities – standardisation, fitness for purpose

controls;

Information matching and sharing; ‘Informating’ the citizen;

Information domains and institutional life; Information, accountability and legitimacy.