Arguments Opposed to the Resolution

We believe our opponents have taken an unnecessarily narrow view of the potential impact of e-government. They appear to ignore (or take for granted) the vast improvements that have already taken place within the government’s internal information infrastructure and in the general availability and accessibility of information and services to the public.

It is true that there are some significant problems that will need to be addressed in order to achieve efficient and effective e-government, but the existence of such problems – many of which are not unique to government e-development – are hardly proof positive that they cannot be solved.

The very fact that the problems are being recognized and analyzed demonstrates that e-government efforts have moved beyond the initial “hype” stage and have reached the necessary realization that truly transformative e-government can only be achieved through a significant change in the way government conceives of itself and its relationship with the public. But this is exactly what the public will increasingly demand as online technology becomes more accessible and integral to daily life.

Digital Dialogue

According to the Hansard Group, "Our broader research demonstrates that the public is interested in a more meaningful and sustained interaction with political institutions, and that this aspiration is reciprocated by Parliament and government at a central and local level." [1]

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e-Government Success Stories

Although there have been some disappointing experiments in e-government, even mistakes provide valuable information for the development of successful "e-Government 2.0" programs. Some countries have already taken advantage of the growing knowledge about e-government best practices to develop highly innovative systems -- which have already changed the way citizens of these countries interact with their government. Such programs provide a hint of the profound changes e-government will inevitably bring about in the future. Below, we provide an overview of just few of such programs.

South Korea

South Korea's e-government program ranked first in the 2006 Global E-Government Report based on a survey of conducted by The Center for Public Policy at Brown. [2]. The study found that the South Korean program had an "impressive level of organization and offer a wealth of information and services," and that it "offers an abundance of features while remaining user-friendly for its visitors." [3]

Online Services

The main government portal, for example, offers easy access to over 500 government services fully executable online. Other departmental pages offer a wide range of e-services, from paying taxes to searching for lost relatives in North Korea.

For Citizens

• Civil services including various permits/authorizations and certificates
• Information services to search for legislative/administrative notices and relevant laws
• Payment services including tax refunds and social welfare payments
• Opportunity to participate in government administration by requesting public hearings and casting electronic votes.

For Businesses

• Civil services including various permits/authorizations, formal objections, diverse reports and complaints.
• Electronic transaction services including procurements, bids and so on
• Payment services for various taxes and public charges
• Opportunity to participate in government administration by requesting public hearings and casting electronic votes.

Government-to-Government

• Information sharing among agencies in terms of documents and knowledge management.
• Exchange of opinions among agencies by distribution electronic documents
• Support for electronic approval and video conferencing for efficient decision-making
• Database sharing among agencies to enhance the efficiency of work procedures

Custom Experience

Highly customizable, with a majority allowing the user to manage his or her own activities. In addition, most sites offer PDA or wireless access, and nearly all allow visitors to sign up for e-mail updates.

Interactive Features

Interactive features available for users – virtually every site contains a prominent guestbook or forum as well as the option to petition the particular department.

Estonia

• The Kodanikuportaal (Citizen’s Portal) allows Estonian citizens to enter and confirm data in the various national databases, fill out application forms, and sign and send documents, allowing government to operate more efficiently and more accurately.
• The Teabeportaal (Information Portal) provides information about government services, ranging from planned power outages to contact information for a wide range of governmental entities.
• The E-Governance Academy is "a non-governmental, non-profit organisation, founded for the creation and transfer of knowledge concerning e-governance, e-democracy and the development of civil society."

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Government Efforts to Improve Efficiency and Effectiveness

Governments are developing integrated e-government programs, similar to the South Korean model.

"Transformational Government" Initiative in the UK

Recognizing that a strategic technology plan was necessary for the United Kingdom to implement technology "decisively and effectively" across government to meet its national objectives, Prime Minister Tony Blair commissioned the development of a unified e-government strategy for the UK: Transformational Government -- Enabled by Technology "to seize the opportunity provided by technology to transform the business of government." The project was initiated in 2005

Index of Tranformational Government Program Information

Strategy

In particular, the strategy was directed to provide overall technology leadership in three key areas:

1. The transformation of public services for the benefit of citizens, businesses, taxpayers and front-line staff.
2. The efficiency of the corporate services and infrastructure of government organisations, thus freeing resources for the front-line.
3. The steps necessary to achieve the effective delivery of technology for government.

Progress

Centralized government web presence at DirectGov

Europe's Information Society

http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/index_en.htm

U.S. Government Efforts

Coordinating Planning Efforts

• Presidents's E-Government Initiative coordinated through OMB

• GSA's eStrategy.gov website provides guidance to help promote, implement and manage E-Government initiatives and programs at federal, state and local levels of government. The overall objective is to improve citizen, intergovernmental, and business access to E-Government information and services.

• Council of Federal CIOs

Coordinating Web Presence

USA.gov [4]

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Private Organizations Promoting Government Transparancy

Because citizens cannot depend on the government alone to provide sufficient transparancy -- particularly those directly impacted by electoral politics -- private efforts to promote easy access to infomation will play a critical role in the development of e-Government. This "watchdog" role has traditionally served primarily by the institutional press, which will continue to play a crucial role for most citizens, but as information becomes more widely available to all, its role will be to integrate available information, rather than to serve as a gatekeeper of information that is not widely available.

Sunlight Foundation

The Sunlight Foundation was founded in January 2006 with the goal of using the revolutionary power of the Internet and new information technology to enable citizens to learn more about what Congress and their elected representatives are doing, and thus help reduce corruption, ensure greater transparency and accountability by government, and foster public trust in the vital institutions of democracy. Sunlight Foundations efforts are entirely focused on the use of "technology and the power of the Internet" to help citizens, journalists and bloggers "be their own best watchdogs, both by improving access to existing information and digitizing new information, and by creating new tools and websites to enable all of us to pool our intelligence in new, and yet to be imagined, ways."

Sunlight Labs

Sunlight Labs is a Sunlight Foundation pilot project to prototype tech ideas to improve government transparency and political influence disclosure. We also provide technical support to Sunlight Foundation sponsored projects.

Sunlight Network

The Sunlight Network is a sister organization to the Sunlight Foundation, which was founded in January, 2006 to strengthen the relationship between lawmakers and the people they represent through transparency, technology, and local communities.

How Does Congress Use It's Time?

• The Punch Clock Campaign

• Congress in 30 Seconds

Transparancy Grants

Transparancy Grants provide financial support to enhance independant efforts such as:

• MAPLight.org, which was founded to illuminate the connection between campaign contributions and voting records in the California legislature. The project correlates publicly available information on bills and legislative voting records with political contributions. The online database is searchable by individual legislator, interest group, subject and by bill number. In December 2006, MapLight received a Transparency Grant that will help the organization create a beta version of their database to correlate information on federal legislators. The new database is expected to be available in April 2007.

• Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) to fund the launch of its "Open Community Open Document Review System." CREW had already developed a demonstration version of an online reviewing process that is a really cool tool. It lets anyone review, tag and comment on any of the thousands of pages of documents that CREW has in their possession. (CREW has thousands of pages of governement records as a result of their thorough and repeated FOIA requests.) Our grant will help them build a massive publicly searchable database of every document they receive -- a database put together by citizen journalists. Beta version will be available in late March 2007.

• National Institute on Money in State Politics to continue the development and implementation of their initial Web Service Application Program Interface (API), to conduct extensive outreach to ensure its adoption later in this year, and to develop several custom APIs for journalists and/or academics.

• Center for Citizen Media to develop an Election Year Demonstration Project for citizen journalism in one Congressional district. CCM will oversee the creation of a website that will seek to cover everything that can possibly be reported on a Congressional election, with an emphasis on drawing on the talents and ideas of local citizen reporters. The site will include in-depth biographical and political information on candidates, audio and video archives, campaign finance profiles, first-person reports, links to articles, etc. This project is designed to serve as a model for possible nationwide implementation in hundreds of districts in 2008.

• New York University's NewAssignment.Net Project, a non-profit site that is working to foster journalistic innovation by showing that open collaboration over the Internet among traditional reporters, editors and large groups of reader-reporters can produce high-quality work that serves the public interest, holds up under scrutiny, and builds trust. This project is an experiment in networked journalism, exploring how to blend the experience of veteran journalists with the engagement of passionate amateurs to produce work that neither could manage alone.

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Efforts to Improve Citizen Involvement in Governance

European Union

European Union eParticipation Case Studies [5]