Document(s) 7 of 16

3.1. ICTS AS A TOOL FOR DEVELOPMENT

The debate regarding the effectiveness of using ICTs to help achieve development goals arises not only around questions concerning the evidence in support of the relationship between ICTs and development, but also more substantially from inherent doubts about the relevance of ICTs in achieving sustainable development, and fears that investment in ICTs will draw resources away from traditional development goals.

ICTs instead can be a powerful tool for development, both because of their inherent characteristics and the mounting empirical evidence that suggest they can, in fact, contribute a great deal to development goals. They can do so at both micro and national levels by increasing the effectiveness and reach of development interventions, enhancing good governance and lowering the costs of service delivery. Moreover, the right complement of targeted ICTs interventions has the potential to play an even more substantial role in accelerating a sustainable dynamic of social and economic development in developing countries.¹

Therefore, it should be clear from the outset that ICTs are not a panacea for the problems of the developing world. Social and economic development is dependent upon many factors which should be addressed through an overall development strategy. Factors such as political stability, macroeconomic governance, transparency and accountability of national and local administrations, the rule of law, physical infrastructure (for example, clean water and energy), and basic literacy should also be addressed in an explicit manner, and ICTs should not be seen as a substitute.

However, the integration of ICTs into overall national development strategies can help facilitate implementation, expand scope and coverage and increase the results for most of these factors. Moreover, development goals cannot be achieved by government efforts alone. The involvement of civil society and the private sector is crucial, and ICTs can help the different stakeholders to be aware, provide and exchange information and communicate among each other.

This is much more important if we consider that full and effective participation in the emerging global information network is of fundamental importance for a country that wants to avoid marginalisation from the globalisation process and is essential for the full participation of its citizens in all spheres of life. ICTs can contribute to the integration of developed and developing countries in the world economy, and it can create the conditions for information and knowledge exchange and utilisation. ICTs offer tremendous potential to raise standards of living and enlarge opportunities for individuals, communities, countries and regions. While many in the world still remain directly untouched by the information revolution, one cannot deny the transformative effect they have already had on our global society.

3.2. e-GOVERNMENT: BENEFITS AND RISKS

Conventional use of the prefix "e" suggests that an activity is electronic or digital in nature. By accepting this, e-government would simply refer to the use of electronic information and communications technologies in undertaking all kind of government activities, in education, health, agriculture, governance, customs, etc. However, this does not reflect the value that the use of ICTs can actually add to a government's ability to foster development.

E-government can support broad public sector reforms and good governance through the introduction of innovative and sustainable applications of ICTs both within government administrations, as well as in their interaction with citizens and the private sector.

Therefore, the key word in e-government is not electronic, but government.

E-government should be regarded as an alternative and complementary approach to government administration and service delivery, as well as a means to redefine the way it interacts with citizens and the private sector. Analogous to e-business, which allows businesses to transact with each other more efficiently (B2B) and brings customers closer to businesses (B2C), e-government applications can affect the interaction and transaction between inter-agency government relationships (G2G), government and business enterprises (G2B), and government and citizens (G2C), in a more friendly, convenient, transparent and inexpensive way.²

In this sense "e" means:

• efficiency: Governments should use ICTs to minimise transaction costs and streamline their bureaucratic procedures, making their operations more efficient, freeing up resources that enable them to deliver services in a better-organised and economical manner.
  
  
• effectiveness: Governments can achieve better results and meet development goals by using ICTs to increase the relevancy of the policy formulation process through increased participation, improve the process of resource allocation, respond timely to citizens' needs and increase coverage and quality of their services.
  
  
• empowerment: ICTs can support increased interaction between citizens and their governments, for citizens both to participate in the decision making process and to become more aware of their personal and community development.
  
  
• economic and social development: Beyond the economic benefits that accrue to government due to efficiency and effectiveness gains, the use of ICTs in government and in its interaction with the business community and citizens can create new businesses, attract investments and generate employment.³

The possible impact of some e-government applications can be divided into three main dimensions of policy objectives: the economic dimension, the social dimension and the governance dimension.

On the economic side, these range from reduced transaction costs to better capacity to target services, increased coverage and quality of service delivery, enhanced response capacity to address issues of poverty and increase in revenue. Other benefits, less often considered in selecting applications, include the intended economic spin-offs that e-government may bring to the business sector, which can then become more competitive in the national and international environment. Lower transaction costs and simplified procedures will translate into comparative advantages by the private sector. In the same way, increased interaction or transactionability with government can help create new businesses. Furthermore, economic benefits may also derive from increased accountability and transparency, which may greatly reduce the risk of corruption and raise the perception of good government among citizens. Citizens' trust in their government may have an impact on their willingness to invest and to pay taxes and levies for services.

Social benefits are considerable and range from employment creation in the third sector, to improvements in the education and health system, from better targeting of the government's services, to increased capacity for the provision of safety and security. In the majority of cases these benefits can be evaluated in political terms and quantified in financial terms.⁴

In other words, appropriate e-government initiatives can lead to strengthened conditions for good governance. Development of e-government is therefore not only a technical issue but also a political one.

As e-government applications can differ in the way they have an impact on, and provide benefits to, the society at large, governments should review the alternatives at their disposal to optimise the use of their resources according to the country's priorities. In this view, "e-government is about the transformation of government, and it may well be the biggest transformation since the democratic revolution of the late 18th. century. Nevertheless, as with all revolutions, many outcomes are possible. ICTs are very likely to lead to more efficient service delivery. It is not clear that they will lead to a form of government that is more open, transparent, accountable or democratic than conventional government"⁵.

Addressing such issues poses many challenges: meeting them requires leadership that is committed, informed and engaged, especially at the political level. A firm commitment from decision makers to think through the issues and steer the right course is critical, otherwise it risks to be just a wishful claim useful only for political purpose. Providing such leadership might be the single biggest challenge on the horizon. In fact, in one form or another, e-government will come; but what is important is which kind of government it will be in the digital era. This involves a broader vision of government systems which includes and integrates the three major aspects of e-government:

• Improving service delivery;
  
  
• Improving information management;
  
  
• Improving accessibility and participation of the different stakeholders.

These three aspects of e-government provide a starting point and, in analysing them, it has to be considered that they are interconnected and interdependent. Therefore, it is necessary to think about the integration of ICTs in the government through a holistic approach, considering e-government as an integrated and evolving platform for a management system. A particular aspect, in fact, is related to the interest that different stakeholders have in how ICTs are being used to transform government. There is a growing awareness, also in developing countries, that new ICTs-networks and databases are creating a new public "infrastructure" which is the basis of e-government. They want to be sure that, as the infrastructure develops, their interests will be taken into account. This is more an more evident and enhanced with the increasing use of "peer-to-peer" systems over the Internet such as Web 2.0 applications (web blogs, communities of practices, etc) that creates ad additional communication platform often defined as Citizens to Government (C2G), and also Citizens to Politicians, and Citizens to Citizens (C2C).⁶

However, considering the risks of introducing e-government, it should be underlined that most e-government projects, both in industrialised and developing countries, fail either totally or partially. There are very little data about rates of success and failure of e-government projects, but some baseline estimates indicate that behind the high-tech glamour of these projects lies a dirty reality – the majority of projects are failures.⁷ This is due principally to the lack of "e-readiness", and the oversize gaps between project design and on-the-ground reality (known as "design-reality gaps"), meaning the lack of assessment of needs prior to the implementation of a project. These failures come at a high price for the world's poorer countries, and six categories of potential costs of e-government failure have been identified by Richard Heeks (2003):

1. Direct Financial Costs: The money invested in equipment, consultants, new facilities, training programmes, etc;
   
   
2. Indirect Financial Costs: The money invested in the time and effort of public servants involved;
   
   
3. Opportunity Costs: The better ways in which that money could have been spent, if it had not been spent on the e-government failure;
   
   
4. Political Costs: The loss of 'face' and loss of image for individuals, organisations and nations involved in failure;
   
   
5. Beneficiary Costs: The loss of benefits that a successful e-government project would have brought;
   
   
6. Future Costs: An e-government failure increases the barriers for future e-government projects. It does this in two main ways. Firstly, through the loss of morale of stakeholders, particularly e-government champions, who may 'defect' to the private sector or overseas. Secondly, through the loss of credibility and loss of trust in e-government as an approach to change. This increases risk adversion in some stakeholders and provides support for others with vested interests in the status quo.

A key problem among e-government practitioners and policy-makers is a lack of awareness of these costs. Most costs are intangible; few are ever measured in the event of e-government failure; e-government failures are often hushed up. This may explain why, despite the high costs of failure and the high prevalence of failure, many officials and politicians are still very keen on e-government.⁸ Here, though, we must recognise this high cost of failure, and look for ways to reduce risks. We should therefore understand which are the external and internal barriers to e-government⁹ and what are the needs and challenges to overcome failures and successfully implement e-government. This will be addressed in the following paragraphs.

3.3. IMPLEMENTING E-GOVERNMENT: NEEDS AND OBSTACLES

There is no single established way, no "best practice" that would lead to successful e-government. Whilst in broad terms the elements for success are already known,¹⁰ their interpretation and application must be invented locally. However, it cannot be stressed strongly enough that if a public administration does cross the "digital divide", it opens endless opportunities that are practically inaccessible by any other means. This is true for all public administrations in the world, regardless of the level of economic development, human capacities, and the social and cultural context prevailing in the community or country concerned¹¹.

Solutions to development often require changes in government processes. Internally derived objectives for change generally tend to focus on economic benefits and on the improvement of effectiveness and efficiency in the provision of services. On the other hand, increased public demands calling for democratic participation, accountability, transparency and quality and speed of service delivery can be an important driving force for change.

To establish an e-government system countries need to embark upon a significant transformation process, particularly in those nations where aspects of good governance are yet to be strengthened. A genuine commitment from government leaders, the private sector and other institutions of the civil society is required to create leverages, benefit from synergies and sustain this transformation within the national development process. Experience has shown, in fact, that the introduction of e-government was either a consequence of sound public sector reforms, directed towards the improvement of governance conditions, or a catalyst for their introduction.

Institutional capacity development in areas such as policy development, public sector reform, legal and regulatory frameworks, strategic planning and change management, as well as co-ordination of intergovernmental relations will be required to harmonise the transformation process with the existing development objectives and facilitate the exchange of information between the different entities that compose the governance system. Furthermore, building a positive perception about the value of ICTs within government and society at large should be regarded as a priority.

Countries should carefully plan their e-government strategic goals, implementation timeframes and resources, vis-à-vis obstacles and risks to be overcome, to ensure the success of this process. Particularly during the start-up phase, lessons learned by other countries that have been at the forefront of e-government should help avoid the costly trial and error approach.

The following initial steps have been identified to guide countries within the framework in which e-government is carried out:

• Formulation of an environmental analysis (e-government Readiness);
  
  
• Elaboration of the long-term vision, including the expected contribution to development foreseen by e-government;
  
  
• Formulation of the strategic goals being pursued;
  
  
• Identification of the priorities and expected impact.¹²

E-government requires a conducive environment to maximise its potential. Before defining an e-government strategy or plan of action, a thorough analysis of the existing environment in which e-government will be implemented is required. Government can pose itself some key questions in order to assess how strategically prepared it is for e-government.

As indicated before, a country level of "e-readiness" is the degree to which each country is prepared for the introduction of e-government. By assessing the relative advancement in the areas that are most critical for e-government adoption by different key factors, countries would be in a better position to evaluate opportunities and challenges, as well as their own strengths and weaknesses.

However, as uniformity across the border is impossible, the objective of the e-readiness analysis is to identify specific actions for improvements and potential niches for the initial start up of e-government programmes, rather than a positive or negative answer to e-government as a whole. The following areas and key factors should be carefully analysed in order to examine the risks and assess the obstacles that may need to be overcome before entering into e-government.

1. Political conditions and leadership: Good governance, as a condition for sustainable development, requires genuine commitment from political leaders, the private sector and organisations of civil society. In the same way, the introduction of e-government in society requires strong political will to see through the transformation process it implies to government both in its internal operations as well as with regard to its interaction with civil society.
   
   
2. Regulatory framework: A proper regulatory framework is needed in order to enable secure information exchanges within government and between government, citizens and businesses. It is also needed to create the economic conditions for accessible ICTs infrastructures, services and equipment;
   
   
3. Organisational conditions: International experience shows that the introduction of e-government calls for and causes profound and evolutionary change of the institutional arrangements. To guide this transformation process, appropriate management and co-ordination mechanisms are needed;
   
   
4. Cultural and human resources conditions: Positive attitudes, knowledge and skills need to be in place – especially within the public sector – to initiate, implement and sustain e-government. Cultural aspects may cause general resistance to change and information-sharing. Inadequate human resource capacity may lead to lack of customer-orientation and overall commitment.
   
   
5. Financial conditions: The initial costs related to implementing e-government can be considerable and governments may have limited capacity to bridge the period between the initial investment and returns. Proper resource planning and access to innovative financing mechanisms are critical for e-government sustainability.
   
   
6. Communication environment: in today's world, communicating with citizens is a duty and a necessity for governments. E-government needs to be accepted and understood by all stakeholders to ensure that its benefits flow to the society as a whole.
   
   
7. Technological Infrastructure: Lack of technologies is a major bottleneck for countries aiming to implement and maintain e-government. Legacy systems may also represent considerable obstacles to change. The demographic and geographic conditions of different areas, accompanied by the distribution of economic activities, may also represent a strong bias in the rollout of ICTs infrastructure if left to the market alone.
   
   
8. Data and information systems: Management systems, records and work processes must be in place to provide the necessary data to support the move to e-government.

Countries should update the environmental analysis on a regular basis to reassess their readiness against technological progress and ongoing changes in the governance system. At different stages of e-government maturity, the relative importance of environmental areas and key factors may differ. The stages of e-government maturity allude to¹³:

1. full digital data availability, when all government data processing operations in its multitude of institutions are done in digital form and data can move among different operating platforms;
   
   
2. e-publishing, when all these institutions are posting their relevant information online, in an organised and easily accessible way to other government agencies, businesses and citizens;
   
   
3. e-interaction, when all relevant interactions, including participation in policy analysis and formulation, can take place online between government agencies, as well as between government and business and government and citizens;
   
   
4. e-transaction, when all relevant transactions between government agencies and between these agencies and the private sector businesses and citizens can take place online;
   
   
5. transformed government, when government has gone through the full transformation process, providing fully integrated services requiring broad organisational change, aligning its organisational set-up with the new capacities it has acquired as a 'digital state'.

The different stages of e-government maturity are closely linked to the successive phases of ICTs implementation at the institutional level. Over time, individual government agencies are expected to go through similar phases.

The speed by which a country will be able to move from one stage of e-government maturity to the other is highly dependent on political leadership and the human and financial resources it can rely on, as well as on the capacity of different institutions to move through their successive phases.

The above does not imply that a country can only move from one phase to the other if all government institutions have met the criteria for that particular phase. On the contrary, to a certain extent, asymmetry will almost by definition occur. Especially in the first phases, individual agencies can move relatively independently although co-operation with an increasing number of other institutions will be required to move into more advanced phases of the e-government process.

Countries should define e-government priorities within the framework of their national policy goals, e-government vision and strategic objectives by evaluating the way different applications draw on scarce available resources and add different value to and impact on the governance process.

E-government tends to be multidimensional, impacting above all on economic, social and governance dimensions. The prioritisation process should focus on these impacts from a people-centred and development-oriented perspective. From the start a participatory approach should therefore be stimulated and guidance provided to ensure that different stakeholders and institutions start discussing the different available options. Experience has also shown that e-government cannot be introduced through a single major initiative but rather through small, achievable components which can build success and credibility. This is what is increasingly be used as the "Think-big, Start-small, Scale fast" approach used in many success stories (or claimed to be so).

In this regard, many examples of "Think-big and start small" exist, but there are not many examples of successful "Scale fast" experiences, despite the political claims on this.

In fact, achieving the future as envisaged by the policy-makers necessitates an incremental and modular basis implementation, a building block approach that allows for greater control and flexibility of the process, particularly during the initial phase. The focus could therefore be placed on priorities that could create an enabling environment for successive stages of e-government maturity. For instance, the ability to facilitate communication and co-ordination of activities among major partner institutions could be one of the main deliverables that is sought after. This kind of priority may involve initially very little technology since the focus would be more on reaching agreement on standardisation of key data sets which could enable linking the information bases of individual partners.

Among the most important criteria to determine their set of priorities, countries should include sustainability, the rate of return in terms of social and economic benefits and the potential spin-offs that e-government applications can generate. In fact, understanding the 'market' in which institutions operate, the social and economic impact and the potential spin-offs is of critical importance in determining how the required inputs could be met by and for the individual institutions.

Overall, however, the impact of e-government on the economic, social and governance spheres is still considered the main determining factor in the prioritisation process and in establishing the level of support that governments will provide.

In this regard, it is important that a clear, strategic vision of what a government aims to achieve through e-government will be generated to guide the transformation process. This may encompass a systemwide perspective, for example at the central government level, or be limited to a specific sector of government administration. This vision has to take into account the national and local development needs and opportunities, as well as the conditions facing the government system or specific sectors.

The vision of e-government for development needs to be aligned with national development strategies and plans, in particular with the national ICTs strategy and governance reform goals. As different political contexts and development needs have to be brought together in one vision, leadership should recognise that a consultative process with all stakeholders is necessary to form consensus.

The vision is a medium to long-term statement concerning broad goals, and which provides a road map and general guidance for institutional change, allowing systematic issues to be better understood and more coherently addressed. It provides a framework within which the actions and interests of different stakeholders can be brought together to ensure a common orientation that makes increments of action by various stakeholders consistent and compatible with the desired long-term goal of democracy, good governance and sustainable development.¹⁴

3.4. e-GOVERNMENT AND e-GOVERNANCE: CHALLENGES AND THREATS

The development of e-government and e-governance takes place in a very specific environment and contextual pressure which we must understand and learn, in order to steer at best. This overall change can be identified as manifold, although producing a composed impact on our lifestyle, level of wealth and relationships, inter-regionally and inter-nationally speaking.

In particular, three main aspects should be stressed, to better understand the phenomenon:

Globalisation, appears as an emerging and constantly reinforcing process. Globalisation is more than just the "mundialisation" identified by previous researchers, from Braudel to Wallerstein, rooted in Middle Age discoveries and expressed through successive expansions, themselves supported by ever more efficient communication means, up to the complete coverage and information production upon, of the planet as the ultimate cognitive object. Globalisation is the effect of this building process in the sense that its overall power relationships (let us think about conflicts or the inequalities of means and performance), but also local initiatives may have an impact instantly or gradually on the rest of the world, thanks to highly interconnected processes and interests. It is, needless to say, that ICTs reinforce this process. Globalisation can be perceived as a source of opportunities, as the scale for any activity tends to take place in a much broader arena than before, but also as a constant pressure, with positive and negative consequences.

Economic competition, as a result of the previous phenomenon, became pervasive and almost a safeguard free paradigm, with significant consequences in terms of energy and material output, nature transformation and technology mastering, but also social and knowledge divides as well as damage at various scales and severe environmental threats ahead; economic competition is believed to benefit the customer, encourage innovation at all levels and, as a consequence, generate a better society. It also generates local shifts and undesired effects, with economic, social and cultural dimensions, to which remedies must be found. Public policy and more significantly political elites and leaders in major OECD countries have set up a framework for developing competition which goes even further, changing the rules of politico-economic regimes in a serious programme trend called liberalisation.

State transformation, in this context, reinforced local means to express needs, projects and alliances in separate terms are growing in parallel with the pressure of globalisation and transnational forms of economic competitiveness; it is therefore no surprise to see the state entering a phase of redefinition. Sovereignty is often at the core of the discussion, but fundamentally, what seem to be essential state prerogatives in most regions of the globe, are being rearranged: public service delivery can often be delegated, with the necessary reinforcement of policy making and regulation capabilities towards more efficient, ethically consistent supervision of services. It is of course particularly the case in industries traditionally owned by the state in many countries (telecommunications, energy industries, transport, health, etc.), but also of more specific administrative services (let us think of geographical information systems for instance).

In fact, the numerous e-activities, e-products, and e-services which are currently being displayed in the public sector cannot be fully understood, appreciated and assessed if they are not placed within the much broader framework of state transformation¹⁵.

However, it is important to stress why. Indeed, the transformation of the state's status encompasses changes in three separate dimensions, namely:

• the growing emergence of non-state actors, basically transnational corporations (TNCs) and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Increasingly, the state has to share its power with these non-state actors. Such power sharing is most pronounced at the supra- and at the infra-national levels.
  
  
• The growing emergence of levels of managing public affairs, other than the nation-state level. I refer here in particular of the emergence of supra-national levels (EU, global), as well as of infra-national levels (local, regions).
  
  
• The growing differentiation of the state's three main functions, namely the service delivery function, the rule-making function and the regulatory function. These three functions can be increasingly treated as being separate from each other and therefore being shifted to the different levels and the different actors.

These three movements are being combined with each other, which leads to the fact that public affairs become more and more fragmented (in terms of functions), diluted (in terms of levels) and outsourced (to non-state actors). There is, in particular, a deficit of cross-functions, seamless operations in which non-state stakeholders can play a proactive role. At the same time, enterprise-based and private individuals' e-activities develop quite freely and increasingly. There is therefore a place for a different type of steering than the one e-government promotes. This is what I defined as governance with, and of, ICTs, or e-governance¹⁶.

But this new concept brings about a number of challenges and threats to be analysed. Some general challenges, as previously evoked are linked to the fact that e-government, just like all e-activities, tends to modify organisational boundaries, statuses and even more, to generate new risks and opportunities that were not part of the pre-Internet landscape. Some of these changes concern the networking capabilities of the organisations, their internal or shared processes, the rationale of the value-chain and even some institutional adjustments. In fact, one could say that the fully-fledged digital transformation of services, with the possible supporting incorporation of several technological innovations, almost certainly lead to institutional redesign, unless some new problems are immediately recreated (let us remember for instance the risk of an increase in the back-office distraction due to exaggeratedly accessible online services).

However, this organisational and institutional dimension of ICTs-induced changes modify in a considerable manner the issue of measuring and comparing achievements as they necessarily involve more complex changes than just efficiency or optimisation effects due to the digitisation of existing administrative services. A whole new domain of what to measure and how to do it is therefore open to exploration, much beyond the rather simple and always difficult to demonstrate reality of the "e-indexes".

Some other issues or challenges are more specific but no less important, when envisaging a more holistic perspective, such as security and identity management, mobility of actors and organisations supported by enhanced technological means and accesses, territorial and data mining-rooted surveillance and private sphere reconsideration, productivity and benefit capturing, using ICTs as a trigger for development, cultural diversity, etc.

In a more generic statement, I see e-government as very heterogeneous and having quite a number of difficulties to evaluate before, during and after projects are undertaken, with effective and sustainable cost-benefit criteria and setting priorities for high impact solutions (vs. quick wins). In addition to this, while e-government initiatives have so far reached, in many cases spectacular inroads in terms of service delivery, especially by digitising the front-office but also that in many cases are just "mirroring" the existing and not always well-restructured back-office, ICTs are so far not being systematically (or at all) used with regard to the other functions of the state (namely, regulatory and policy making). Thus, the potential of ICTs in linking the overall functions of the state and the different levels and actors involved in the governance process, is far from being realised (or in many cases even started).

Combining the above mentioned, general or more specific, challenges that e-government is confronted with, and the necessity to address these issues with a consistent toolbox and in terms of multi-actor, multi-level and multi-sector involvement, we are obliged to ask whether e-government is not forgetting some important "missing masses" in its linear, optimistic and mostly mono-factor type of deployment.

As already said before, I am fully aware that worldwide, at the moment, for most actors, e-governance is a synonym of e-government. Some scholars try to propose a perspective in which e-governance is just e-government extended to non state actors, but still with the state as the leading force in such endeavours.

The definition I proposed here is instead a radically new and fully innovative vision of e-governance where institutional redesign, state transformation, and organisational changes, as well as networking and relationship management are the key features of this new paradigm.

This conceptual framework is based on some "e-governance theses" I developed together with my colleague Pierre Rossel during the redesign and conceptualisation of the Executive Master in e-governance at EPFL (2005, 2006), and that can be summarised as follows¹⁷:

• There is a growing awareness of the need to improve the quality of public-service delivery, through new mechanisms and forms, including public-private partnerships, externalisation, delegation, etc. and with an attention to the market, the "citizen-user-customer" and the need to manage efficiently and effectively limited resources, in a time of rapid technological change. In this context, e-government is playing an important role in promoting the transformation of the state, but its value-chain, and the market relations between suppliers and providers are demonstrating its limits, and actually even provoke risks, especially in not well established democracies, or in less developed countries. E-government is therefore becoming an "industry" in itself, with a complex system of relationships that need to be managed and governed. But what have to be governed are not only the solutions to collective problems but the manner of collectively constructing the Information Society.
  
  
• Rapid technological change induces organisational changes and these result in a continuous "dynamic tension" that generates pressure for institutional change and new needs in the society that cannot always be satisfied, controlled or even followed by the state. These needs of change cannot be governed or decided by a static decision making process and often go beyond the rigid existing regulatory frameworks, but need innovative solutions involving all stakeholders. ICTs add complexity and increase the speed of change. In the same way as governance is about collective problem solving, but unlike the state, not necessarily or not only in a vertical or hierarchical way; e-governance is therefore collective problem-solving not only with the use of ICTs, but also of the ICTs. It is also about innovating, to solve some problems that cannot be solved the usual way and, if necessary, it is finally about changing the institutional rules, processes, configurations or boundaries or even inventing new ones, e-governance is also a new form of social engineering. Non-state actors are not just citizens or users of the administration, they are stakeholders of problems that require attention or solutions, these problems are quite diverse and have to cope with many possible industrial domains. Once again, more than just problems (to be solved collectively) they are actors in the building of the Information Society.
  
  
• E-governance is more a process about the "how" than the "what". E-governance is a reflective activity in which the way problems are tackled is as important as the result and even to a great extent having an impact on the result. In this sense, accessibility, transparency, evaluation and accountability are features intrinsically marking a robust e-governance process, where e-government is only an instrument for better service delivery (the governance with ICTs). But ICTs, in addition to being used to perform the governance task, are multi-faceted in nature. There is at least a triple aspect to ICTs: as a tool, as a means for producing a structural effect and as a domain, all aspects of which also have to be regulated and governed as they involve many types of stakeholders. ICTs as tools explain to a large extent the governance "with" ICTs aspect of e-governance; the structural effect is largely the consequence of the impact of the many and rapidly changing technologies of the Information Society. This is difficult to measure and also largely involves policy-making and not just regulatory action; ICTs as domain cross-cut all activities and need to be regulated (e-governance as governance "of " ICTs). Most activities involve two or three of these facets, although most of the time only the first one is taken into account.
  
  
• E-governance is also a knowledge creation and management process, but at the same time it is a learning process and, as such, it must be concerned with measurement, evaluation and also foresight. The requirement therefore is to build an evaluation system that will be at the same time capable of measuring the impact of the tools (i.e. the use of ICTs or the e-government), but that can be linked to the measurement of the e-governance. This means considering the capacity of the various stakeholders points of view to appraise processes, new services or business models, and the capacity to incorporate values, diversity, openness and multi-level perspective to embed any significance, as well as foresighting about long-term impacts, rather than just the short term immediate results of introducing ICTs in a specific process. E-governance is therefore about maintaining, beyond the problem solving actions and taking into consideration what exists, the necessity to open new avenues of how to do things among stakeholders.

These theses are intended to dismiss the naïve perspective of valuing the connective aspect of the Internet as if we were from now on only part of one network. There are many networks, of different kinds, social, organisational, technological-infrastructural, and they partially interconnect, they also oppose one another and e-governance is also the negotiations, intermediations, compromises taking place and the crafting of ad hoc organisational and institutional forms to allow or maintain such half-way solutions.

Convergence of the first order, making it possible for the same type of data to flow through various channels or at least to be captured and managed as such at key points of the infrastructure networks does not make enough in terms of networking: discontinuities are essential to explain the generation of a solution, much more than the presence of connective tools.

Society, in fact, is not harmonious and just saying that e-governance, like governance, is about the transactional aspect of inter-actor life would not account for the complexity of what really takes place, it is also confrontational. Stakeholders have to muddle their way through even when they are not fundamentally friends, inter-industry-wise and inter-level-wise. This is why e-governance can be seen as the expression of a dynamic tension. As mentioned before (see Definition of e-governance) there is although a basic asymmetry between the two side of the coin that define e-governance (governance with and of): where "with" means basically "bureauatic", web-based and connective type of technologies and applications or rather the said mediation-supportive technologies and applications; whereas governance of ICTs means dealing in terms of innovation and regulation with all the technologies of the Information society.

3.5. FROM e-GOVERNMENT TO e-GOVERNANCE: THE WAY TOWARDS A KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY

The need to respond to changing pressures resulting from globalisation, fiscal demands, evolving societies and citizens' expectations has meant a continuing process of public administration reform to enhance performance, both in industrialised and developing countries, notwithstanding significant changes over the last two decades. Reforms have addressed (and are addressing, especially under the guidance of the UN MDGs) the full range of good governance objectives. In many areas, ICTs have been an important enabling tool for reform. While the pursuit of efficiency gains and the effective delivery of programme outcomes have been main drivers of ICTs use in government, governments are now confronted with a new reality and changed imperatives as a result of the diffusion of ICTs throughout the world and within their nations. The focus has turned more recently to other good governance objectives, such as facilitating consultation and public engagement to respond to standards of accountability, transparency and participatory governance as critical elements for democracy and state legitimacy.¹⁸

In this framework, ICTs allow a government's internal and external communication to gain speed, precision, simplicity, outreach and networking capacity. This can be converted into cost reductions and increased effectiveness – two desired features of all government operations, but especially of public services. It can also be converted into 24 hour 7 days a week usefulness, transparency and accountability, networked structures of public administration, information management and eventually knowledge creation.

But what is now becoming more important is that, in addition to this, ICTs can equip people for genuine participation in an inclusive political process that can produce well-informed public consent, the ever more prevalent basis for the legitimacy of governments.¹⁹

This demands a fundamental change in the way the state acts internally and interacts with its citizenry, particularly in its function of promoting good governance as a condition for sustainable development. E-government can transform the existing government structure and consolidate the establishment of an inclusive governance system, through digital means, that is capable of exercising its powers and functions efficiently and effectively. It can produce a governance system that is committed to working with civil society in a transparent and accountable way to reduce poverty, safeguard the environment, redress inequality, foster security and fulfill social, economic, cultural, civic and political rights.²⁰ In other words, governance, in combination with ICTs, is making its way towards "e-governance", where - as we have seen before - the concept of e-governance further encompasses the concept of e-government. E-governance, in fact, involves not only the use of ICTs, but also a new way of looking at, and attitude to, governing and managing ICTs, where participation and efficiency are required of all the partners linked in a network²¹.

While e-government may be understood as the performance of the governance systems via the electronic medium in order to facilitate an efficient, speedy and transparent process of disseminating information to the public and other agencies, and for performing government administration activities, e-governance is generally considered as a wider concept than e-government, since it can bring about a change in the way citizens relate to governments and to each other. For someone, the idea of adopting ICTs in governance is to move beyond passive information-giving to active citizen involvement in the decision making process²².

The purpose of implementing e-governance, is seen not only to enhance good governance, but to take advantage of the recent advances in ICTs, and especially the Internet, to provide opportunities to transform the relationship between governments and citizens in a new way, bringing forth new concepts of citizenship, both in terms of citizen needs and responsibilities. The use of ICTs, in fact, can increase the broad involvement of citizens in the process of governance at all levels by providing the possibility of online discussion groups and by enhancing the rapid development and effectiveness of pressure groups. The government should gain in that through the provision of better service in terms of time it makes governance more efficient and more effective. In addition, the transaction costs can be lowered and government services become more accessible, while it can engage, enable and empower the citizen.

However, for this to be a reality, it is required not only to define new ways of organising and delivering information and services, but a new style of leadership, new ways of debating and deciding policy and investment, new ways of accessing education, new ways of listening to citizens, and at the same time providing adequate and innovative regulatory frameworks.

Within this context, e-governance is also necessarily about the improvement of the performance of civil servants to provide better services to citizens. In principle, it has the potential to enhance decentralisation, accountability and transparency, and can thereby improve the position of developing countries in the global political economy.

However, recent studies have found vast differences between countries in the maturity of their e-government efforts. Perhaps the key findings, is that even the most mature countries have tapped less than 20% of the potential.²³ Furthermore, the results of the UN Global e-government Survey 2003, identify that: "only very few governments have opted to use e-government applications for transactional services or networking; and even fewer governments use it to support the genuine participation of citizens in politics. Those who do, in most cases, apply it at a very rudimentary level".

On the other hand, one of the main findings of the UN Global e-government Survey 2003 was that: "No country or group of countries in the world owns the monopoly on imagination, wisdom and commitment or political will for use of e-government for the delivery of the public value of human development. Original, advanced content of e-government applications finds a home in the geographic and developmental South, as it does in the North".

Analogous to the development of e-commerce in the private sector (which has evolved already through several stages: from publishing, through interactivity, completing transactions, and delivery, and it has now been overtaken, at least in some areas, by the so called "economy", that involves the creation and use of "e-marketplace" instead of e-procurement relations) e-government has so far centred its activity on publishing, but, in many cases, it is evolving quickly through the different stages of e-government maturity. Thus, if we consider the same analogy, and having in mind what was underlined by the Human Development Report (2001) ".....technology networks are transforming the traditional map of development, expanding people's horizons and creating the potential to realise in a decade progress that required generations in the past....."²⁴ developing countries could benefit from the progress made in the sector of ICTs application to accomplish government tasks and service delivery, and reaching the "e-marketplace" solution immediately, without passing through the "e-procurement" applications, in a sort of "leapfrogging" paradigm, still far to be effectively realised, despite the potential and the political discourses about it.

Obviously, this new participatory approach in running governance affairs has to be developed - and not only in the developing countries - considering the barriers and threats to its implementation, being viewed as a complex process, articulated over time, embracing the overall system in which governments operate and interact with individuals, organisations and communities to perform their functions, achieving public ends by digital means²⁵.

In general terms, the debate regarding e-governance is most often polarised between those who feel that the new ICTs will enhance participation by the citizen in the government policy decision making process and those who feel that it will simply be business as usual via a new medium. The arguments range from a promise that the new ICTs will completely revitalise democracy, giving more power to the citizen, to the opposite position that it will do nothing more than enhance the existing mechanisms to deliver government services in a more efficient manner.

But, as the subjects of e-government and e-governance (with the related issues of e-Participation and e-Democracy) are in their nascent stages, there is still very little empirical data to support either side of these arguments²⁶.

In spite of the criticism of technocracy, those who believe in the success of e-governance argue that further development of information systems will contribute to overcoming bureaucratic contradictions within government²⁷. At the same time, this will also allow the enhancement of the economic performance of developing countries, more through the creation/strengthening of an ICTs industry, than through the easier access of the private sector to crucial public sector information, and the increase of "capacity for public service delivery of basic social services, public administration reform, integrated planning, increased citizen participation in decision making, decentralisation, transparency, accountability and combating corruption".²⁸

Despite this optimistic approach, somewhat induced by an ICTs-driven positivistic philosophy, as I have already underlined before, and in this comforted by the evidence of fieldwork and analysis that try to go beyond the "supply side" indicators available in the front-office, entering into the back-office and looking at the "demand-side" indicators, the potential for e-government and e-governance in both industrialized and developing countries, remains largely unexploited²⁹. This is perhaps because of the difficulty in achieving the revised organizational structures and skills; degree of decentralization of decision making; new forms of leadership; transformation toward public-private partnerships; and effective involvement of stakeholders, that is required. Moreover, local governance is in general given little attention within national e-government policies and strategies. In this regard, the broad assumption that the use of ICTs can greatly increase good governance has yet to be proven. To date there is little empirical evidence of the "multidimensional" effects of ICTs on governance, which can in turn inform national e-government policies.

Furthermore, and more important, if we consider the large amount of money wasted for e-government for Development initiatives that, in some cases, have been criticized to be a new form of market acquisition for national industries from the so called developed countries, or even new forms of "e-Colonialism..."³⁰, I want to stress here the risks beside the opportunities of introducing ICTs in different contexts, and the need to look at the issue of development considering that, based on the conceptual framework I presented here, it is not sufficient to just introduce ICTs into Government operations to solve the problems of today's world, or even worst just transferring "best practices", as unfortunately many policymakers seems to believe.

So far, the main effort in e-government has been dedicated to the digitization of existing information and procedures, addressing in a hopefully more efficient way a variety of administrative functions and service delivery options. We have to recognise the value of this ongoing achievement. At the same time, the underpinning assumptions, methods and philosophical biases that have been used to support that type of change (that we call change I, see after) bear some cost and to some extent, prevent an easy move towards more ambitious transformation, such as suggested by the higher stages of the maturity model in particular and in any case by an effective local development involving grass-root motivations and projects. One of the reasons behind this paradoxical barrier is the success and productivity of the process-minded approach.

In this regard, the Business Process Reengineering phenomenon (or simply BPR), which has been highly fashionable throughout the nineties, was heavily convoked, directly or indirectly, to address the issue of transforming administrations with ICTs toolsets. In my opinion, however, it did so in a rather simplistic manner (although technically it can be quite sophisticated). It has been necessary to adapt the process re-engineering rationale to the characteristics of the particular process analysed, taking into consideration the peculiarities of the public sector. The challenge was to identify the different sub-processes (stages) that take place within the public sector, in particular with regard to the linkages with politics and the role of the different "clients": citizens, users, customers, other administrations and agencies, private sector, etc. and decide which process re-engineering concepts can be beneficially used in their analysis.

In fact, BPR³¹ is about redefining the complexity of organizations on the basis of linear and interrelated threads of action called processes, with regard to specific human resources as well as infrastructure use, hopefully leading to customers' satisfaction. The problem is that the solution is immediately perceptible and impacting the organization, but at the same time it narrows down the vision of its scope, place and options in a wider framework of inter-organizational, market or governance-minded considerations. It therefore tends to close down to similar practices, self-rewarding indicators and short-term results. In its lower-end version, BPR may have meant nothing more than some very partial process reformulation and a general excuse for undertaking severe organizational restructuring. Today new concepts have taken the relay, including more "network-minded" substance (ICTs mean more and more the involvement of the Internet in and out) than BPR, which was organization-centered, namely Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) and the notion of ICTs/business process "alignment".

In this context, it has to be considered in fact that, especially in developing countries, the public sector is increasingly seen as the main engine to bridge the digital divide at country level. Public agencies can start acting as model users of ICTs and be catalysts for others to follow. The public sector tends to be the biggest provider of local content and it can nurture and foster the further development of the local ICTs industry. For this reason, the enhancement and/or building of the capacity of public bodies and government agencies in the use of e-government applications, promoting at the same time the accessibility of businesses and citizens to internet and government services online, can improve availability of information and eventually produce knowledge.

The debate is therefore now turning towards the discussion of the role of information and knowledge in public sector reform, and the role of the public sector in developing and implementing the Knowledge Society as a whole, through national policies. The role of knowledge development and governance is certainly not new. However, it has to be recognised that knowledge has taken on an even greater degree of relevance and a different shape with the advent and deepening of the knowledge economy and society. There are multiple drivers of this phenomenon, one of them being the way in which society is becoming more complex and unpredictable in both positive and challenging ways. One can point to: globalisation, the economic value of ideas, global production chains, demographics of youth, challenges to political systems and rapid development in science and technology, including ICTs as examples of this change. These new imperatives demand responses that are more creative, innovative and smarter and more active in their use of knowledge. Yet while there is an abundance of information there is a deficit of knowledge, or at least a deficit in the ability of the public sector to create, use and apply it meaningfully.

The UN Millennium Declaration, in addition to detailing a number of socio-economic and governance goals, also takes note of the importance of innovation, science and technology and knowledge as tools for meeting the Declaration's objectives. Capacity building towards these ends is called for. Guided by this philosophy, it becomes necessary to seek to determine those knowledge related activities and policy decisions that add public value and result in the meaningful utilisation of knowledge throughout the whole society. For this purpose, there is a recognisable need to translate these general goals and recommendations into more concise – though flexible – conceptual frameworks, implementable policy and concrete actions, especially taking into consideration the lessons learned to date by those around the world seeking to realise the potential of the Knowledge Society.

While the precise role of the public sector in developing national knowledge systems may be the subject of debate, there is a clear role for the public sector in enhancing its own generation, dissemination and use of knowledge and in the gathering of knowledge through public debate and citizen participation in policy making and implementation. This goes beyond mere e-government policies and seeks to place knowledge as an essential factor in improving quality, effectiveness, collaboration, multidisciplinary programmes and meaningful government reform. As such, it is important to focus not only on the tools for knowledge management, but also on the content and use of knowledge as it is found in various forms in the public sector³².

However, as I have already mentioned, access to information, while an important component of acquiring knowledge, does not in itself constitute learning³³. Information is not knowledge or competence. As a matter of fact, information access and sharing, as well as expert data handling, necessitates having a lot of knowledge. Information is not the first stage towards, nor the pre-condition of knowledge, it is quite the opposite. From the same perspective, the increase of participation in the usage of ICTs is no automatic and linear step towards deep, effective, sustainable or democratic evidence. Just the opposite, one has to stress that to carry out collective learning of some significance through ICTs, more horizontal processes, empowerment and trial and error linked with experience sharing must somehow take place "upstream" or at least considered quite early on in an ICTs-based project to constitute a democratic enhancement chance.

As a matter of fact, the Internet, e-government, e-learning, etc..., do not lead in a straightforward manner to better chances and awareness among practitioners. Altogether, particularly if mishandled, wrongly put into perspective or simply shortsightedly tied with short-term, low impact efficiency goals of substituting actual processes with a digital equivalent without any further analysis of the organisation, ICTs may not be always necessarily profitable, nor e-government in all cases, lead to improvement of administration performance or service to the citizen.

The pitfall suggested above, that involves a mere digital translation of existing services, with all the technological solutions outsourced and no particular change induced in the value chain, we (Misuraca, Rossel, see op. cit.)³⁴ call "Change I type".

The e-governance type of interactions and collective problem solving negotiation, which may involve state agencies and requires some redesign to fit the new assignments, experiments or opportunities of alliances and partnerships, we call "Change II type".

Change I is ICTs driven, Change II is basically the art of reconfiguring processes, tasks, roles and, if necessary, institutions in order to make better use of ICTs. Change I is mainly a substitution operation, Change II a new deal to enhance each stakeholder's chances. Change I is mostly an administration-focussed preoccupation, rhetorically concerned with improving the servicing of customers or users. Change II is often multi-actor, multi-level and multi-sector.

Based upon this conceptual framework and considering that any complex issue will quite quickly bring complex issues to deal with, some key areas of concern for e-governance can be identified such as: Public security development and regulation, Identity management, Risk management, not only technological, but also economic, political and social; Sustaining the motivation for innovation beyond the best or good practice trend (which aims at not always re-inventing the wheel, a goal quite noble in itself); Developing new mobility schemes for individuals and organisations, with the kind of knowledge and environments which will enable them; Cross-border applications and projects; Cross-function learning beyond the boundaries of the various network industries in which e-activities are deployed (telecoms, post, transport, energy, health, education, etc.); Territorial management for development; The various types of digital divides to be taken care of, etc.

For all these problems and, of course, many more to be identified and documented, which most of the time do not occur separately but in conjunction (the above listing in reality must be regarded as a matrix of issues), there is a need for new competence, leadership and combined efforts and learning patterns, first in projects, experiments, knowledge sharing and benchmarking as in practice up to now, but also in knowledge management and neo-institutional skills³⁵.

E-governance is therefore first of all an open area for innovation and solution pooling, which presently seem only to be in its infancy. A lot remains to be done to really harness ICTs as tools as they should be, instead of being steered by them, as unfortunately happens too often. This appears the only way to achieve a knowledgeable and inclusive society, taking advantage of ICTs, and managing the risks deriving from them in the best way possible.

3.6. e-GOVERNANCE IN AFRICA: CHALLENGES AHEAD

Africa's experience with ICTs has unfortunately, and for the most part, taken a different path from most of the world. Poor ICTs infrastructure, combined with weak policy and regulatory frameworks, low technological penetration and unimpressive human and institutional capacity, have led to inadequate access to affordable telephones, broadcasting, computers, the Internet and efficient postal services. This has hampered the continent's ability to capitalise on ICTs as a central tool in creating new business opportunities. The combined constraints have also played a key role in creating rifts within and between nations, between sub-regional African markets, isolating them from global markets.

The contexts and institutional frameworks within African countries are changing rapidly, reflecting their commitment to the Information Society. Many reforms have been introduced and measures have been taken by policy makers and telecommunications operators. Despite these reforms, telecommunications costs are still relatively high, particularly at the local level; whereas international communications costs are relatively cheaper. This is evidence that telecommunications policies still favour international rather than national communications. Significant progress has indeed been made in the ICTs sector, and a number of African countries have embarked on policy reforms that have introduced competition and improved policy and regulatory frameworks. In fact, since 1990, approximately forty countries have initiated programmes to separate postal functions from telecommunications. Over twenty have privatised their state-owned national telephone companies. Thirty have liberalised their markets and opened up to private cellular services, and over twenty have revised their regulatory frameworks to facilitate more effective private investment. Over forty-five have at least one cellular services provider, and at least forty have achieved some level of connectivity and the presence of local full-service dialup Internet Services Providers (ISPs), even though Internet service and other advanced services are limited by scarce bandwidth.³⁶ These developments reflect a growing belief that Africans are realising the enormous potential of ICTs as a key driver for social and economic development and poverty reduction, particularly as reforming countries are reaping the benefits through improved infrastructure, increased applications and better accessibility and affordability of ICTs infrastructure, equipment and services.

But although the foundations of integration into the Information Society have been laid, integration into the information economy remains the responsibility of the policy makers and the different development actors. In fact, in many African countries, a systematic and consistent policy to integrate ICTs into all aspects of economic and social life is yet to be formulated. The development of the telecommunications sector is far from being integrated into the overall macroeconomic framework, and it continues to reflect a sectoral approach to telecommunications policy. Even then, most of the reforms have been done without much co-ordination at the sub-regional level. The region as a whole does not have a consistent strategy to attract larger and higher quality, local and foreign capital and other resources for investment, or to remove the many barriers in order to accelerate development. In addition, one of the major developmental challenges confronting Africa is to develop the capacities, strategies, and mechanisms necessary to take full advantage of the opportunities for development offered by ICTs. Given the potential for ICTs to induce changes, many development analysts -and I am among them- believe that these instruments can play an important role in the development process.

For example, the recent trend and developments of mobile technologies, fits within this claim, obeying the principles of the underpinning approach and earlier mentioned characteristics of e-governance (generating at the same time opportunities, resources and nuisances, durable problems, which we shall examine further), but somehow now opening to new service and user-involvement perspectives (see for that Rossel, Finger and Misuraca, 2005).

Besides describing concrete trials to make e-governance real, in Africa, it is generally admitted that ICTs have the potential to help poor communities to find new ways of accelerating their development process. But this is an implicit hypothesis based upon the fact that because development is neither a linear nor unitary process, the transforming nature of ICTs can be used to catalyse rapid and sustainable economic and social development. ICTs-enabled developed countries have been able to take maximum advantage of the opportunities that these tools can offer. Therefore, poor countries and communities should be able to take advantage of these new tools to improve their capacities to create wealth and reach an improved level of development.

The fact that ICTs are increasingly integrated into the development programmes of African countries is confirmed by their prominent position in the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). Steps are being taken to gradually institutionalise ICTs tools in the economic and social system of African countries to promote more rapid integration of these countries into the global economy. However, these steps are still limited and general strategies or policies that integrate ICTs into the overall macroeconomic framework of African countries are lacking. Integration of African nations into the Information Society will require far-reaching actions that will affect all aspects of economic and social life. However, the potential exists for ICTs to be used in all fields of activity if the constraints limiting their transforming effects can be lifted. ICTs can make this contribution by helping to meet the dynamic and changing expectations of Africans for access to information on such subjects as agriculture, education, and governance, for example. As people become familiar with ICTs they discover the opportunities that these tools can offer and express their needs on the basis of the anticipated usefulness of these technologies. In other words, they anticipate the capacity of ICTs to deliver information that will solve the practical and concrete problems they face.³⁷

Some countries and local communities have undergone substantial changes in their effort to appropriate the tools. The changes, which have occurred at the individual level and within community organisations, include capacity building, acquisition of new skills, more efficiency in community activities, and better integration of previously marginalised groups.

Therefore, it is urgent to take far-reaching actions to meet not only expectations but also to consolidate the advances that have been made in ICTs appropriation by these African communities. Challenges and problems are generally common to the whole of Africa. As identified by the e-Africa Commission of NEPAD, the main challenges for integrating ICTs in Africa can be summarised as follows³⁸:

Leadership: Need for a Clear e-Vision; Capacity and will to lead change; Management and accountability structures;

People: Appropriate skills and attitudes available at all levels; Availability of training programmes; Entrenching a culture of increased information access and transparency; Commitment to high level team-work; Support for public service wide collaboration; Change management initiatives.

Policy: Liberalised telecommunications sector and effective regulation; Policy environment supportive of growth of ICTs adoption and use; Policy frameworks that secure freedom of information, privacy, security, intellectual property and copyright; Arresting the "brain drain".

Processes: Identification and improvement of critical processes; Process adaptable, integrated and open to innovation; Monitoring and evaluation; Identification and adoption of best practices.

Technology: Access to ICTs networks, services and equipment; Development of local content in local languages; Ensuring that programmes drive ICTs; Standard approaches to ICTs infrastructure, to ensure scalability and interoperability; Privacy and data sharing; Authentication; Building user trust.

Stakeholders and Access: Support for the need for "e"; Ownership across the board; Making information widely available to citizens; Utilising a variety of channels, including those owned and managed by the commercial and voluntary sectors (such as Kiosks and Call centres); Consideration of people with disabilities; Ensuring that any new channel live up to high consistent standards of trust, confidentiality, security and accountability (PCs, interactive TV, cell phones, telephones/mail, etc.).

A number of initiatives and projects on ICTs for development in Africa are already under way³⁹. However, many of the projects on ICTs for development led by International Organisations focus on financing technological infrastructure and providing assistance oriented to lower tariffs. New approaches aim to incorporate socio-cultural dimensions "placing the individual at the centre of development objectives"⁴⁰.

Increasingly, initiatives focussed on enhancing "local dynamics" and creativity, are being implemented, especially in rural and remote areas of the world. This is required also in order to address what has been defined the "dynamic digital divide", that is given considering not only the national "e-Readiness" capacity at a certain point in time, and how it evolves in a specific timeframe, but instead it considers various components of the digital divide, within a given context, and how they evolve in relation to the local and the global conditions⁴¹. In this context, the centrality and importance of strengthening the political and administrative frameworks in African countries is therefore pivotal. Recent developments in ICTs have however opened up Africa to exciting possibilities for public administration, in particular, and governance in general. The appropriate use of ICTs in managing public services and governing state affairs has therefore become a necessity. This is well recognised by the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) and in particular by African Ministers with responsibility for the public services. The establishment of the e-Africa Commission of NEPAD, focussing on a range of areas pertinent to ICTs implementation, from policy to e-applications, as well as the identification of good governance as a focus area for capacity-building within NEPAD, reflect the importance given to building the capacity of African states to function more effectively through the use of ICTs.

But, of course, the scenario for integrating ICTs in Africa's governance is difficult and there are some technological and human barriers that threaten the exploitation of ICTs. In short, the barriers against such initiatives are summarised by the weakness of the ICTs infrastructure in Africa and the low rate of ICTs penetration in administration. Africa ranks at the bottom of world statistics not only regarding ICTs penetration, but also for other telecommunications technologies such as television and broadband. Regarding ICTs penetration in general, according to the NUA Survey, Africa has only 3.11 million users, that is miniscule as a proportion of its population. When compared with the world's other regions the digital gap is even more evident, where Asia/Pacific has 104.88, Europe 113.14, Canada and USA 167.12. The number of users in Latin America is growing, and is now at 16.45. Only the Middle East, with 2.40 millions users is in as bad a situation as Africa, although with a smaller population⁴². A specific barrier is also related to the weakness and marginalised role of parliaments in Africa, as highlighted by the UNECA Report on "Striving for Good Governance"⁴³.

However, despite the many indicators showing Africa at a disadvantage, the potential for growth through integrating ICTs in the governance systems is encouraging. In particular, the key issue is how to build capacity to move towards an African knowledge-based society that will allow enhancement of the economic performance of governments and the public sector. African countries can enormously benefit from the use of ICTs for their effective development. In addition to faster management and analysis of the execution of decisions, ICTs can especially support, in the best instances, how each public administration intends to implement its activities in relation to budget allocation, and how it thinks it ought to manage performance. The introduction of digital, knowledge-based economy in Africa would have a strong impact on the life of all citizens. It can be a powerful engine for growth, competitiveness and jobs, while at the same time improving citizens' quality of life.

However, the central issue behind ICTs utilisation in Africa is not a matter of technology transfer. It has everything to do with people's empowerment and society's ability to use the technology as a facilitator for democracy, a tool for universal access to services, opportunities and resources. "Market forces or financial superpowers alone cannot solve these questions. They must be engineered within the framework of social movements' thirst for freedom, genuine development and social justice"⁴⁴.

Notes

¹ Khan Sarbuland, "ICTs as an instrument to Leverage the Millennium Development Goals", in ICTs for African Development, Edited by Okpaku Joseph Sr, PhD, UN ICTs Task Force, New York, 2003

² World Bank, www.worldbank.org

³ UNDESA, Government of Italy, Ministry for Innovation and Technologies, Plan of Action – e-government for Development, 2002, www.paler-moconference2002.org www.unpan.org

⁴ A Comprehensive System of Indicators for Monitoring and Evaluation of e-government is being developed within the framework of the e-government for Development Initiative of UNDESA and the Italian Government www.unpan.org

⁵ Lenihan Donald, "Realigning Governance: from e-government to e-Democracy", Crossing Boundaries Paper, Changing Government, Volume 6, Centre for Collaborative Government, Canada

⁶ Web 2.0 and peer-to-per communication mechanisms are still in their infancy but are growing fast. For more about this see, among others, Glassey Olivier, (2005; 2006).

⁷ Estimates indicate a rate of 70-80% of e-government Projects as total or partial failure (see Heeks, R., 2003).

⁸ Heeks Richard, "Most eGovernment-for-Development Projects Fail: How Can Risks be Reduced?", in iGovernment Working Paper Series, No 14, eGovernment for Development Information Exchange project, co-ordinated by the University of Manchester's IDPM, funded and managed by the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation as part of the UK Department for International Development's "Building Digital Opportunities" programme. http://www.egov4dev.org/or http://www.e-devexchange.org/eGov/topic1.htm

⁹ On this issue see also: Breaking Barriers to eGovernment, anEU-funded project led by the Oxford Internet Institute, implemented in collaboration with Gov3 ltd and the University of Namur.

¹⁰ In this regard, both OECD and United Nations compiled a list of "Guiding Principles for Successful e-government". See OECD, e-government Studies, "The e-government Imperative", 2003, www.oecd.org (pag. 19); and United Nations, "World Public Sector Report 2003: e-government at the Crossroads", New York, 2003, www.unpan.org, (Box 3, pag. 8 and 9).

¹¹ In this regard, see also the Results of the UN Global e-government Survey, 2003, www.unpan.org

¹² Many of the operational indications reported in this paragraph are the results of activities conducted within the framework of the UNDESA, Government of Italy, Ministry for Innovation and Technologies, Plan of Action – e-government for Development Initiative, 2002, www.paler-moconference2002.org www.unpan.org

¹³ UNDESA, Government of Italy, Ministry for Innovation and Technologies, Plan of Action – e-government for Development, 2002, www.palermoconference2002.org. See also Gartner, from 2000; and European Commission, from 2001.

¹⁴ UNDESA, Government of Italy, Ministry for Innovation and Technologies, Plan of Action – e-government for Development, 2002, www.paler-moconference2002.org

¹⁵ On this see, Fingeret et al ii. (2004; 2005).

¹⁶ Matthias Finger, Gianluca Misuraca and Pierre Rossel, "Governance with and of ICTs: the need for new institutional design in a changing world", egov magazine, Volume II – Issue 5

¹⁷ For the e-governance theses see: Rossel, Misuraca, "Triggering the governance perspective of e-government projects: beyond mere digitization of administration services; or the Change I to Change II shift issue", Lausanne, CDM-EPFL Working Paper, 2006 (forthcoming); and also "Rossel, Finger, Misuraca, "Assessing and steering mobile e-government options: findings and indication proposals", ECEG, 2006.

¹⁸ See the United Nations Millennium Declaration, section 'Human rights, democracy and good governance'; the Monterrey Consensus, which states that 'good governance is essential for sustainable development' (Section II); and, the World Bank Development Report 2002, Chapter 5 reports that 'Good governance matters for growth and poverty reduction'.

¹⁹ United Nations, "World Public Sector Report 2003: e-government at the Crossroads", New York, 2003, www.unpan.org

²⁰ UNDESA, Government of Italy, Ministry for Innovation and Technologies, Plan of Action – e-government for Development, 2002, www.paler-moconference2002.org

²¹ Misuraca Gianluca, "From e-government to e-governance: the e-Africa initiative for good governance", paper presented to the International Conferene on e-government, SITEXPO 2004, Casablanca, Morocco, 18th.-21st. February, 2004, not published.

²² www.portal-unesco.org

²³ World Bank, 2002, www.worldbank.org which reports a Study by Accenture, www.accenture.com

²⁴ UNDP, Human Development Report 2001 "Making New Technologies Work for Human Development"

²⁵ CAFRAD, "e-Africa: Elements and Principles for a Strategic Plan of Action" - Draft Working Paper, not published, edited with the technical assistance of Gianluca Misuraca.

²⁶ Gilbert Riley Cathia, "The Changing Role of Citizen in the e-governance & e-Democracy Equation", CceG, 2003, www.electronicgov.net

²⁷ IDEA, Conference on "Democracy and the Information Revolution, Stockholm, June 2001, www.idea.int

²⁸ UN Road map to good governance and democracy

²⁹ An interesting research in this area has been carried out by RSO-Spa, LUISS Management on behalf of the European Commission within the framework of the "eGEP Project – eGovernment Economics Impact Project, see www.rso.com

³⁰ On this see for example, Andrea Di Maio, 2002, www.gartner.com

³¹ It is somehow unsatisfactory to embrace all BPR approaches with one single label. Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) has provided the business world with several complementing approaches (Davenport, 1993), (Glykas, 1994), (Harrington, 1991), (Hammer, 1993), (Morris, 1993), (Ould, 1992), most of which follow five generic steps in the process of redesign (Valiris and Glykas, 1999). Starting from the original analysis of Davenport, Stoddard, Hammer and Champy applied to the private sector and being then "translated" into the public sector, BPR became a sort of discipline in its own, with several different applications and "schools". According to Kettinger, Teng and Guha (1997), there are at least 25 different BPR Methodologies, 72 Methods and 102 Tools. Different perspectives of process modelling are suggested, such as functional, behavioral, organizational and informational, pointing out the notions of agent, role and artefact (resource, transaction) as basic process modelling constructs (Curtis et al, 1992). Some of these approaches are closer to beyond-process options and stakeholder involvement than others.

³² Bertucci Guido, "Opening Remarks to the UN Ad Hoc Expert Group Meeting on Knowledge Systems for Development", UN New York, 4th.-5th. September, 2003, www.unpan.org

³³ Okpaku Joseph, E-Culture, Human Culture and In-Between: Meeting the Challenges of the 21st. Century Digital World - An Address to the ITU Conference on Creating New Leaders for E-Culture, Coventry, UK, August, 2001

³⁴ Rossel, Misuraca, "Triggering the governance perspective of e-government projects: beyond mere digitisation of administration services; or the Change I to Change II shift issue", Lausanne, CDM-EPFL Working Paper, 2006 (forthcoming).

³⁵ An effort in this area is the Executive Master in e-governance of EPFL, crafted exactly to undertake a continuous "learning journey" around the Governance "with and of" ICTs. (http://egov.epfl.ch/)

³⁶ Olekambainei Emmanuel and Sintim-Misa Mavis Ampah, "Info-communication for Development in Africa", UN ICTs Task Force Series 2, ICTs for African Development, UN, NY 2003.

³⁷ Molo Thioune Ramata, (Edited by) Information and Communication Technologies for Development in Africa: Opportunities and Challenges for Community Development, CODESRIA/IDRC, 2003.

³⁸ NEPAD e-Africa Commission, www.nepad.org

³⁹ The most recent and accurate overview of ongoing initiatives with regard to ICTs for development in Africa is included as an annexe to this book.

⁴⁰ UNESCO's medium term strategy 2002-2007, 31 C/4: Chapter on "The contribution of ICTs to the development of education, science and culture and the construction of a knowledge society" - pp.53-56.

⁴¹ See Rossel Pierre, Cooperation at EPFL, 2002, Bridging digital divide

⁴². www.nua.com/surveys/how_many_online/index.html

⁴³ United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, Striving for Good Governance in Africa, 2004.

⁴⁴ Sy, J. Habib, "Critical and Prospective Views on ICTs and Governance in Africa", in "Africa Networking: Development Information ICTs and Governance, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, UNECA, Addis Ababa, 2004

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