Open Governenment: A Case Study Overview

Government 2.0

How Social Media is Changing the Way We Participate

A Few Roles of Government

National DefensePublic ServicesCollect TaxesEnforce LawsSet RegulationsEnsure Order (and Democracy)

Problems With Government

Countries face different challenges depending on the political, social, and economic conditions

E-Government: 21st Century Democracy

“To promote more efficient and cost-effective government, facilitate more convenient government services, allow greater public access to information, and make government more accountable to citizens.”

Models for E-Government

Common themes: Open, Transparent, Accountable

UN E-Readiness Rankings

Top 4: Sweden, Denmark, Norway, United States

Bottom 4: Central African Republic, Guinea, Niger, Chad

Still Connected – 189 Countries Online

UN Benchmark for Web Readiness

Different countries and cities are in different stages of readiness

Botswana: Emerging

Chad: Emerging

India: Enhanced

Iceland: Enhanced/Interactive

China: Interactive

United States: Transactional

Sweden: Transactional

E-Participation

“E-Participation has the potential to establish more transparency in government by allowing citizens to use new channels of influence which reduces barriers to public participation in policymaking.”

E-Participation: Harnessing the Social Web Social Media Tools and Networks

Participatory Platforms

Open Data

Crowdsourcing

Levels 1&2: Social Media Tools

Twitter, Blogs, Wikis, PodcastsWidely employed by Western European and

the United States. Easy, cheap and can be effective

Level 3: Participatory Platforms

Engages citizens in policy debates and voluntary service at all levels of the government.

Europa Debate

Active community, monitored by EU officials but not a 2-way conversation

TellBarroso.eu

Platforms combine interactive features and visualizations; primarily a one-way conversation

Level 4: Open Data

Mash-ups translate RSS, OXML and other data feeds into visual applications and for mobile devices

Case Study: Stimulus Spending How can citizens, non-profits and the government

collaborate to monitor spending of the stimulus package?

Open-Data and Mash-ups Government engagement

Stimulus Watchdog Groups

Visualizations help us to understand complex and abstract ideas

Level 5:Connected and Collaborative

How can citizens engage directly with the policy making process?

Combine social media tools with public-private partnerships, and reach target audiences

Not there yet, but promising case studies

Whitehouse.gov Ask Questions

AmericaSpeaks: Multi-Dimensional

Online and offline data gathering; public-private partnerships; institutional support

Whitehouse2.Org: Direct Democracy

Hyopothethical future; Crowdsourcing and Collective Intelligence Gathering

A Globally (Dis)Connected Government Still a long way to go The total bandwidth of Africa is equal

to the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo The total bandwidth in Latin America

is equal to that in Seoul, Repbulic of Korea

In the United States 54.3 per cent of citizens use the Internet, compared to a global average of 6.7 per cent, and 0.4 per cent in the Indian subcontinet.

Openness, Transparency, Accountability

ICT + Transformational change in government == 21st century democracy