International service delivery channel initiatives

A review of international initiatives [Refer to Channel Strategy - Summary of International Initiatives, provided as an addendum to this paper.] shows there are several ways that other governments are dealing with e-service development. This largely depends on how advanced the e-government strategy is in any given nation. Most of the international literature accepts the general taxonomy that describes the maturity of e-government in four broad stages [Windley, Phillip J. eGovernment Maturity, Office of the Governor, State of Utah, 2002.] (often linear) whereby governments use new technologies to:

• provide citizens and businesses with convenient access to government information and services
• improve the quality of government services
• provide more opportunities to participate in democratic institutions and processes, and
• transform government.

The movement through these stages is more complex than it appears in this taxonomy. Development is rarely linear in practice. The first stage of development for most nations is usually one of placing government information online. This stage is often still in progress when governments move very quickly to attempt to move core government services online. In many countries this is currently only done in a partial way whereby citizens can complete part of a transaction with a government agency online, but still have to finish the transaction manually so that full authentication and verification of entitlement can be guaranteed.

In most of the literature reviewed for this assignment it was also apparent that the use of e-government for increasing participation of citizens in democratic processes is on a separate and quite different development track.

While transactional processes between the public and government are not yet fully developed, some countries have already moved through to attempts to cluster government services, both informational and transactional, together so that they are more accessible to members of the public. This is a process that is happening at the same time as the first two, and it is very difficult to access where any given nation is within the taxonomy.

For example, in 2003, the UK has issued a 'Channels Framework' [Office of the E-Envoy, Channels Framework: Delivering government services in the new economy, Cabinet Office, 2003.] for use by government agencies in making investment decisions when accessing service delivery efficiencies (i.e. in what circumstances would e-services replace, or support, traditional service channels). The primary purpose of this initiative is to support government agencies in making channel investment decisions to provide more efficient services to the public. Just over 12 months later, the UK government has launched DirectGov, which is an online, citizen-centric portal for accessing government services. Similar examples of dual approaches to e-service development can be seen in Canada, Ireland, and the USA.

The development cycle of government e-services

Where e-government is a relatively recent initiative in any given nation, the focus of discussions tends to be more on e-service channels as a means of improving specific government services. The goal is to improve the credibility of government by the provision of more efficient, cost-effective and reliable services to the public [Greece, Lithuania, Malta, UK (via Channels Framework)]. This approach is primarily government-centric, rather than citizen-centric. The underlying principle is one of maximizing the efficiency gains available through new technologies.

Critical success factors for this approach include the resolution of issues such as data protection (especially personal data), authentication, data integrity, and the maintenance of civil liberties. Other challenges include overcoming the digital divide to ensure the availability of services to the public, and addressing general issues of technological skills so that service uptake justifies the investment.

Trust in government so that people are willing to conduct transactions online is also a critical issue. Online services provide greater transparency of process. On one hand, this is beneficial to the public. On the other, it can at times lead to increased scrutiny and criticism of government that erodes public confidence. Exaggeration of failures by media sources often obscures success with a subsequent negative impact on uptake of online services.

Where e-government issues of this order have been worked through, either fully or partially, some nations are starting to look forward to explore the potentiality of government e-services, and how they might be managed more effectively to encourage citizen uptake. In some countries the first step towards transformational government is rethinking business and information processes and moving to shared and commonly understood business architectures without necessarily changing external structures [Canada, Victoria (Australia)]. This is most easily done where governments have looked to cluster information services rather than transactional ones.

The UK (DirectGov), Ireland and Canada are examples of where governments have started to work through the process of providing citizen-centric transactional services, i.e. where services are organised around the needs of the citizens (e.g. students, businesses, seniors, or travelers) as opposed to the needs of the government agency providing the service. This not only requires the reorganisation of front-end processes to allow citizens to access cross-agency services, but the management of back-end processes to be increasingly collaborative to enable these services to be seamless.

This approach constitutes a new way of thinking about the provision of government services, and requires new modes of governance, funding, business architectures and interoperable technologies. The movement to this approach also requires rethinking the public management system, and as such is far more momentous in its outcome. Although the literature of some nations is clearly in this mode of development it would require much more in-depth research to ascertain how far this conceptual model has translated into wide-spread practice.