The first idea of a digital administrative law was born in Italy in 1978 by Giovanni Duni and was developed in 1991 with the name
teleadministration Teleadministration is based on the concept that documents in electronic format have legal value. Administrative informatics is not new, but for many years it was merely Information Technology applied to legal documents, that is, the reproduction of ...
.
In the
public administration
Public Administration (a form of governance) or Public Policy and Administration (an academic discipline) is the implementation of public policy, administration of government establishment (public governance), management of non-profit est ...
debate
Debate is a process that involves formal discourse on a particular topic, often including a moderator and audience. In a debate, arguments are put forward for often opposing viewpoints. Debates have historically occurred in public meetings, a ...
about
New Public Management
New Public Management (NPM) is an approach to running public service organizations that is used in government and public service institutions and agencies, at both sub-national and national levels. The term was first introduced by academics in the ...
(NPM), the concept of digital era governance (or DEG) is claimed by
Patrick Dunleavy
Patrick John Dunleavy (born 21 June 1952), is Emeritus Professor of Political Science and Public Policy within the Government Department of the London School of Economics (LSE). He was also Co-Director of Democratic Audit and Chair of the LSE P ...
,
Helen Margetts
Helen Zerlina Margetts (born 15 September 1961), is Professor of Internet and Society at the Oxford Internet Institute (OII), University of Oxford and from 2011 to 2018 was Director of the OII. She is currently Director of the Public Policy Prog ...
and their co-authors as replacing NPM since around 2000–05.
[Dunleavy, P., Margetts, H., Tinkler, J., & Bastow, S. (2006). Digital era governance: IT corporations, the state, and e-government. Oxford University Press.] DEG has three key elements: reintegration (bringing issues back into government control, like US airport security after 9/11); needs-based holism (reorganizing government around distinct client groups); and
digitization (fully exploiting the potential of digital storage and Internet communications to transform governance). Digital era governance implies that public sector organizations are facing new challenges and rapidly changing information technologies and information systems.
Since the popularization of the theory, it has been applied and enriched through the empirical works, such as the case study done on Brunei's Information Department. The case study demonstrated that digital dividends that can be secured through the effective application of new technology in the digital governance process.
Management approaches for digital era governance
To create a better government by means of ICT, public sector organizations cannot rely on their traditional methods.
Firstly, traditional public services often are fragmented, duplicative, and inconsistent across government.
Secondly, silo-like organizational management then leads to more individual government offices that are less effective regarding the creation of public values.
A reorientation towards more innovative approaches is necessary. The mere implementation of technological instruments however does not necessarily require a change of management. For an improved government it is necessary to go from traditional management approaches towards innovative approaches.
Collaborative management
One approach is a highly collaborative way of managing future policy implementations such as the development of proactive public services. Such proactive services require little to no action by the users and eliminate the “burden and confusion for citizens and businesses, who can now obtain services without dealing with bureaucracy”.
This new course of action on the one hand entails a significant transformation of government practices while on the other hand proactive or new services (e.g., automated assistants) might rely on third parties who are leveraging government information. This shift from government-provided towards third party services represents a distinct approach and forces public management to transfer some of their control by forming policy knowledge and resource networks.
Problem oriented governance
Another approach refers to a change of mindset.
This means that management should consider the transformation from service-oriented governance towards problem-oriented governance which is an “approach to policy design and implementation that emphasizes the need for organizations to adapt their form and functioning to the nature of the public problems they seek to address”.
This will create a more holistic and efficient way of tackling citizens’ needs and future technological advances.
Since the digital era management challenges are also about harmonizing “delivery-first, user-centric, agile work models while also satisfying, or alternatively, challenging, onerous hierarchical accountability requirements”, public sector organizations require fundamental change of the inflexible culture of bureaucratic organizations,
e.g., by establishing cross-functional problem-oriented teams.
See also
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Cyberocracy
In futurology, cyberocracy describes a hypothetical form of government that rules by the effective use of information. The exact nature of a cyberocracy is largely speculative as currently there have been no cyberocratic governments; however, a g ...
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E-governance
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E-government
E-government (short for electronic government) is the use of technological communications devices, such as computers and the Internet, to provide public services to citizens and other persons in a country or region. E-government offers new ...
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Government by algorithm
Government by algorithm (also known as algorithmic regulation, regulation by algorithms, algorithmic governance, algocratic governance, algorithmic legal order or algocracy) is an alternative form of government or social ordering, where the usa ...
References
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Political science
Public administration
Public policy
Digital technology