Web Technologies Supporting Direct Participation in Democratic Processes

introduction

Empoying e-Government

Internet Coverage

It is vitally important to be able to provide citizens and officials with access to the system. When defining what services will be provided on-line, it should be known, which part of the target group has access to the services.

The quality of the Internet connections should also be considered. Large amounts of data cannot be transferred via Internet with low speed connections. Government policies for Internet coverage building have a significant effect on how large the Internet coverage will be.

Citizen awareness

Defining the e-Government vision needs input from various groups, including government officials and citizen groups. Ultimately, e-Government should be about meeting the needs of citizens and improving quality of life.

The diverse roles that citizens have should be recognized and services targeted to meet the real needs. The more aware the citizens are about the e- Government efforts, especially about e-Government systems employment, the higher and more successful system usage the development team can expect.

Cheap ICT

Citizens participation may in some cases depend highly on the technology they have. To gain more users, there should be reasonably priced ICT available. It might however be difficult to equip all the users with required ICT. To reach also those users, there is a need for public Internet connection points in schools, libraries and Internet-cafes, Internet-kiosks and other similar places.

Government and municipality awareness

The people in leading positions in government and municipalities need to be aware of the e-Government, its targets, means, risks and possibilities. E-Government must be a shared vision and part of a larger program for reform. If there is no national programme on information society or it is not action-oriented, any kind of e-Government system implementation is extremely hard. To raise the government and municipality awareness, the top-decision makers should be included in a project group.

Public Funding

Information policy programs usually define the funding targets regarding e-Government system development. For e-Government system employment projects it is important to be aware of these funding resources. It should also be analysed, which areas of project are already funded by government/ municipalities, and how much financial resources have been allocated to those areas (e.g. Internet coverage in general).

Organistaion's active role

Concrete actions usually take place in the organisational and personal level. Therefore it is very important to learn, understand and analyse the organisational structures and processes within them in order to map them into e-Government thinking. Sometimes networks of partner organisations, customers and collaborators force the organisations to complex structures. The evolution of ICT technology, strengthening concept of networking and outsourcing are trends that may reform the organisation structures.