OECD e-Government Studies e-Government for Better Government

E-government is expected to improve the function of public administration and its relationship to the public. The good news is that information and communication technology (ICT) offers an array of tools to meet the promise of e-government. The bad news is that the reality has not yet caught up with the promise. To date, the approach to e-government has too often been driven by ICT solutions instead of user demand. While this has been effective for putting services online, it has led to a proliferation of websites, portals and electronic services that are incompatible, confusing and overlapping... not to mention expensive. Rather than simply adding a new service delivery channel, e-government can improve the services that governments offer. But this can only happen as part of an overall transformation of the processes, structure and culture of government. Some OECD governments are now applying a new "logic of e-government" to allow networked government organisations to share resources and deliver user-focused information and services. This requires a better understanding of what government does and how it does it from a whole-of-government perspective. Following a series of discussions among senior e-government officials held by the OECD in 2003 and 2004, this report focuses on the key challenge of e-government and, indeed, the core governance challenge for all public administrations: how to be more agile, responsive, seamless and accountable. This report looks at new thinking and practice in OECD countries in five different areas: User-focused e-government: making electronic services more responsive to the needs of citizens and businesses; Multi-channel service delivery: improving links between traditional and electronic services in order to promote service innovation and ensure access for all users; Approaches to common business processes: identifying common processes within government in order to achieve economies of scale, reduce duplication and provide seamless services; The business case for e-government: measuring and demonstrating the costs and benefits of ICT investments in order to prioritise and better manage e-government projects; E-government co-ordination: bringing a whole-of-government perspective to e-government initiatives and their management, while taking into account existing structures and cultures of government institutions.