Chapter 1 depicts the need for better public governance in the digital transformation of the public sector to support healthy digital government ecosystems, economies and societies. It also demonstrates the rationale leading up to the production of the Handbook and the accompanying OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government.
The E-Leaders Handbook on the Governance of Digital Government
OECD Digital Government Studies
1. Introduction
Abstract
The path towards digital government maturity calls for better governance
Over the last few decades, the digitisation of government processes and public services (i.e. transition from analogue to e-government) has progressed significantly. Governments have been working to modernise their working methods and procedures to adapt to new technologies and the needs of people through large-scale public sector reforms. While digitisation has undoubtedly led to higher vertical integration within single public sector organisations, policy makers are still confronted with the public governance challenge of fostering the horizontal integration that is enabled by digitalisation but also required to advance a coherent digital transformation of governments.1
Countries that were more advanced in their digital governance showed to have gained substantial advantages in managing the crisis. For instance, the governments of Korea and the United Kingdom (i.e. the top performing countries on the 2019 DGI) demonstrated that they were able to efficiently and easily leverage existing enablers (e.g. common and open source digital tools, digital/data infrastructure, public-private partnerships) to build and scale up their responses (G20/OECD, 2021[1]).
The digital transformation of the public sector is a complex and huge process that revamps both the functioning and structure of public sector organisations, and the conditions of access to and use of public data and services. On one side, it requires equipping civil servants with the means to improve and transform public sector operations and services using digital technologies and data while guaranteeing the sustainability of solutions, their regular monitoring and evaluation, and the dissemination of new practices. On another front, it involves accompanying users with various needs in a trustworthy, transparent and collaborative relationship to better understand, meet their needs and fully empower them (OECD, 2014[2]).
A digitally mature government requires clear and legitimised leadership, with a mandate and strategic vision for system-wide transformation, and government-wide coherence and integration of decisions and activities within and between public sector organisations, while ensuring that the relations with citizens and businesses are fostered on collaborations around public policies and services for increased economic productivity and improved societal well-being. For this reason, the establishment of governance arrangements and mechanisms that secure sound leadership and co-ordination, and foster system-based rather than silo-driven decisions are necessary for governments to properly drive the digital transformation of the public sector, and to ensure the continuity required to deliver long-term sustainable results.
The most prevalent challenges faced by governments are linked to existing administrative environments that are characterised primarily by vertical hierarchical models and silos that hamper an evolution towards more coherent investment and operational cycles. Governments should prioritise actions that are geared towards horizontal integration rather than on vertical efficiency. This is needed to foster the use of digital technologies and data that favours linkages among strategic policy efforts across different sectors and levels of government, and to ensure the level of policy coherence and synergies required for long-term sustainability of investments, initiatives and results. Institutional models need to be considered and adjusted to support a whole-of-government transformation that delivers better results and responds to citizen’s increasing and changing expectations with agility and fairness.
Although efficiency and productivity have been the primary targets in digital government policies, more mature governments are also emphasising a values-based and human-centred approach built on trust to meet the needs of citizens and businesses. Hence, service users and other stakeholders from the private sector and civil society are increasingly placed at the heart of user-driven approaches to public service design and delivery. Ultimately, public governance that draws on political support and clear administrative mandates can enable a more coherent and strategic path to digital maturity. This means that sound co-ordination in the ecosystem of stakeholders on the design, development, implementation and monitoring of public policies supporting digital transformation is needed to deliver the expected policy results (OECD, 2014[2]).
Building on the work of the E-Leaders Task Force on the Governance of Digital Government
On October 30-31, 2018, delegates from 32 OECD member countries attended the annual meeting of the OECD Working Party of Senior Digital Government Officials (E-Leaders)2 and agreed to develop further understanding on the governance of digital government in light of the higher integration demanded by the digital transformation of the public sector. The OECD Secretariat was tasked with researching, analysing and producing policy guidance on this matter, which culminated into the E-Leaders Handbook on the Governance of Digital Government (hereinafter the E-Leaders Governance Handbook).
This mandate came from the realisation that public governance is a crucial element at the core of studies and debates on digital government and public sector reforms, but the concept is still abstractly defined and applied. The understanding of the governance of digital government had not yet been crystallised and translated into a tool to guide and inform concrete decisions.
To improve the conceptual and empirical knowledge on the topic of governance in the context of digital government, and building on the work developed in the OECD Digital Government and Open Government Data Reviews, Studies and Reports (see Box 1.1), the OECD Secretariat invited delegates to participate in an E-Leaders Task Force on the Governance of Digital Government. The intent was to take a deeper dive into the issues surrounding public governance in line with the principles in Pillars 1, 2 and 3 of the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014) (see Figure 1.1).
Box 1.1. Relevance of governance in OECD digital government and open data publications
Digital Government Publications
Since the approval of the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014), the topic of governance has been substantially addressed in the vast majority of the OECD Digital Government Reviews and Studies:
Estonia and Finland: Fostering Strategic Capacity across Governments and Digital Services across Borders (2015)
Digital Government in Chile: Strengthening the Institutional and Governance Framework (2016)
Benchmarking Digital Government Strategies in MENA Countries (2017)
Digital Government Review of Norway: Boosting the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector (2017)
Assessing the Impact of Digital Government in Colombia: Towards a New Methodology (2017)
Digital Government Review of Norway: Boosting the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector (2017)
Digital Government Review of Morocco: Laying the Foundations for the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector in Morocco (2018)
Digital Government Review of Colombia: Towards a Citizen-Driven Public Sector (2018)
Digital Government Review of Brazil: Towards the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector (2018)
Promoting the Digital Transformation of African Portuguese-Speaking Countries and Timor-Leste (2018)
Digital Government Review of Sweden: Towards a Data-Driven Public Sector (2019)
Digital Government Review of Argentina: Accelerating the Digitalisation of the Public Sector (2019)
Digital Government in Peru: Working Closely with Citizens (2019)
Digital Government in Chile – A Strategy to Enable Digital Transformation (2019)
Digital Government in Chile – Digital Identity (2019)
Digital Government Review of Panama: Enhancing the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector (2019)
Digital Government in Lebanon: Governance for Coherent and Sustainable Policy Implementation (2020)
Digital Government in Chile – Improving Public Service Design and Delivery (2020)
“OECD Digital Government Index (DGI): 2019 results” Policy Paper (2020)
Digital Government Review of Slovenia: Leading the Digital Transformation of the Public Sector (2021)
Open and Connected Government Review of Thailand (forthcoming)
Open Government Data Publications
Governance has also been a central topic on the following OECD Open Government Data Reviews and Reports:
Open Government Data Review of Poland: Unlocking the Value of Government Data (2015)
Open Government Data Review of Mexico: Data Reuse for Public Sector Impact and Innovation (2016)
Open Government Data in Mexico: The Way Forward (2018)
Open Government Data Report: Enhancing Policy Maturity for Sustainable Impact (2018)
The Path to Becoming a Data-Driven Public Sector (2019)
“OECD Open, Useful and Re-usable data (OURdata) Index: 2019 results” Policy Paper (2020)
Source: Author.
Figure 1.1. Three pillars of the OECD Recommendation on Digital Government Strategies (2014)
Source: (OECD, 2014[2]), “OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies”, https://legalinstruments.oecd.org/en/instruments/OECD-LEGAL-0406.
In line with the outputs of the discussions during the virtual meetings of the E-Leaders Task Force on the Governance of Digital Government, the OECD Secretariat produced the E-Leaders Governance Handbook to establish a robust framework of analysis in this area based on (but not limited to) OECD country approaches and practices, and to support OECD member and non-member countries to seize the benefits and tackle the difficulties of digitalisation through robust governance approaches. It sets out the OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government that can be used by the OECD and governments to (self-)assess the current situation and identify areas for improvement.
The first draft of the E-Leaders Governance Handbook was presented to delegates during the annual meeting of the E-Leaders in Brussels on September 19-20, 2019. Following the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020, the OECD Secretariat further developed the E-Leaders Governance Handbook to reflect the new opportunities, challenges and priorities that governments faced as a result of the economic, social and sanitary crisis in addition to the heightened urgency to mitigate climate change and undertake the green transition. Similarly, the United Kingdom Government Digital Service provided support on content design to upgrade the first version of the Handbook through online and in-person exchanges at their premises. As a result of these steps, a second version of the E-Leaders Governance Handbook was presented during the virtual annual meeting of the E-Leaders on October 15-16, 2020.
Presenting the OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government
The OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government contains three critical facets (see Figure 1.2):
Facet 1: Contextual Factors that elaborates on country-specific characteristics that should be identified and considered according to the political, administrative, socio-economic, technological, policy and geographical context. Although each country has its contextual specificities that warrant a unique governance framework, the application of the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014) can help to identify common elements of governance that are relevant for all countries.
Facet 2: Institutional Models that presents the different forms of institutional set-ups, approaches, arrangements and mechanisms for working within the public sector and the digital government ecosystem, and how their parameters can and should influence and direct digital government strategies and their implementation sustainably.
Facet 3: Policy Levers that addresses the different policy instruments that governments can use to ensure a sound and coherent digital transformation of the public sector, covering the strategy, project management tools, financial management mechanisms, and regulations and standards.
Figure 1.2. The OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government
The three governance facets and each of their four dimensions
Note: Facets refer to the fundamental features of governance. Dimensions are the main elements that make up each facet. Sub-dimensions (shown later in Chapters 3, 4 and 5) are the sub-elements that form each dimension.
Source: Author, based on the discussions of the E-Leaders Task Force on the Governance of Digital Government and iterations thereafter.
Enclosed within the three governance facets of the OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government are key dimensions and sub-dimensions to be considered when identifying an adequate mix of elements defining the governance of digital government in each country. The Handbook provides practical guidance (i.e. through descriptions, policy questions, recommendations) to take strategic, tactical and operational decisions towards the adoption of robust public governance approaches to digital government based on the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014). It also presents a range of approaches and practices in a number of countries (both OECD member and non-OECD member) that can illustrate how governments have addressed and approached their governance of digital government concretely.
In regards to aligning the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014) with the OECD Framework on the Governance of Digital Government:
Principles in Pillar 1 “Openness and Engagement” are taken to be the norms that governments should embed throughout their governance process (i.e. to be transparent, open, inclusive, data-driven, and to encourage the engagement and participation of stakeholders wherever possible). Therefore, they feature in both Facet 2: Institutional Models and Facet 3: Policy Levers as facets that elaborate on the operationalisation of the governance of digital government.
Principles in Pillar 2 “Governance and Co-ordination” align closely with the dimensions of Facet 2: Institutional Models as they deal with organisational structure, personal leadership, co-ordination, co-operation and collaboration across levels of government and policy areas, and the interplay with the broader digital government ecosystem.
Principles in Pillar 3 “Capacities to Support Implementation” align closely with the dimensions of Facet 3: Policy Levers as they deal with policy instruments for the strategising, implementation and management of digital government programmes, enablers, initiatives and public services.
The E-Leaders Governance Handbook is structured such that Chapter 2 briefly introduces the concept of public governance and its application to the governance of digital governments by drawing on the work of the OECD, while Chapters 3, 4 and 5 correspond to an elaboration of each of the three governance facets.
Notes
← 1. The OECD has produced various publications that reflect on and demarcate the digitisation and digitalisation of the public sector. Digitisation refers to the introduction of digital technologies in public administration, namely by transforming analogue information and processes into digital ones. Building on digitisation, digitalisation is a transformative process that integrates digital technologies and data into public sector transformation efforts (OECD, 2016[98]). The OECD Recommendation of the Council on Digital Government Strategies (2014) promotes and supports governments in their digitalisation efforts, namely in developing and implementing digital government strategies that establish more effective co-ordination mechanisms, stronger capacities and frameworks to improve the effectiveness of digital technologies in delivering public value and strengthening citizen trust (OECD, 2014[2]).
← 2. The OECD Working Party of Senior Digital Government Officials (E-Leaders) was established to foster knowledge sharing and peer-to-peer learning to support policy makers around the world in advancing digital government policies’ design and implementation for the benefit of economies and societies. It serves as a safe space for international co-operation, in collaboration with OECD member countries and invited non-member countries, based on their experiences of “what works and what does not work” to overcome policy challenges, seize policy opportunities and improve policy impact. As such, the aim of the E-Leaders is to facilitate intergovernmental and interorganisational partnerships in the spirit of mutual learning and targeted co-operation, matching the needs and skills of different digital government stakeholders and building on countries’ different competitive advantages. The E-Leaders relies on the sustained interest of governments to leverage the OECD’s expertise and existing normative, policy and analytical tools and mechanisms to exchange and transfer knowledge through global peer learning. It envisages an effective mobilisation of digital technologies and data to improve countries’ public sector, economic and societal conditions through an equitable, inclusive and sustainable transformation to digitally mature states.