Government Transformation and Digitalization: Governance, Organization, and Management

Minitrack Description

Both practice and research communities suggest that digitalization of governments and societies at large has substantial transformational capacity. Phenomena like the sharing economy, big or open data, robotization, Internet of things and social media, just to mention a few, significantly impact governments organizational structures and managerial practices. The internal transformation of agencies could significantly change governments and their relationships with citizens.

Research demonstrates the critical importance of treating e-Government as a multidisciplinary and multidimensional phenomenon in order to understand and explain its potential for ICT-enabled government transformation. More specifically, strategic, political, institutional, managerial, organizational, legal, economic, and external relationship factors have been identified as key aspects in the study of e-government and, particularly, transformational government.

This minitrack examines the complexity of effectively governing, organizing, and managing e-Government and its transformational potential especially in the context of emerging phenomena. Increasingly, this involves inter-organizational collaboration and co-creation of value, multi-sector and cross-jurisdictional networks, and the management of a large variety of relationships with both internal and external stakeholders. Moreover, many governments in developing countries perceive ICT-enabled government transformation as an opportunity to establish ‘good governance’ in their countries, which involves improved accountability and transparency as well as fighting corruption.

This minitrack welcomes papers that focus on the transformational aspects of e-Government as well as their implications for government and society. It invites empirical, theoretical, and/or conceptual contributions that show the importance of governmental, institutional, organizational, managerial, and democratic aspects of transformational e-Government.

Minitrack topics include, but are not limited to:

• Strategies and value foundations for ICT-enabled government
• Strategies for the design, development, implementation, maintenance, performance, and evaluation of e-Government applications
• Governance, accountability, and transparency
• Theoretical premises and development for transformational government
• Service transformation and multi-channel service delivery
• Integration of government data, services, and/or processes
• User-centric e-Government and e-Government uptake
• Transformational aspects and implications of data analytics, policy informatics, and smart cities
• Change management in e-Government initiatives
• Transformational aspects of e-engagement and e-participation initiatives
• E-Government business models and benefits realization from e-Government initiatives
• Efficiency and/or effectiveness through e-Government initiatives
• Co-creation of public value through inter-organizational collaboration, public- private partnerships, and other collaborative arrangements in the public sector and between government agencies and external stakeholders (e.g. citizens, businesses, NGOs)
• Stakeholder engagement in e-Government initiatives
• Cross-government information sharing, regional, national and transnational information- sharing networks, information integration, privacy, and security
• Impact, outcomes, and implications of e-Government initiatives
• Methods and frameworks for e-Government evaluation and performance assessment
• Innovation management, benchmarking, and trend monitoring in e-Government
• EAM - e-Government Architecture Management
• Political, economic, legal, and social aspects of e-Government
• Organizational and managerial aspects of e-Government
• Examples of government use of sharing economy principles

More information on the minitrack chairs:

Leif Skiftenes Flak, Ph.D., is head of the department for information systems at the University of Agder, Norway. He holds a Ph.D. in computer science from Aalborg University. His research interests are on e-Government in general with emphasis on stakeholder related issues and benefits management in particular. His work has been published in information systems and e-Government journals like Communication of AIS, Government Information Quarterly, and Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems. Professor Flak is active within the international e-Government research community. He has served as a board member of the Norwegian network of e-Government researchers. He is also member of the AIS SIG eGov and IFIP 8.5 and is involved in various e-Government research and practice projects in Norway. Professor Flak is currently involved in program committees for a number of conferences and is on the editorial board for Government Information Quarterly, Transforming Government: People, Process and Policy, Information Polity and associate editor for the International Journal of Electronic Government Research.

• Note: The University of Agder will ensure funding for Prof Flak´s attendance at HICSS 51.

J. Ramon Gil-Garcia is an Associate Professor of Public Administration and Policy and the Research Director of the Center for Technology in Government, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY). Professor Gil-Garcia is a member of the Mexican National System of Researchers and of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. In 2009, he was considered the most prolific author in the field of digital government research worldwide and in 2013 he was selected for the Research Award, which is “the highest distinction given annually by the Mexican Academy of Sciences to outstanding young researchers.” Currently, he is a Faculty Affiliate at the National Center for Digital Government, University of Massachusetts Amherst, and an Affiliated Faculty member of the Informatics Doctorate Program at the College of Computing and Information, University at Albany. Professor Gil-Garcia is the author or co-author of articles in prestigious international journals in Public Administration, Information Systems, and Digital Government, and some of his publications are among the most cited in the field of digital government research worldwide. His research interests include collaborative electronic government, inter-organizational information integration, smart cities and smart governments, adoption and implementation of emergent technologies, digital divide policies, new public management, public policy evaluation, and multi-method research approaches. For more information, please visit: https://www.ctg.albany.edu, http://www.albany.edu/rockefeller/faculty_pad_gilgarcia.shtml

Miriam Lips, Ph.D., is Professor of Digital Government at Victoria University of Wellington’s School of Government, where she leads a new five-year research program on ‘Government and Democracy in the Digital Age’ and teaches in Victoria University’s Master of e-Government and Master of Public Management Programs. She also serves as the Deputy Chair of the Open Government Partnership Stakeholder Advisory Group, appointed by the Minister of State Services, and as an appointed Member of the New Zealand Data Futures Partnership Working Group, which reports to the Ministers of Finance, Justice, and Statistics. Professor Lips is the Editor-in-Chief of Information Polity and is an Editorial Board Member of Government Information Quarterly, Information, Communication & Society, and Policy & Internet. She holds a PhD in Public Administration from Erasmus University Rotterdam.

Professor Lips’ research concentrates more generally on the introduction, management and use of ICTs in the public sector and its external relationships. Current research topics include data innovation; administrative simplification for SMEs; children’s use and experience with digital technologies; information-sharing, identity management, privacy and ethics; service transformation; technology-enabled forms of public engagement; gning; benefits realisation in Government ICT; and electronic public records management. For more information on Miriam’s research please visit the following website: http://e-government.vuw.ac.nz/index.aspx