Digital government: a new approach is needed

To achieve a transformation of government through the use of digital technologies requires a complete reversal of the current way of looking at the challenge. Instead of viewing the problem from the point of view of the internet, we must start with the political process of policy design.

This is our conclusion from research, discussion and consultation at Brunel University London on why so-called ‘e-government’ or ‘digital government’ has not delivered on its promise. Our full analysis has been published in the form of a Working Paper for further consultation. In particular, we must look at how technology can change the range and characteristics of policy instruments — the tools that governments choose from to intervene in the economy, society and environment to make change, such as taxes, benefits, licences, information campaigns and more tangible things like public services and infrastructure.

They are the practical outputs of government, and only when technology changes those can we say it has transformed government. Many good things have happened, but two or three phases of trying to “make government digital” over the last 20 years have not really taken us beyond information provision and a few online transactions.

Governments do policy, not services

The dominant assumption has been that “government is a service industry”. This is dangerously misleading. In the case of the application of technology to the public sector, it has led to attempts to overlay the processes of newspapers, banks, and retailers on to public functions — the result is a model based on interactive web sites. That isn’t what the public sector is really about. The existence and functions of the majority of the public sector arise directly from the choice of policy implementation instruments, determined at the moment of political decisions on policy design, then crystallised in legislation. Looking closely, we can see that most parts of the public sector can be classified as either being instruments in themselves (like a healthcare, transport or prison service), or organisations administering instruments like taxes and benefits.

Transformation is about changing policy instruments

So transformation, or reform, in the public sector is about changing a set of policy instruments. Digital technology (including how it can manage data) can change the economics — and thus affect the feasibility — of instruments and open up possibilities for new ones. Rather than Digital by Default, we need to speak perhaps of Digital by Design — policy design.

The London Congestion Charge illustrates how a combination of number plate recognition, electronic payment systems and data matching has transformed the enforcement of a toll-and-permit instrument from roadside booths, cash, and paper tickets that would make congestion worse. There are other choices of instruments for managing congestion of course, either using technology or not, and that’s the point: the options for design are changed. It has often been said that civil and public servants need digital skills. Maybe so, but more important is that their digital expert colleagues better understand the specialised and often complex policy development, legislative and administrative world within which they are attempting to enable transformation.

There is an implication for government projects. Moving a tax, regulatory, benefits, healthcare or energy policy system from a complex mix of interrelated instruments to a reformed set, whether or not technology is involved, is a hugely complex task, requiring programme and project management skills of a high order, and fresh capability to manage the new instruments. A large programme might have interlinked streams for policy evolution, legislation, stakeholder management, procurement, communications, finance, construction, people, IT… If you add in novel technology to the mix, things are no easier and an even wider set of skills is needed. But that doesn’t make it a technology project: it is still policy implementation and it is a huge error to focus too much on the digital component — worse still to allow that to drive the project. To discuss the issues raised in this blog contact vishanth.weerakkody@brunel.ac.uk, or comment directly below.

The Institute for Government is currently helping government leaders understand how to make digital work in their organisation. Our report will be published in the Autumn – in the meantime, stay tuned for more blogs from the team.