DEVELOPMENTS IN E-GOVERNMENT

A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
BETWEEN IRELAND AND THE NETHERLANDS

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 Content

• Introduction
• Goal and Scope
– Research Question
– Sub Questions
– Scope
• Methodology
• Findings & Results
• Discussion and Conclusions
• EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
• Lessons Learned
• Time for questions

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 News of the day (22 oct.)

EU: New eGovernment website launched

• providing information on the Commission’s general policy lines in this area
and on the various EU programmes supporting eGovernment
development
• http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/egovernment/index.htm

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 Introduction

• Definition E-Government
• What is E-Government
• History of E-Government

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 Definition E-Government

E-government Refers to the federal government’s use of

information technologies (such as Wide Area Networks, the
Internet, and mobile computing) to exchange information and
services with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government
(source: whitehouse.gov)

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 What is E-Government

• Communication government and citizens

• Communication government and businesses
• Communication between government departments

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 History of E-Government

Yr. Netherlands Ireland

1994 The National Action Programme on Launch Strategic Management Initiative
Electronic Highways
1998 The Electronic Government Action
Programme
1999 The Dutch Digital Delta Action Plan on implementing the
Information Society in Ireland.
Information Society Fund
2000 Lisbon Strategy
2000 Better Government for Citizens and Launch Reach
Business (2002)
2001 Launch OASIS

2003 eGovernment - More than an automation

of Government Services
2004 eCabinet

2005 DigiD Citizens Live Reachservices

DigiD Companies

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 Content

• Introduction
• Goal and Scope
– Research Question
– Sub Questions
– Scope
• Methodology
• Findings & Results
• Discussion and Conclusions
• EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
• Lessons Learned
• Time for questions

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 Goal - Research Question

In our paper, we compare the developments and integration of

services in E-government in Ireland and The Netherlands. We are
looking at problems that were encountered by both countries, and
how they were dealt with.
Based on these findings, we will try to formulate an advice on how
to make further improvements to E-Government facilities in the
near future for both countries.
Therefore, our research question is:

What are the differences between The Netherlands and Ireland in

E-Government measured by use and sophistication, and how can
these E-Government ‘missions’ be improved?

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 Goal - Sub Questions

To find out how the Service Brokers were doing, we had to find
answers to some other questions:
• How does the government succeed in using the potential of ICT to
improve the communication with citizens?
• What kind of innovative E-Government projects are currently
under development? Is this a succes-factor?
• Which problems did both governments encounter in their
development of E-Government services, and creating a broad
interest within the population?

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 Scope

E-Government is about a lot of different systems, applications, and

services. We had to create an understanding about what we
wanted to explore, in order to have a valid research.
The constrictions we put on research are as followed:
• We narrowed the subject of E-Government to the delivery of
services to citizens and government departments. We did not look
at the business area, because that would be to broad.
• E-Government services are very broad, which is why it is hard to
make direct comparisons between them. To make a
generalization, we only considered the Public Service Brokers:
Reach and DigiD.

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 Content

• Introduction
• Goal and Scope
– Research Question
– Sub Questions
– Scope
• Methodology
• Findings & Results
• Discussion and Conclusions
• EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
• Lessons Learned
• Time for questions

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 Methodology

In the Netherlands we looked at DigiD and in Ireland we regarded

Reach (services). These services function as Service Brokers;
they try to bring E-Government services together.
In Dublin, we visited Reach, and the ministry of Taoiseach.
Before our visit to Dublin we did a lot of research about E-
Government in Ireland, The Netherlands and Europe. Statistics
and other information was gathered and stored.

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 Content

• Introduction
• Goal and Scope
– Research Question
– Sub Questions
– Scope
• Methodology
• Findings & Results
• Discussion and Conclusions
• EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
• Lessons Learned
• Time for questions

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 Findings & Results

Several interesting findings:

• Ireland started earlier with their E-Government development;
• The Dutch government has since then been ‘catching up’.
Right now, the Irish and the Dutch governments have about the
same number of E-Government Services deployed.

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 Online Sophistication

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 Online Sophistication

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 Findings & Results – continued

Therefore, we found it strange to hear about the fact that Reach

Services is not as well integrated and has far less users than the
counterpart of DigiD in The Netherlands:
• Reach has been unable to acquire a large user group; about
300.000 users at the current time (around 20% of the population).
• DigiD has about 6.000.000 registrations, which is about one third
of the Dutch population (around 55% of the population).
E-Government in Ireland has thus far not been as successful as it
has been in The Netherlands.

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 Comparison between supply and use of
online public services for citizens

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 Comparison between supply and use of
online public services for citizens

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 Findings & Results – continued

What is/are the reason(s) for this observable fact?

As we looked for an explanation, we used the Holistic

Measurement model, which is based on indicators necessary to
successfully put E-Government services into operation.
(borrowed from CapGemini)
With this model in mind, we talked to a representative at Reach
Services in Ireland, and a coworker at DigiD Nederland.
This led to some interesting conclusions…

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 Findings & Results - continued

Technical cause:
• Despite the economic growth, and developments in the area of
ICT, the Internet penetration is still very low in Ireland. Only about
52% of the population has an internet connection, of which 26%
have a broadband connection.
In the Netherlands, 86% of the population has an internet
connection, of which 85% is a broadband connection.

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 Findings & Results - continued

Cultural cause:
• The Irish people have always been suspicious regarding their
government. This is probably caused by the political disturbances
in the last and for last century.
• The Irish population is therefore resilient in their communication
with the government and not anxious to use new government
services.

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 Findings & Results - continued

Probable Organizational Cause:

• There is no ‘Killer-application’ which has been able to convince the
Irish citizens to use the E-Government services on a large basis.
The car-tax service, enrolled by Revenue (Irelands tax collecting
agency) has been very successful, but is a stand-alone service
which has no connection with Reach Services.
In The Netherlands, businesses are for example obliged to do all
their tax reports online. This is not the same in Ireland. Although
we didn’t consider the business area of E-Government, we think
this has been a great enforcer of the number of users.
Dutch students are also obliged to use DigiD to login to their
accounts at IB-Groep: the organization which regulates
government funding for studies (student grants).

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 Discussion and Conclusions

With our findings, we try to give an advice on how the Irish

government can overcome the encountered problems, and
increase the usage of their E-Government services in the near
future.
The cultural problem will probably not easily go away. Although
we’re not sociologists, we think that a so-called ‘Killer service’ (like
the car-tax service) will have a big pull-effect on Irish citizens.
We believe this car-tax service should be governed by Reach (or
at least create some sort of strategic cooperation). Besides that, a
new service to remove a lot of bureaucracy can be launched:
We advice a (obliged?) passport or permits service, because
every citizen has an advantage with it. It means reduced standing
in line for something you don’t want to stand in line for.

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 Discussion and Conclusions

Besides that, the Irish government should actively encourage and

support citizens taking up (broadband) internet connections.
They could create a coalition of interested parties. There are
plenty of modern and interested providers in Ireland. As we
believe, an increase in internet penetration will benefit the whole
Irish population.

The common key success factor in leapfrogging countries can be

attributed to the centralized political sponsorship of E-Government
programs that have been implemented with great success the last
two years.

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 Content

• Introduction
• Goal and Scope
– Research Question
– Sub Questions
– Scope
• Methodology
• Findings & Results
• Discussion and Conlusions
• EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
• Lessons Learned
• Time for questions

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 EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
(1/2)
1. No citizen left behind
Advancing inclusion through eGovernment so that by 2010 all
citizens benefit from trusted, innovative services and easy access
for all;
3. Making efficiency and effectiveness a reality
Significantly contributing, by 2010, to high user satisfaction,
transparency and accountability, a lighter administrative burden
and efficiency gains;
5. Implementing high-impact key services for citizens and
businesses
By 2010, 100% of public procurement will be available
electronically, with 50% actual usage, with agreement on
cooperation on further high-impact online citizen services;

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 EU i2010 E-Government Action Plan
(2/2)
1. Putting key enablers in place
enabling citizens and businesses to benefit, by 2010, from
convenient, secure and interoperable authenticated access
across Europe to public services;
3. Strengthening participation and democratic decision-making
demonstrating, by 2010, tools for effective public debate and
participation in democratic decision-making.

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 Lessons Learned

We encountered several problems during our research.

• Too little time. As we had already suspected in advance, it would

be hard to do our research in the designated time. Because of
that, we had to work hard, and change two other things:
• The scope was still to broad; we had to narrow it. Because of that,
not all E-Government services were regarded, but only the Public
Service Brokers.
• We changed the research methods; we had neither the time nor
the power to do all our research by ourselves. We used several
sources to gain insight in current E-Government practices (e.g.
developments / current usage / sophistication / etc.)

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 End of presentation

Are there any questions?

First one is for free.

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VRiSBI International Research
Project

Innovation and ICT - Comparing

Ireland with The Netherlands
Please visit http://studiereis2007.vrisbi.nl for the
complete paper of this presentation.
Other papers and presentations are also available.