The Internet Is A Revolutionary

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Introduction

The internet is a revolutionary form of technology that took the entire world by storm, gaining instant popularity due to its many advantages. For people to be able to communicate with one another twenty four hours a day, seven days a week and also being able to have access to all kinds of information inexpensively made lives globally easier and more efficient. The business world soon recognized the importance of internet and how digital media is much more effective, efficient and cost friendly compared to print media. This adaptation of internet from industries took the name of e-business or e-commerce. E-business is basically conducting business online. It does not simply mean the buying and selling of products or services but also collaborating with business partners and suppliers. More and more companies are being heavily dependent on the internet to reach out to customers and many other businesses have learned how to exploit the availability and easy accessibility to the internet by forming their entire business online. Sites such as amazon.com, ebay.com and asos.com function entirely on the internet illustrating all their products online and delivering them everywhere in the world all day, every day of the week and all year round.

With the rise of this technology reaching all aspects of business and the world and having such a strong impact on an individual’s everyday life, different governments have come to realize the importance and effectiveness of this technology and are driven to utilize it to start the concept of e-government. According to Silcock(2007) Governments have come to apprehend the explosive technology of the internet and have come to understand that by applying the same concepts and principles that have revolutionized the business world can bring about the same transformation within the government.

E-government is simply put, the use of technology to boost access to and delivery of government services for the advantage of citizens (Prins 2001). The basic point of e-government is not only providing seamless service to its citizens but also to build a partnership with them (Silcock 2007). It all begins with how well a government understands and integrates all the major areas such as technology, business processes and human resources that come together to form an e-government with a center who is the customer. In a tech-savvy world where people expect impromptu service and are most likely used to it from the private sector will not accept any less from the public sector. Governments have to keep up with the private sector in order to not come under any strain from its people’s expectations. It is widely understood that within the next ten years, government departments that do not move to using internet technology will soon cease to exist (Gould, 2000).

E-government is mainly consisted of three domains; e-administration, e-citizens and e-services, and e-society. E-administration is mainly concerned with cutting costs (improving input to output ratio by lowering financial and time costs), managing process performance (planning, controlling and monitoring human, financial and other resources), making strategic connections in government (connecting arms, agencies, levels and data stores of government to strengthen capacity to investigate, develop and implement the strategy and policy that guides government processes), and creating empowerment (moving resources, authority and power to new locations).

E-citizens and e-services are mainly concerned with talking to citizens (making details of public sector activities more readily available to its citizens), listening to citizens (this takes a turn towards democratization as citizens are given a right to voice their opinions towards public sector actions and decisions) and, improving public services (improving services in terms of quality, convenience and cost).

E-society is mainly concerned with working better with business (improving quality and convenience and making interaction between business and government more cost friendly), developing communities and building partnerships (creating groupings to acquire social and economic goals). (Heeks, 2001)

Challenges

Reffat (2003) argues that due to lack of information and strategy, the impact of the effectiveness and usefulness of e-government has been greatly affected. In their haste to e-enable their services, the government is ignoring the need for an information management framework which is a necessity to utilize government information and records. Another issue is the UK data and privacy protection laws; it is believed that these are a reason why the progress of e-government has been rather steady as with the existence of these laws, it is a struggle to overcome the issues of trust and security that are concerned with online transactions. Bonham et al (2003)

Another rather significant drawback is poor coordination, according to Detr (2001) "Technological adaptation of Administrative Law usually requires an effective coordination among all public administrations concerned, especially when national authorities have the competence to promote general modifications in this field which must be respected at regional and local levels. From the European perspective, the lack of a general competence to approve regulations regarding public administrations is a relevant inconvenience that may also appear at the national level. Another potential legal obstacle to developing networked services can appear if, for political reasons, national authorities sometimes do not exercise their powers to establish more uniformity in relevant regional and local regulations. The constitutional autonomy of regions and local bodies could also become an obstacle. This can constrain certain administrative and organizational decisions designed to promote the use of electronic means, such as approaches based on a wide understanding of a citizen’s right to use ICTs to contact relevant authorities."

And lastly, Reffat (2003) also stated that workplace and organizational flexibility, lack of trust and poor technical designs may be a largely blamed for the hindrance of adaptation towards a fully automated e-government.

Benefits

According to Fang (2002), people will have more say in matters of the government. If the government wants to make changes to a certain policy, it can simply post it online and get quick feedback on what the people have to say and then move forward accordingly. He also said that people will celebrate better services from government organizations. The efficiency of the internet will come in handy when people no longer have to wait in long queues to get whatever they need be done, they can simply have all that done in the comfort of their own home and have access whenever they need. Due to the effective communication process through the internet, several government organizations will be able to communicate with each other and the people efficiently resulting in better integrated services for the people. And lastly, the citizens will be better informed as they can have easy access to all the up-to-date information about government laws, regulations, services and policies.

Legal Perspective

The main concern of e-government is keeping itself in check with two laws of Data Protection Act and Freedom of Information Act; though these acts are both mutually exclusive they can both be contradictory so what exactly do they say? According to Bellamy and Taylor (1998), the Data Protection Act is based upon a number of principles which are meant to be in order to ensure that the personal data is processed fairly and lawfully. The data that is being used is only being used for that specific purpose and not for any other purpose, also that the data should be relevant to the purpose and nothing more. The data should be accurate and updated and shouldn’t be kept longer than it is required. Adequate levels of security and protection should adhere to prevent any loss or unauthorized access or use of that data.

According to Dean (2000), the Freedom of Information Act is basically there to ensure that individuals and organizations can request data that is being held by any public organization. Only specific categories of information do not fall under this Act which are national security, defense, personal information, economic information, and legal proceedings. Any other kind of information must be made available by the public organization upon request within a given timeframe.

Even though some people might argue that both these Acts are contradictory as one seeks to make information available while the other seeks to protect information, from a legal perspective, they are supposed to be cooperative and not contradictory. The information that cannot be shared will be under the Data Protection Act and the rest will be available under the Freedom of Information Act. Drake (2000)

The rise of the ICT technology has made data sharing and accessibility easy like never before. With this new technology however, it is increasingly difficult to protect sensitive data. Although one of the greatest benefits of e-government is to make information readily available the key problem lies with the protection of personal data. (Perrith and Rustad, 2000). The Freedom of Information Act has however, brings with a wave of revolutionary democracy by allowing people to share their views and let their voices be heard by the public servants, politicians and other people. Drake (2003) further comments on how citizens of that particular nation acquire the knowledge of what the government is and is not doing which is how government information is highly important for the sectors of business, health, education, research and the well being of its people.n