Future Government: A Global Perspective in Connection to Open Government Data and Citizen Engagement

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1 A I D E M E M O I R E Future Government: A Global Perspective in Connection to Open Government Data and Citizen Engagement Geneva, Switzerland May 2012 U N I T E D N A T I O N S N AT I O N S U N I E S DIVISION FOR PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS Meeting organized by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) in cooperation with the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)

2 Background The Information Society changes views on social institutions and their accountability areas. Governments around the world are increasingly opening and sharing their information with citizens, media and other stakeholders, as a response to the widely accepted principles of good governance, which are the foundations for achieving peace and development goals. Open government has become a dominant trend in the public administration in a number of countries in recent years, and it is supposed to co-create public value together with business, civil society and citizens. This political paradigm is based on the principles of transparency, participation and collaboration. This is a cultural change putting government, citizens and other stakeholders of society as partners. Core values of open government can be summarized as: (i) Transparency: Government should provide citizens information on what the government is doing, so government can be held accountable; (ii) Participation: Government should actively solicit expertise and consult with all sectors of society so that it makes policies with the benefit of the best information; (iii) Collaboration: Government officials should work together and with citizens and the private sector as part of their job of solving national problems. Open Government Data (OGD) is one pillar of an open government strategy. OGD means that government agencies put their data online in a way it can be read by humans and processed by computers (preferably as structured data or raw data in machine readable, open standard formats and under a open license allowing for the data to be re-used by third parties). The public can review and download the data, and even create new analysis and applications based on the data. OGD allows entirely new levels of civic engagement and government accountability and transparency, which in turn enhance public service delivery and the use of public resources. Despite the various challenges brought by the digital divide between countries at different levels of development, which affects many economically and socially relevant applications in such areas as government, business, health and education, governments worldwide are increasingly using and sharing data through the Web at national, regional and local levels. The intrinsic value and the potential benefits of OGD seem reasonably clear, although still our collective imagination can be widened by active exchanges of ideas II

3 and experiences. What is even more challenging is to look at how governments at every level national, regional, local-initiate, sustain and build capacities for ensuring that the potential of government transparency and citizen engagement to promote effectiveness, efficiency and accountability in public service delivery is realized through open government initiatives. This requires strengthening the capacities of civil servants, as well as stakeholders from business, science and civil society, to initiate, implement, and evaluate innovative and sustainable forms of government services. While there is wide consensus on the overall benefits for society and democracy that can arias from a more transparent, accountable, participatory and efficient government, recent studies 1 also indicate the positive effects for the economy through new products and services re-using open government data. A wide range of indicators are now used to evaluate government performance, especially in e-government. One of the challenges for the future government is to design and implement new metrics for benchmarking governments performance to ensure that citizen engagement and open government data initiatives can be monitored and improved. It is necessary to allow benchmarking of the transformation readiness of governments as well as improvements in public value from the point of view of citizens. For this purpose, the Division for Public Administration and Development Management of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DPADM/DESA), in cooperation with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), is organizing an international capacity building workshop entitled Future Government: A Global Perspective in Connection to Open Government Data and Citizen Engagement, to take place in Geneva, Switzerland, on May 2012, during the 2012 annual follow-up meetings of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS). The workshop will serve as an enabling platform of WSIS, for an international and multidisciplinary (public officials, academia, civil society and private sector stakeholders) group of experts, and national practitioners, to share their experiences and exchange best practices on open government data, including strategies for designing, implementing, and evaluating open government data services, that have proven viable and have brought about lasting development results in different socio- 1 III

4 economic and cultural contexts. The workshop sessions will provide opportunities for participants to interact with speakers, in order to develop new capacities for designing and implementing successful open government data strategies and policies for a more transparent, accountable and efficient government and citizen engagement and participation, as well as to create or strengthen international networks of stakeholders and practitioners. Objectives The Workshop has the following objectives: Strengthen the participants capacity in policy and program formulation, implementation and evaluation of open government data initiatives. Understand the value created for governments, citizens, civil society, and the business community, by making governments more transparent, accountable, participatory and efficient Share open government data initiatives based on experiences of early adopters and also identify challenges, especially in the areas of cultural change, resource concerns, data quality, as well as data security and privacy Accelerate participants learning on implementation of legislation concerning open government data Output The main output of the workshop will be an Open Government Data and Citizen Engagement Toolkit which will serve as the entry point for those UN Member States who plan to start such initiatives. The toolkit will include strategies and action plans for open government data initiatives, policy recommendations, templates that governments can customize for their own needs, checklists and open government data readiness assessment, overview of technologies for opening government data, recommendations about open government data services and platforms and methodology for evaluation of open government data implementations. In summary, step by step instructions for public officials interested in implementation of open government data initiatives. The toolkit will be accessible at The workshop will also produce a comprehensive report, outlining major findings and best practice recommendations, and containing case studies resulting from the IV

5 workshop. The report will be published online for maximum global outreach in an environmental friendly fashion at minimum cost. Other accomplishments will include following: Enhanced knowledge among participants on the current concepts, approaches and best practices on open government data. Strengthened capacity of participants to assess the benefits and outcomes of government transparency and citizen engagement including the open data platforms for citizens, government and business. Building on and strengthening existing networks of participating organizations and individuals for further sharing of knowledge and best practices on open government data and service adoption. In this regard, networking will also facilitate DPADM to build the section on participatory governance in citizen engagement for the new DPADM online knowledge-base platform named UNPACS (United Nations Public Administration Country Studies). Proposed programme The workshop will include one plenary session and three thematic sessions. The plenary session will introduce overall approaches, trends, best practices and key challenges in open government data initiatives for greater transparency and citizen engagement to promote effectiveness, efficiency and accountability in public service delivery. The sessions, listed below, will include presentations followed by open discussions. Session I: Open Government Data as a Service Session II: Citizen Engagement through Open Government Data Session III: Benchmarking Open Government Data and Citizen Engagement Initiatives The workshop will be concluded with major findings and future actions to be taken by the organizers and participant. It is planned that the Member States especially from developing countries will benefit from the use of the toolkit on open government data which will be developed with workshop outputs immediately after the workshop. V

6 Participants Participants in the workshop will include senior policy makers, experts on open government data and citizen engagement initiatives and representatives from academia, civil society, social media networks, private sector and international organizations. Organization and management The workshop will be conducted in English. All documents and papers presented will subsequently be posted at: Venue The Workshop on will take place on 16 and 17 May 2012 at Room III of the Conference centre of the International Labour Organization (ILO) -(le Centre de conférences du BIT), 4 route des Morillons, CH-1211 Genève 22, Switzerland. Contact: Mr. Vyatcheslav Cherkasov Senior Governance and Public Administration Officer Development Management Branch / Division for Public Administration and Development Management UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs cherkasov@un.org Mr. Deniz Susar Governance and Public Administration Officer UNPAN Management Unit / Division for Public Administration and Development Management UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs susar@un.org Mr. Hani Eskandar Technical Officer ICT applications BDT/POL/CYB International Telecommunication Union hani.eskandar@itu.net VI