E-GOVERNMENT

E-Government (short for electronic government, also known as e-gov, digital government, online government, or connected government) is digital interactions between a government and citizens (G2C), government and businesses/Commerce (G2B), government and employees (G2E), and also between government and governments /agencies (G2G). Essentially, the e-Government delivery models can be briefly summed up as (Jeong, 2007):

• G2C (Government to Citizens)
• G2B (Government to Businesses)
• G2E (Government to Employees)
• G2G (Government to Governments)
• C2G (Citizens to Governments)

This digital interaction consists of governance, information and communication technology (ICT), business process re-engineering (BPR), and e-citizen at all levels of government (city, state/provence, national, and international).

Defining e-Government

‘E-Government' (or Digital Government) is defined as ‘The employment of the Internet and the world-wide-web for delivering government information and services to the citizens.’ (United Nations, 2006; AOEMA, 2005).

'Electronic Government' (or in short 'e-Government') essentially refers to ‘The utilization of IT, ICTs, and other web-based telecommunication technologies to improve and/or enhance on the efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery in the public sector.’ (Jeong, 2007).

E-government describes the use of technologies to facilitate the operation of government and the disbursement of government information and services. E-government, short for electronic government, deals heavily with Internet and non-internet applications to aid in governments. E-government includes the use of electronics in government as large-scale as the use of telephones and fax machines, as well as surveillance systems, tracking systems such as RFID tags, and even the use of television and radios to provide government-related information and services to the citizens.

Examples of e-Government and e-Governance

E-Government should enable anyone visiting city website to communicate and interact with city employees via the Internet with graphical user interfaces (GUI), instant-messaging (IM), audio/video presentations, and in any way more sophisticated than a simple email letter to the address provided at the site” and “the use of technology to enhance the access to and delivery of government services to benefit citizens, business partners and employees”. The focus should be on:

• The use of Information and communication technologies, and particularly the Internet, as a tool to achieve better government.
• The use of information and communication technologies in all facets of the operations of a government organization^.
• The continuous optimization of service delivery, constituency participation and governance by transforming internal and external relationships through technology, the Internet and new media.

Whilst e-Government has traditionally been understood as being centered around the operations of government, e-Governance is understood to extend the scope by including citizen engagement and participation in governance. As such, following in line with the OECD definition of e-Government, e-Governance can be defined as the use of ICTs as a tool to achieve better governance.

UN e-Government Readiness Index

There are several international rankings of e-government maturity. The Eurostat rankings, Economist, Brown University, and the UN e-Government Readiness Index are among the most frequently cited. The United Nations Public Administration Network conducts a bi-annual e-Government survey which includes a section titled e-Government Readiness. It is a comparative ranking of the countries of the world according to two primary indicators: i) the state of e-government readiness; and ii) the extent of e-participation. Constructing a model for the measurement of digitized services, the Survey assesses the 191 member states of the UN according to a quantitative composite index of e-government readiness based on website assessment; telecommunication infrastructure and human resource endowment.

The following is the list of the top 50 countries according to the UN's 2010 e-Government Readiness Index.

Rank	Country	Index
1	South Korea	0.8785
2	United States	0.8510
3	Canada	0.8448
4	United Kingdom	0.8147
5	Netherlands	0.8097
6	Norway	0.8020
7	Denmark	0.7872
8	Australia	0.7863
9	Spain	0.7516
10	France	0.7510
11	Singapore	0.7476
12	Sweden	0.7474
13	Bahrain	0.7363
14	New Zealand	0.7311
15	Germany	0.7309
16	Belgium	0.7225
17	Japan	0.7152
18	Switzerland	0.7136
19	Finland	0.6967
20	Estonia	0.6965
21	Ireland	0.6866
22	Iceland	0.6697
23	Liechtenstein	0.6694
24	Austria	0.6679
25	Luxembourg	0.6672
26	Israel	0.6552
27	Hungary	0.6315
28	Lithuania	0.6295
29	Slovenia	0.6243
30	Malta	0.6129
31	Colombia	0.6125
32	Malaysia	0.6101
33	Czech Republic	0.6060
34	Chile	0.6014
35	Croatia	0.5858
36	Uruguay	0.5842
37	Latvia	0.5826
38	Italy	0.5800
39	Portugal	0.5787
40	Barbados	0.5714
41	Greece	0.5708
42	Cyprus	0.5705
43	Slovakia	0.5639
44	Bulgaria	0.5590
45	Poland	0.5582
46	Kazakhstan	0.5578
47	Romania	0.5479
48	Argentina	0.5467
49	United Arab Emirates	0.5349
50	Kuwait	0.5290