Why gov 2.0 calls for risk managers

Sunday, 12 February 2012

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IT has provided the opportunities for governments to remodel the entire process of tax collection over the last decade. It is, however, a continuously evolving process and governments the world over need to constantly upgrade their tax systems to optimise their revenue workflows.

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Governments and Socialising

The advent of social media has seen governments hopping onto the bandwagon in a bid to further engage citizens.

Citizen Engagement, Policy

By Robin Hicks | 11 April 2010

If governments are to use social media more effectively, they must learn to operate in environments over which they have no control. In interviews with FutureGov, government modernisers from Hong Kong, Australia and the UK said that the “wild west” of web 2.0 calls for a new approach to risk management.

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Jeremy Godfrey (pictured), Government CIO of Hong Kong, which revamped its government portal earlier this month, said that the culture in government is “frightened of exposure to the public.” But, it is important for government “to be prepared to get input when the public wants to give it. When you try to control the conversation in a structured way, the result is less productive.”

Gov 2.0 calls for a cultural shift in citizen engagement where government is not the chairman or moderator of the debate, Godfrey added. But how does government shape a conversation responsibly in social media?

Andrew Mills, CIO of the Government of South Australia, told FutureGov that rules the same rules apply to social media as they do offline. “What should you publish and how, in an open and safe way? It’s a business issue, not an IT issue. A conversation needs to be carefully managed. If things get abusive, then you close the platform down. Simple.”

So what are the implications for policy testing? Jeremy Godfrey recalls a newspaper article written by a stakeholder who took issue with policies being discussed in an open forum before they had been announced. “We don’t discuss anything terribly sensitive. I blogged and tweeted about each stage of the development of our government portal. Part of my job is to make policy, and Twitter is a good tool to get feedback from the public on what they like and what they don’t.”

Birmingham Council’s Director of Business Change, Glyn Evans, said that social media has brought “mixed results” for Britain’s second city. But a citizen panel of 600 residents has helped co-design the web site Birmingham.gov.uk, and preparations for the construction of the biggest public library in Europe have been aided by virtual versions tested on the public.

Web 2.0 has challenged the idea that civil servants are risk-averse, Mills added. “Gov 2.0 is a new way of doing business, and in online social communities we must be managers of risk. Policy making through crowd sourcing is not a reality yet. And governments have probably been the victims rather than the beneficiaries of policymaking in social media to date. We must be watchful of mob rule.”

Yes, we are now a 24-hour government with connections with people, he said. “But it’s really just another channel that lets the offline world deal with governance issues better.”