Communicational Problems of E-governmentin Local Public Administration

Communicational Problems of E-government
in Local Public Administration

I. Tózsa - B.B. Budai

Abstract

The paper surveys in brief all the communicative channels of E-government and the role they play, they are bound to play or they could play in the administration of local authorities in Hungary. The authors think there are five groups of E-government channels possibly applied to the local (settlement) level of public administration. They outline these groups answering the form of a SWOT survey.

The first two groups involve the channels, already functioning or being elaborated in the course of local public administration, as the Strenght of E-government. The third group contains the channels that do not exist in Hungary so far, as the Weakness of E-government. The fourth group involves the limits of applying E-government devices in public administration, as the Threats. Finally the fifth group involves the circle of educational aspects that could act as Opportunities of the E-government in Hungarian Public Administration.

Since Hungary is one of the CE countries approaching EU ascension in the first place, such a groupping, survey and evaluation of E-goverment device applications in local public administration, might be interesting to experts from other CE and other transitional countries where access to E-governmental possibilities may be even less, than in Hungary at present.

Also, E-government usually comes into existence and develops on central governmental levels, though its real task is to serve people directly, making administration more convenient, than it is today. It is the municipal level where E-governmental devices may achieve their most effective application, when the inter-active administration between the citizens and the local municipality can be realized. Therefore it may be interesing to learn about the present state of local E-government, and the problems it is facing, in Hungary.

Functioning channels include telecimmunication, administration of employment and wages, information systems of public utulities, settlement home pages, legal regulation of digital signature, network of the document offices. Channels being under establishment include CAD applications in master planning, traffic control information systems with GPS, home access to Internet, the so calles tele-house network in the country, and application forms available from the web sites of municipalities. The missing channels of local E-government include E-learning and E-employment in public administration, inter-active administration betwwen the client at home and the municipality, the spatial information systems supporting decision-making, the transparency of local government through Internet and E-voting devices. The Threats include the problems limiting the spreading of E-government channels like using the telecommunicative devices at the office for private goals, the lack of technical devices to receive and identify the digital signature at offices, data protection, lack of money, lack of knowledge, lack of affinity to apply E-devices on the part of officers and clerks working in local public administration. Finally, the the authors consider post graduate training courses, graduate and under-graduate acquiring of knowledge on E-government, and launching E-governmental enginneer training in higher education, as the major factors of Possibility to improve and support E-government devices and communicational channels in public administration on the municipal level.