Digital Era Governance

Government information systems are big business (costing over 1 per cent of GDP a year). They are critical to all aspects of public policy and governmental operations. Governments spend billions on them - for instance, the UK alone commits £14 billion a year to public sector IT operations.

Yet governments do not generally develop or run their own systems, instead relying on private sector computer services providers to run large, long-run contracts to provide IT. Some of the biggest companies in the world (IBM, EDS, Lockheed Martin, etc) have made this a core market. The book shows how governments in some countries (the USA, Canada and Netherlands) have maintained much more effective policies than others (in the UK, Japan and Australia). It shows how public managers need to retain and develop their own IT expertise and to carefully maintain well-contested markets if they are to deliver value for money in their dealings with the very powerful global IT industry.

This book describes how a critical aspect of the modern state is managed, or in some cases mismanaged. It will be vital reading for public managers, IT professionals, and business executives alike, as well as for students of modern government, business, and information studies.

Patrick Dunleavy is Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has authored and edited numerous books on political science theory, British politics and urban politics, as well as more than 50 articles in professional journals. His publications include: the series Developments in British Politics (co-authored, Eighth edition, forthcoming 2006); Democracy, Bureaucracy and Public Choice (Harvester-Wheatsheaf, 1992); Theories of the State: The Politics of Liberal Democracy (Palgrave, 1987). He also edited the journals Political Studies and Political Studies Review for the UK Political Studies Association for six years (1999-2005), with Jane Tinkler and others. Helen Margetts is a Professor at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, before which she was Director of the School of Public Policy at UCL. Previously she worked as a lecturer at Birkbeck College (1994-99), a researcher at the LSE (1990-94), and as a systems analyst and computer programmer in the private sector (1984-89). She is a political scientist specialising in the implications for government of use of the Internet and related information technologies. She has published widely in this area including (with Patrick Dunleavy) two studies of Government on the Web for the UK National Audit Office (1999 and 2002), the book Information Technology in Government (Routledge, 1999) and a book with Christopher Hood Tools of Government in the Digital Age (Palgrave, 2006).
Simon Bastow is Senior Research Fellow in the LSE Public Policy Group at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He was previously Senior Research Fellow at the School of Public Policy, University College London. Educated at Manchester University in languages he later changed direction, taking an MSc in Comparative Politics at LSE and is completing his PhD in political science. He has been main researcher on four VfM studies, Government on the Web II (May 2002), Difficult Forms: How Government Agencies Interact with Citizens (October 2003), Citizen Redress: What People Can Do if Things Go Wrong with Public Services (March 2005) and Achieving Innovation in Central Government Organizations (forthcoming). He has published reports and journal articles in the areas of UK public policy, electoral analysis, e-government and digital era governance.
Jane Tinkler is manager of the LSE Public Policy Group at the London School of Economics and Political Science and researcher on many of its projects. Previous to this, she was Managing Editor of the journals, Political Studies and Political Studies Review for six years. She was also a Research Fellow in the School of Public Policy, University College London. Her first degree was in psychology and business at Leeds University and she later took an MSc in social sciences at Birkbeck College, University of London. She has worked on three National Audit Office reports, Difficult Forms: How Government Agencies Interact with Citizens (October 2003), Citizen Redress: What People Can Do if Things Go Wrong with Public Services (March 2005) and Achieving Innovation in Central Government Organizations (forthcoming). She has published on UK public policy and digital era governance.