Means to Perfect Public Administration System

Today we are witnessing considerable reforms which occur in the activity of governments in different countries. The question arises: why do we reform governments? The answer to this question varies relatively to the context and timing. Sometimes a reform is stimulated by a shortage of financial resources. Sometimes it is brought on by a change in political power. At other times it may be forced by citizens’ demands. And, at times is results as a response to corruption and scandal. Moreover, in many cases, more than one of these aspects work together to push forward government reforms. This is also why reformers adopt various strategies ranging from institutional reorganization, rationalization, introduction of new managerial techniques, and more recently, implementation of e-government.

E-government (short for electronic government, also known as e-gov, digital government, online government or transformational government) is a diffused neologism used to refer to the use of information and communication technology to provide and improve government services, transactions and interactions with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government.

The problem of e-government implementetion concerns not only developing countries, but also developed ones. All of them have definite methods how to create more efficient governments adapted to the rapidly changing world. One of the most succeeded countries in this sphere is Italy.

The Ministry for Reforms and Innovation in the Public Administration coordinates and encourages direct actions in the field of innovation and ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) from central and local adminisrations, with the aim of defining a common integrated e-Government system in Italy. By developing programs, action plans and specific projects, the Ministry has contributed to the deployment of information technologies throughout the country, to bring better, more effective, and efficient services to citizens and business.

In addition, Italy has created "Committee of Ministers for the Information Society" to coordinate the action of various public adminisrations and oversee the definition and realization of a coherent straTegy for the development of the information society in Italy.

The creation of effective digital government serving the needs of citizens and businesses requires an integrated approach. In Italy, this has been formalized in the Public Administration Digital Code. The Code, unifying all the several existing statements, works as a “Digital Constitution” for all public operators in the field of ICT. Through its more than 70 articles, the Public Administration Digital Code states all the rights/duties, principles and perspectives of Italian citizens within the information society. It is the result of two years of work by the then-Ministry for Innovation and Tecnologies, which convened several consultative sessions with stakeholders from universities, the industrial sector, professional societies, and civil associations.

All these institutions act according to the E-Government Plan 2012. The Plan aims at promoting government innovation, spreading online services and reinforcing the accessibility and transparency of Public Administration, so as to bring it closer to the needs of the citizens and the businesses.

E-Gov 2012 is a flexible plan in constant progress – its objectives, which have been defined in collaboration with the concerned public authorities, must be reachable, monitored and adequate to the resources available. The Plan consists of 80 digital innovation projects structured around 4 intervention areas, namely: Sectoral, referring to Central Government and Universities; Local, covering either the Regions or their capitals: Structural, including infrastructure projects, e. g. projects for reducing the digital divide or for improving the accessibility of government services; International, to maintain Italy’s major involvement in the European-scale networks focused on infrastrustures, innovation and best practice dissemination.

The measures we have outlined are sure to make public administration more accessible and transparent and bring it closer to needs of Italian people and businesses.

Ex. 3. Read the text about the role of legal issues in public administration and speak about the way public administrators implement them in their everyday work: