The USA in Transition: Open Government Leading to Connected Governance

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The USA in Transition Open Government Leading
to Connected Governance
International Symposium Connected Governance
Vision or Reality? Rome, Italy 21-22 October
2009

• Gregory G. Curtin, Ph.D.
• Managing Director
• Civic Resource Group, USA
• Senior Fellow
• Bedrosian Center on Governance and Public
  Enterprise
• University of Southern California, USA

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CONNECTED GOVERNANCEWHY?

• UN, WEF, Others Connected Governance as an
  Advanced State of Governance Facilitated by ICT
  whereby Governments Provide
• Better Delivery of Public Services Efficiency
  and Quality
• Open, Transparent, Accountable Government
• Greater and More Meaningful Participation
• Innovation Economic, Societal, Government
• Bottom Line Improved Quality of Life

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CONNECTED GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK

• Federal LevelHorizontal
• Collaboration Across Agencies
• System Interoperability/Backoffice Integration
• Coherent Policy Making
• GIS Standardization and Platformatization
• Information and Data Sharing
• Communications Networks
• Cost and Service Sharing
• Federal, States, LocalVertical
• Information and Data Sharing
• Reporting, Compliance, Tracking
• Connected Publics
• Citizen Feedback, Consultations
• Collaboration
• Crowdsourcing of New Public Information,
  Knowledge

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THE USA ENVIRONMENTA CHALLENGE FOR CONNECTED
GOVERNANCE

• 76B in Federal Government Information Technology
  Spending
• More than 10,000 Federal Government Systems
• More than 1.9M Employees
• 100s of Individual Agencies and Departments
• More than 300M Customers
• 50 Separate State Governments
• Thousands of Local Governments

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THE USA APPROACHAN OPEN GOVERNMENT STRATEGY

• Leadership and Vision
• Commitment from the highest levels
• Articulation of the value of technology for open
  government
• Government is the Open Platform
• The web as the foundation
• Enterprise/service oriented architecture
• Focus not on infrastructure, but on value
• Open Data and Information
• Open data stimulates user activity, input, new
  ideas and processes, trust in government
• Exposing data to users encourages more and better
  backend collaboration and integration

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TECHNOLOGY LEADERSHIP IN THE OBAMA
ADMINISTRATION

• Technologypromises to provide an unprecedented
  window into the workings of government,
  supporting democratic principles of transparency
  and, by inviting more public participation,
  making use one of the nations greatest untapped
  resource the shared knowledge of its citizenry.

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TECHNOLOGY LEADERSHIP IN THE OBAMA
ADMINISTRATION

• Bring government into the 21st Century 
• Establish a Chief Technology Officer position
  within the Executive Office of the President
• Ensure that every government branch and agency
  has the right infrastructure, policies and
  services for the 21st century
• Create an Open and Transparent Democracy
• Develop cutting-edge technologies to create a new
  level of transparency, participation, and
  collaboration for America's citizens
• Enhance scientific integrity in government
  decision-making
• Protect Americas Cyber Networks 
• Initiation of new and powerful protection
  strategies
• Ensure that Americas cyber network remains safe
  from espionage and disruption
• Step up efforts to track down cyber criminals

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CONNECTIONS WITH THE PUBLIC

• Whitehouse.gov Open and accessible
• Recovery.gov
• Regulations.gov
• Open Government Brainstorm Initiative
• Web Video and Online Chat Sessions
• White House and Executive Agency Social Media
  Blogs, Wikis, Twitter, Facebook, etc.

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CONNECTING WITH THE PEOPLEOPEN GOVERNMENT
DIALOGUE

• Open and transparent process for citizens to
  discussopen and transparent government!
• Wiki and blog formats use allowing citizens to
  view the input of others

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REGULATIONS.GOV--TRANSPARENCY IN DECISION
MAKING

• Search and find ALL federal rules and related
  documents from all federal agencies
• Provide formal comments
• View comments of others

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TRANSPARENCY IN FEDERAL FINANCIAL BAILOUT
(STIMULUS PACKAGE)

• Effectively using the web and open data sources
  to quickly and reliably provide dynamic
  information
• Tracking at the state and local levelsstructured
  connections
• Social media for connecting with public

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DATA.GOV--EXPLODING SOURCE OF OPEN GOVERNMENT
DATA

• Started in May 2009 with fewer than 50 data
  sources
• Now has more than 100,000 data feeds in a variety
  of open, machine readable formats

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OPEN DATASTATE AND LOCAL CONNECTIONS

• Slow start, but states recently agreed to
  collaborate
• California and Utah as State leaders
• San Francisco and Washington D.C. initial local
  participants

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RELATED INITIATIVES AT THE STATE LEVEL

• National Association of State Chief Information
  Officers (NASCIO) Collaboration with Federal Gov
  on Open Data
• Electronic Commerce Coordinating Council (EC3)
  Symposium and Guidance for Use of Web 2.0 Tools
  in Government
• States of California and Utah Participating in
  Data.gov
• Increase in State E-Government Activity
• Web 2.0
• Cloud Computing
• Open Data/Gov

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ORGANIZATIONTHE REAL KEY

• Formalized Federal Chief Information Officer
  (CIO)
• Strategic Technology Planning and Policy
• Federal Enterprise Architecture
• Systems Interoperability
• Democratization of Data
• Created Federal Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
• Technology Innovation
• US Broadband Rollout
• Economic, Health, Education, Community
  Connectivity
• Deputy CTO for Open Government
• Office of E-Government and Information Technology
  within the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)

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REINVIGORATING E-GOVERNMENT AT THE FEDERAL
LEVEL

• Renewed focus on e-government
• New e-gov initiatives and policies
• Federal enterprise architecturefoundation for
  connected systems

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IT DASHBOARD--TRANSPARENCY IN FEDERAL IT

• Window into ALL federal IT projects
• Details on purpose, vendors, contracts, status,
  ROI, etc.
• Federal agencies and other governments can
  compare, align projects, etc.

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NEW PROCUREMENT APPROACHES POLICIES

• Apps.govnew portal for procuring cloud based
  resources
• New streamlined IT procurement
• Shared services initiatives
• Online IT shopping
• Aggressive use of the web and social media

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USA.GOV CONNECTING FEDERAL, STATE, LOCAL AND
TRIBAL SERVICES

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CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS

• More Open and Transparent Government will Lead
  Naturally to More Connected Governance at All
  Levels
• Open Data and Information are the Keys to Open
  Government
• New Web 2.0/3.0 Technologies and Approaches Make
  Open Government Feasible
• Leadership is the Stimulus to Make it All Happen

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THANK YOU!

• Gregory Curtin
• gregc_at_civicresource.com