Public sector leaders around the world face a daunting challenge to deliver good government in the 21st century. They are under increasing pressure to deliver more and better services to a growing urbanized population, and to manage complex issues, from macroeconomic uncertainty to international conflicts, in an environment of diminishing trust in government, increasing bureaucratic complexity and natural resource constraints.

This Smart Toolbox, developed by the World Economic Forum’s 
Council on the Future of Government, shares insights on how 
technology can strengthen good government – for example, 
by enabling greater transparency of government actions through 
open data, empowering citizens to have faster and more accurate 
access to online services, and helping to strengthen responses 
to aid civilians in conflicts. It also explores the risks and challenges 
of an increasingly digital era, including the often expensive and 
complex need to keep pace with changing tools and technology, 
the divides that can expand between user groups that have 
less ease of use, and the security and protection of data 
and information.

The Council posits that, if well managed and strategically 
deployed, information and communication technology (ICT) can 
reshape government in the next decade by strengthening trust 
in government, leadership, delivery of services, political 
representation, anti-corruption, bureaucratic cooperation, 
the management of conflict, and innovation. In each chapter, 
the authors define the topic, assess its varied and changing 
meaning, explore how it is affected by ICT, offer key insights and share case examples that public sector leaders can apply in their work. The toolbox also assesses risks, including privacy, security, access, and organizational capabilities to build and manage new IT plans.

The toolbox takes trust in government – a cornerstone of good 
government – as a unifying theme. Without the trust of its citizens 
in the political process and in government representatives, leaders 
struggle to pass legislation and enact policies. Moreover, trust is 
a holistic indicator of when government is “good”. Measuring trust 
can help government to benchmark progress, identify gaps and 
learn from best practices across the world.

Besides trust in government, the Council identifies leadership in 
government as the second underlying factor and an intervening 
variable. The information revolution and democratization are 
causing a long-term secular shift in 21st century government 
and post-modern organizations. Building leadership in the 
technological era will shape the social contract between 
governments and citizenry as traditional structures of power 
and the leadership-followership-context triangle are redefined

Please click here to view the full report: 

http://workspace.unpan.org/sites/Internet/Documents/UNPAN93265.pdf