Mobiiliasiointipalveluiden käyttäjäkeskeinen suunnittelu Namibiassa: Mobiilin henkilökorttihaun ja tunnistautumisen prototypointi

The average e-government implementation level in Africa remains low. While many African governments have created e-government strategies and informational government websites, much attention has not yet been paid to implementing socially inclusive and accessible services. Especially in Namibia, where a digital divide is prevalent and income inequality rates are high, creating equal opportunities to access government services is important in order to combat the divide. Offering services on mobile platforms, gathering an understanding of citizens' needs, and designing intuitive user interfaces have been suggested as courses of action for Namibia. It seems that Namibian e-government initiatives would benefit from user-centred design. The aim of this thesis is to explore the opportunities of mobile platforms for delivering citizen-centric e-government services to Namibian citizens, and how a combination of design science and user-centred design might support the creation of such \textit{m-government} services. The subject is approached through a practical design challenge: creating prototypes for two mobile services related to identification (a service for online ID applications, and for digital authentication of individuals). According to the results, mobile platforms hold a multitude of opportunities related to making existing government services more efficient and approachable, and related to the young, urban Namibians' proficiency in mobile use and overall positive perceptions of offering identification services on mobile platforms. For rural communities, m-government services could help reduce the amount of travel related to interacting with the government, but internet coverage remains an issue. The results also indicate that using prototypes can facilitate cross-cultural co-creation of knowledge by helping to establish a mutual understanding of concepts between parties.Sähköisten asiointipalveluiden keskimääräinen taso Afrikassa on yhä matalalla. Vaikka valtionjohto monissa Afrikan maissa on luonut strategioita sähköisten asiointipalveluiden kehittämiseksi ja verkkosivuja tiedotusta varten, paljoakaan huomiota ei ole vielä kiinnitetty sosiaalisesti inklusiivisten ja saavutettavien palveluiden kehittämiseen. Varsinkin Namibiassa, jossa digitaalinen kuilu eri ryhmien välillä on syvä ja tuloerot suuria, on tärkeää luoda asiointipalveluiden käytölle yhtäläiset mahdollisuudet erojen pienentämiseksi. Menettelytavoiksi Namibiassa on ehdotettu palveluiden tarjoamista mobiilialustoilla, tiedonkeruuta kansalaisten tarpeista sekä käyttöliittymien suunnittelua intuitiivisiksi. Vaikuttaa siltä, että projektit voisivat hyötyä käyttäjäkeskeisestä suunnittelusta. Tämän diplomityön tavoitteena on tutkia mobiilialustojen mahdollisuuksia kansalaiskeskeisten sähköisten asiointipalveluiden tarjoamiseksi Namibian kansalaisille, sekä tietojärjestelmätutkimuksen ja käyttäjäkeskeisen suunnittelun yhdistelmän mahdollisuuksia tukea tällaisten mobiiliasiointipalveluiden suunnittelua. Aihetta lähestytään käytännön suunnitteluhaasteen kautta: työssä kehitetään kaksi prototyyppiä henkilöllisyyteen liittyvistä palveluista (yksi sähköistä henkilökorttihakua varten, toinen sähköistä tunnistautumista varten). Tulosten mukaan mobiilialustat tarjoavat monenlaisia mahdollisuuksia nykyisten asiointipalveluiden tehostamiseksi ja kehittämiseksi lähestyttävämmiksi. Mobiilialustojen käyttö on lupaavaa myös siinä mielessä, että nuoret, kaupungeissa asuvat namibialaiset ovat kyvykkäitä mobiilikäyttäjiä ja heidän suhtautumisensa henkilöllisyyteen liittyvien palveluiden tarjoamiseen mobiilialustoilla oli yleisesti ottaen positiivista. Maaseudulla asuvien yhteisöjen osalta mobiiliasiointipalvelut voisivat vähentää julkisten palveluiden käyttöön liittyvää matkustusta, mutta internet-yhteyden saatavuus seuduilla on yhä heikkoa. Tulokset viittaavat myös siihen, että prototyyppien käyttö voi fasilitoida kulttuurienvälistä tiedon yhteisluomista helpottamalla yhteisen konseptuaalisen ymmärryksen syntymistä eri osapuolten välille

A Framework for An Integrated E- Government System for Public Service Sectors in Developing Countries Using Design Science Research Methodology

This study aimed to develop an integrated framework to enhance government services and improve service delivery for the Namibian government. The Delone and McLean Information Systems success model and the Organizational Information Processing Theory served as the theoretical foundations for this study. The target population consisted of members of the public and a Government Ministry in Namibia. A sample size of 25 participants was selected for the study, utilizing the purposive sampling technique for government employees and the snowball sampling technique for members of the public. Thematic analysis was employed to analyze the data gathered. The study's findings revealed several significant insights. Despite the existence of multiple e-government systems, poor integration among them hindered the ability of the Namibian public service to provide effective and efficient services to citizens. Additionally, the study identified a strong demand from the public for services to be more accessible, convenient, and responsive, including a preference for online applications and faster service delivery. Moreover, the study developed an integrated e-government framework specifically tailored for the Namibian public service, aiming to enhance accessibility, convenience, responsiveness, and cost-effectiveness of services provided to citizens. The implementation of this framework is expected to promote an open and accountable government. It is crucial to emphasize that the successful achievement of e-Government goals relies on factors such as political leadership, support across all government levels, key infrastructure, skilled human resources, a suitable legal and regulatory framework, information resources, and citizen-centric services

E-government iImplementation and adoption: the case study of Botswana Government

ABSTRACT The advancements in the ICT and internet technologies challenge governments to engage in the electronic transformation of public services and information provision to citizens. The capability to reach citizens in the physical world via e-government platform and render a citizen-centric public sector has increasingly become vital. Thus, spending more resources to promote and ensure that all members of society are included in the entire spectrum of information society and more actively access government online is a critical aspect in establishing a successful e-government project. Every e-government programme requires a clear idea of the proposed benefits to citizens, the challenges to overcome and the level of institutional reform that has to take place for e- government to be a success in a given context. E-government strategy is fundamental to transforming and modernising the public sector through identification of key influential elements or strategy factors and ways of interacting with citizens. It is therefore apparent that governments must first understand variables that influence citizens’ adoption of e-government in order to take them into account when developing and delivering services online. Botswana has recently embarked on e-government implementation initiatives that started with the e-readiness assessment conducted in 2004, followed by enactment of the National ICT policy of 2007 and the approval of the e-government strategy approved in 2012 for dedicated implementation in the 2014 financial year. Significant developments have taken place around national and international connectivity including initiatives that offer connectivity to citizens such as the I- partnership, community run Nteletsa projects, post office run tele-centres and Sesigo projects that have been deployed on a wider Botswana. In spite of these remarkable initiatives there is no change management strategy in place and evidence to suggest that citizens cluster groups, government employees, key influential citizens’ stakeholders and other local government administrative governing structures at district levels have been appropriately informed, consulted, engaged and participated in the design, development and implementation initiatives. This position has contributed largely to low e-readiness indices for Botswana, low PC, Internet and broadband penetration levels, which do not commensurate with levels of connectivity initiatives already in place and operational. The strategy development, which is the viability business plan for the entire project has been initiated and concluded without the appropriate input of citizens, employees and local government structures at the districts. Considering that that e-government is new and narrowly researched in Botswana. There is non existing research on both the impact of strategy factors to e-government implementation success and citizens’ involvement and participation in the e-government design and implementation through to adoption and continual use. This study therefore explores and investigates empirically the key e-government strategy influential success elements and the how citizens’ involvement and participation in e-government development can be secured, supported and facilitated towards adoption and continual future use. This culminates in the proposal of both theoretically supported and empirically validated e-government strategy framework and citizen centric conceptual model. The study is crucial as it aims understand how can influences upon success in e-government project be better understood and citizens’ stakeholder adoption of e-government enhanced to facilitate successful development of e-government in Botswana and is also timely as it comes at the time when Botswana has not yet implemented her e-government strategy, hence factors identified are critical to both strategy re-alignment and design of the citizens’ involvement and participation change management strategy to support both implementation and citizens’ adoption of e-government in Botswana. The study utilises the mixed methods research, employing both qualitative and quantitative methods to address the research question and triangulated data collection approaches used to select survey sample for two questionnaire sets carried on opinion holders within government and non government structures and ordinary citizens, use of observations on operating tele-centres, interviews with key e-government strategic stakeholders and document analysis which included e-government policies and related documentations as well as extensive review of e-government published literature including applied implementation and citizens adoption experiences of developing and developed countries. In the analysis of data the multiple regression analysis has been utilised and multivariate analysis performed to ensure linearity, normality and collinearity. The linear regression has been used to test the hypothesis through the Analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique. Keywords E-government, strategy critical success factors, key influential elements, citizen centric conceptual model, strategy framework, Botswana.Botswana International University of Science and Technology (BIUST)Botswana Embass

Understanding the failure of education for sustainable development:an analysis of the content and pedagogy of education for sustainable development

Abstract. Widespread changes to the social, economic, and natural environments caused by human activities threaten the increase in life quality achieved in the 21st century. This has led to the acknowledgement that a sustainable transition of our societies is required so that the basic human needs of current and future societies are met. The recognition of education as one of the main tools to achieve this transition has led to the creation of education for sustainable development (ESD), which aims at transmitting skills, values, and ethics of sustainability. Although there have been numerous declarations of intention from states and global governing bodies, evidences show a gap between the expressed ambitions and the effectiveness of ESD implementation. One of the main challenges is to switch from an environmental studies-centered approach to ESD, where sustainability competences are merely seen as a collection of learned knowledge and skills, to a holistic educational approach where the entire educational and social structure is devoted to transmitting sustainability skills and values and give opportunities to act sustainably. The aim of this thesis is to 1) understand what is ESD, its relation to sustainable development and to the educational process; 2) identify the obstacles to an efficient implementation of ESD; and 3) define the content and pedagogy of ESD. The intention is to build a content and pedagogical framework that can be used for the implementation of ESD in educational contexts

Training of Crisis Mappers and Map Production from Multi-sensor Data: Vernazza Case Study (Cinque Terre National Park, Italy)

This aim of paper is to presents the development of a multidisciplinary project carried out by the cooperation between Politecnico di Torino and ITHACA (Information Technology for Humanitarian Assistance, Cooperation and Action). The goal of the project was the training in geospatial data acquiring and processing for students attending Architecture and Engineering Courses, in order to start up a team of "volunteer mappers". Indeed, the project is aimed to document the environmental and built heritage subject to disaster; the purpose is to improve the capabilities of the actors involved in the activities connected in geospatial data collection, integration and sharing. The proposed area for testing the training activities is the Cinque Terre National Park, registered in the World Heritage List since 1997. The area was affected by flood on the 25th of October 2011. According to other international experiences, the group is expected to be active after emergencies in order to upgrade maps, using data acquired by typical geomatic methods and techniques such as terrestrial and aerial Lidar, close-range and aerial photogrammetry, topographic and GNSS instruments etc.; or by non conventional systems and instruments such us UAV, mobile mapping etc. The ultimate goal is to implement a WebGIS platform to share all the data collected with local authorities and the Civil Protectio

電子政府サービスの品質評価 : ベトナムの事例

早大学位記番号:新7118早稲田大

A Review of Critical Factors Impacting the Implementation of E-government in Developing Countries

A key challenge facing developing countries is the high failure rate of electronic government (e-government) programmes. Since its inception, e-government has been implemented globally with the aim that it will enhance the quality-of-service delivery, transform government's internal and external processes and make the public sector more effective and efficient. However, the majority of e-government initiatives have failed to meet their objectives, particularly in developing countries. Therefore, this research considers the factors facilitating and inhibiting the successful implementation of e-government in developing countries. The methodology adopted for the thesis was a qualitative research approach. Secondary data was collected through a literature review of various sources, namely government publications, annual reports compiled by international development agencies and relevant books. To address the research question, I identified literature from journal articles with expertise in information systems such as the Electronic Journal for E-government. The research findings indicate that e-government in developing countries is impacted by various infrastructural, financial, political, socio-economic, organisational and human related aspects. Some of these include the digital divide, resistance to change, limited ICT skills and a lack of robust regulatory frameworks. The study concludes that successful e-government does not solely rest on technology. Instead, developing countries need to understand the impact of the various local contextual factors. These are the fundamental aspects that must be considered during the strategic design of e-government initiatives to ensure they are appropriate for and relevant to local conditions

Eco-Africa and facilitated community participation in the /AI-/AIS Richtersveld Transfrontier Conservation Area

This research investigates how environmental consultancies frame participation as a tool for project implementation using a cross-border conservation initiative as a case study. The study focuses on the facilitation process led by Eco-Africa Environmental Consultants during the establishment of the /Ai-/Ais Richtersveld Transfrontier Conservation Area. This study analyzes the promise of participation as a crucial component for Transfrontier Conservation Areas. Analyzing participation of the Richtersvelders is necessary for understanding the work that was carried out and how it was experienced by the stakeholders. The study refers to participation in conservancies in community-based resource management, where the role of non-government organizations and environmental consultancies is well established. Primary data were collected through qualitative document analysis, semi-structured interviews with members of the four communities and with Eco-Africa Environmental Consultants. The findings of the study are that there was a strong attempt towards an all-inclusive bottom-up approach to participation. However, such the success of such an approach was hampered by local mismanagement, politics of money, and a marketing strategy favoring the South African National Parks and the Transfrontier Conservation project