Delivery of Effective E-Government Systems: The Case of Oman - Dissertation Example

Manoharan and Holzer (2011) suggest that in an age of ubiquitous computing, computers are now a part of everyday life in all developed and emerging nations. Thus, with the advent of rapid and unprecedented growth in ICT, governments in nearly all nations have embarked on e-government strategies. Good governance is consensus-oriented, responsive, accountable, transparent, equitable and inclusive, participatory, consensus-oriented, effective and efficient, and leans towards legal compliance. The evolution of the ICT and the rapid proliferation of these technologies have presented an opportunity to governments to remain connected and to benefit from the opinions of the citizens.

E-government presents a promise for disseminating effectively information to citizens, improving transaction efficiency in citizen to government transactions, enhancing the performance of the civil service, improving service delivery to citizens, enhancing empowerment, reducing costs associated with governance, etc. Thus, it makes sense for governments to try to enhance effective governance by deploying e-government systems that enhance connectivity between a government and citizens.According to Sideridis and Patrikakis (2010), democracy has proven to be an exceptionally adaptive form of government through the ages.

However, Paivarinta & Saebo (2008) emphasize the fact that the idea of democracy depends on effective and participatory decision-making about public issues, and democracy emphasizes effective participation by all citizens. Thus, it should be possible for citizens and groups with interests to communicate effectively with their representatives in a parliament, with various government departments, and those in a government who oversee administrative and governance functions. In the present day and age, Information Technology (IT) has the capacity for supporting a proportion, if not all, of the activities desirable for effective governance in a democracy if a will exists to do this in society.

Efforts directed towards trying to enhance the functioning of a democracy are not new.