COMNET-IT - COMNET95 Workshop Report Chapter 2

The Need for Sustainable Information and Communication Technology Policies and Strategies in Commonwealth Countries

The development of IT policies and strategies is a highly complex matter. Why have a policy at all? What are the benefits? What constitutes an appropriate IT policy, and what are the elements of such a policy? These were some of the issues dealt with during the first session of the workshop.

Dr. Stephen Mncube of the Development Bank of Southern Africa offered the workshop an analysis of the needs being addressed in South Africa and compared these to the approaches being pursued in Canada. South Africa can be viewed as a prototype of a newly democratised nation in the process of formulating its approach to information policy. Three initiatives, the National Information Project, the Open Democracy Act and the Telecommunications Policy Programme form the underpinnings of this approach. They address a broad set of societal needs: access to information, education, economic development, financial, cultural and moral needs. They involve a variety of actors, including investors, financiers, manufacturers, operators, educators and artists. Regional and global co-operation are fundamental elements in all IT related policies.

Dr. Mohan Kaul and Rogers W'O Okot-Uma spoke about the Commonwealth Perspective on Informatics Policies and Strategies. They highlighted the key role played by IT in organisational and system change throughout the public service. They reviewed the key strategies being followed by a selected group of Commonwealth member countries and presented the policy frameworks used by these countries as guidance for the workshop deliberations. (Kaul, 1995)

Two panellists, Dr. Chee Sing Yap (National University of Singapore) and Dr. Abdus Sattar (Pakistan Computer Bureau) responded to the issues presented in the papers. Dr. Yap stressed the value of IT as a tool to boost the whole economy of a country. It is difficult to get it right, but the elements must include local involvement in implementation of IT policies, close attention to the human resources aspects and careful co-ordination of efforts.

Dr. Sattar outlined three essential prerequisites for success implementation of IT policies. These are:

He suggested that a Research and Development Board is an essential element of a national infrastructure. A sound infrastructure will include networks well integrated with terminal networks and equipment. Above all a sound fiscal environment is necessary for success.

The workshop participants addressed these issues through general discussion in the sessions and in the subsequent working groups. Before deciding on the full range of issues, they debated the need for an overall national IT policy.

Is there a need for a national IT policy? The UK has no IT policy, yet other countries have invested considerable effort in developing national policies. It was concluded that there is a need for some sort of roadmap for planning the development of IT. This might be an articulated policy, or a collection of initiatives. Countries that have neither one nor the other would be well advised to evaluate the need for an IT policy in their own context and to act accordingly. On balance, the workshop felt there was a need for IT policies. Some arguments against the development of national IT policies were put forward. These included the cost of the human resources to develop and formulate policies, the danger that imposed decisions could be worse than those that the market would decide, and the danger that decisions might be taken too late to be effective (Heeks, 1995)

The use of the term "policy" is itself problematic. It holds different meanings for different people. One of the working groups at the workshop adopted the following definition for policy:

"The term "policy" connotes a political statement, statute, act of parliament, regulation, procedure, established practice, defined standard which is formulated, implemented and/or reviewed in response to identified or perceived national need".

The following issues were identified by the workshop as those which are likely to be elements in the identification of needs.

In order to address the need for a national policy, it is necessary to have an appreciation of the role that IT can play in society. There is an emerging global consensus that IT is a crucial factor in today's society. IT provides the tools to propagate the information that may be both necessary and important in the day-to-day decisions of society. Ready and rapid access to information in society can lead to more informed decision-making which in turn can contribute to economic development.

IT facilitates communication between people. It can also facilitate access to information bases such as the formal records of government and those of commercial providers. It enables the keeping of the large and accurate records and information that is important in complex, modern-day societies. IT facilitates the making of decisions of importance to all participants in society and plays an important role in education, employment and governance. It can help reduce the gap between those with access to information and those without. It is necessary, therefore, that IT policies address the issue of the provision of access to the technology by all sectors of society.

The role of IT in society is extremely complex. It is difficult to separate national policies from public sector policies. A single national IT policy may not be practical in some instances. A collection of sectoral policies may be a practical alternative. These are much smaller, can have measurable goals and can be more easily managed. Above all, IT policies must be sustainable. The workshop chose to define "sustainable" as an internal capacity to define, implement, and redefine policy over time.

Considering the importance of IT as an economic sector in its own right and as technology underpinning the development and effective functioning of the economy and society, a policy is required to chart the direction and provide a framework for acquisition and effective use of IT.

There is an apparent dichotomy between a national IT policy and sectoral IT policies (public and private) because of the differing perspectives of the diversity of the actors influencing Government.

Whereas Government intervention within the public sector is a natural consequence, government intervention beyond the public sector, to include the private sector, for example, should remain nominal and not functional.

What policy infrastructures are needed to develop and promulgate policies? At what level is policy made? Where does the feedback come from? What processes and procedures are used to develop policy? Where does policy authority lie - with Cabinet, in the Legislature?.

An important factor in addressing these questions is the need to understand the changing relationships of government and the private sector. On the one hand, the role of government has changed in many countries and the private sector is becoming the more important driving force. Many governments are abandoning their leading role in IT development. With the current trends towards divestiture and the emphasis on government-private sector partnerships, it is unrealistic to expect governments to develop and implement detailed national information technology policies to cover all economic sectors. On the other hand, Government does have a role in planning and through that role must address policy issues. They have a role to play in facilitating collaboration with and within the private sector. Above all, they need to address the gaps in the provision of service that will not necessarily be met by the private sector. They have to ensure that social goals are not lost in the pursuit of economic goals. The new focus in developing IT policies should not be on government leading the process but on it being an instrumental player and a catalyst.

This catalytic role must ensure that the needs of all participants in the community are considered. Government can facilitate a dialogue with those who for whom a policy would make a difference. The result may not be a "grand government plan" but rather a consensus agreement on what needs to be done, and who is going to do it. Government can still help to harness resources, and to plan their own use of IT. Their demonstration of effective use of IT, through appropriate allocation of human, technical and economic resources, can be an example for others to emulate.

Governments can ensure that in developing plans for priority sectors intensive use is made of IT (e.g. in health, education, agriculture), and that specific policies are developed for the IT sector. In areas such as infrastructure development, tariffs and the removal of regulatory constraints their role is crucial. In short, governments can set up the institutional mechanisms and policy framework within which the development of IT can take place.

As far as creating the right policy environment for the development of the IT sector one area of significant concern was highlighted. This had to do with the telecommunication regulations that are currently in force in many countries. After much discussion it was concluded that:

In order for IT policy and its implementation to be effective it needs commitment from the top, that is, from the Prime Minister and/or the President. However, the relevance of IT can only be appreciated at the highest level if it can be clearly demonstrated to be relevant to national goals - if there is a congruence between IT policies and national development policies.

Richard Heeks stressed the importance of working with politicians and bureaucrats to convince them that policy is needed, to ensure that any policy is successfully implemented, and to ensure that there is a flexible feedback mechanism that monitors policy impacts and alters policy as required. In practice one is faced with a dichotomy between what might seem to be "objectively" the best policy from the outside and what is politically feasible in practice. It means overcoming fear of the new technology and re-orienting government officials from a regulatory to a promotional mindset (Heeks, 1995)

Considering the relatively disadvantaged position of most members of the Commonwealth in their use of IT the intervention of the highest political level is imperative. This must be so if the socio-economic and fiscal climate in which telematics can be cost-effectively acquired and used for the benefit of the country is to be created. Many of the high level policy issues, such at the privatisation of telecommunications, can only be addressed from the top. This raises serious organisational and structural questions. It means that IT policy cannot be left solely to IT professionals, nor can it be narrowly focused on economic goals, as it might be if located in the Ministry of Finance.

The workshop stressed the importance of finding mechanisms to bring the benefits of appropriate IT use to the attention of political leaders. One suggestion was that the Commonwealth Association for Public Administration and Management (CAPAM) might undertake this task. It is well situated to articulate and present this message.

All members of society should be able to access information via networks and to place information on the network. Access to information could be through public kiosks or community-based information centres which can also act as a brokerage for information posting. Such community-based information centres could either be pay-as-you-use or subsidised by government. The use of such public information access points has the added benefit of promoting universal standardisation to the concept of accessing information. In time, people may adapt to information access with the same facility that they do now when they use the telephone.

In order to achieve universal access, countries need a clear policy and plan to move towards progressively greater access for everybody from their place of work and their home. Policy development might first target group access - and the responsibilities of such group as a provider of information and training in IT. This might include groups such as schools, libraries, community centres and local business associations. Further, access policy should address individual access (from home on "my" machine).

A number of suggestions were made to raise general awareness of the need for access policy. These included a conference on utilising Internet in the Public Sector, which could perhaps be linked to CAPAM, the Commonwealth's initiative on Public Administration. The workshop felt that the Commonwealth countries have a unique opportunity internationally to encourage the internetworking of IT facilities between member states to enable greater sharing of information. Attention should also be paid to training and service access for non-profit (NGO) groups and other groups in society.

Since information has become a critical element in today's society, bringing social, professional and commercial benefits, public access should be made available to all members of society.

The convergence of telecommunications, broadcasting (including cable) and computers and all of their supporting technologies is creating new challenges for policy makers. Two of these industries, telecommunications and broadcasting, are highly regulated. The third, computers, is relatively unregulated. As these industries and their associated technologies converge, the nature of the regulatory structures and policy frameworks need to change. For example, one can no longer define infrastructure in terms simply of "basic" telecommunications services. Policies now must be oriented to information flow, and questions of public access, discussed above, become the key issue.

These changes have significant impact on national policies for the creation of infrastructure. The promulgation of policies to create physical infrastructure, the telecommunications and broadcasting networks, are still important. But policies which address information involves different players. For example, access to information being provided to citizens by the public sector is a problem for governments as information providers- and many countries are beginning to develop policies to facilitate such access. Future national infrastructures will involve a complex mix of physical networks, information and content.

Some information is available from governments, but much is in the private domain. Left to the market-place, competitors would probably try to encourage access to their own information and services, and deny access to the content of their competitors. Part of the appeal of the future "bitway" is the attraction of being able to reach anyone from anywhere. This will only happen if appropriate policies and regulations are in place - and these become part of the IT infrastructure. Information and services are to be provided by the private sector, but within a public policy regulatory framework.

In the past, the infrastructure was built first, and it was used by people to satisfy their basic communications (telephone calls) and entertainment needs (television programs). Now other sectors, such as education and health, are beginning to recognise the value of interactive information flow. In the future, as the information needs of these other sectors mature, the technology will be put in place in response to user-oriented demands.

Finally, there is growing recognition that the IT infrastructure of a nation includes the human resources which support it. This involves the training and development of these resources, their salary and other costs, and the building of their capacity and quality. In short, national IT infrastructure is a complex mix of physical networks, facilities and equipment, people, content and information.

COMNET-IT '95

WORKSHOP REPORT CHAPTER 2