Disconnected communities? ICT, policy learning and the lessons for central–local relations

Laffin, Martin; Ormston, Christianne

doi:10.1080/09540962.2013.785703

Cited by 7 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 20 publications

(15 reference statements)

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“…However, it ‘is not cost free’ (Nah and Saxton, : 298). Integrating new rounds of technology with existing legacy systems is a problem (Laffin and Ormston, ; Batlajery et al . , ).…”

Section: Enrolling Iandsm Into Public Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enacting the internet and social media on the public sector's frontline

Mearns¹,

Richardson²,

Robson³

2015

New Technol Work Employ

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Recognising their growing role in public services, this article draws on the notion of ‘enactment’ to argue that the internet and social media (I&SM) need to be understood in particular institutional, organisational and social contexts. Focusing on street‐level bureaucrats who deliver frontline services, we explore efforts to integrate I&SM into youth work with clients who are thought to be ‘digitally savvy’ but also in need of protection from the ‘online world’. As clients can be vulnerable and trust is a key relational component, organisation–practitioner–client boundaries are complex and under continuous renegotiation. However, the layering of new virtual channels of interaction adds extra complexity. This change necessitates the development of innovative routines, practices and protocols, but these are being developed in a wider social context where the norms of using social media have not caught up with practice and the use of these tools is still often surrounded by moral panic.

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“…However, it ‘is not cost free’ (Nah and Saxton, : 298). Integrating new rounds of technology with existing legacy systems is a problem (Laffin and Ormston, ; Batlajery et al . , ).…”

Section: Enrolling Iandsm Into Public Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enacting the internet and social media on the public sector's frontline

Mearns¹,

Richardson²,

Robson³

2015

New Technol Work Employ

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“…After all, citizens directly experience services, or the lack thereof, as part of their daily lives. Yet, it is increasingly recognized that the adoption and operation of technologies for coproduction raise a host of managerial, institutional, and political challenges (Gil-García and Pardo, 2005;Heintze and Bretschneider, 2000;Laffin and Ormston, 2013;Liu and Yuan, 2015). Despite the tension between these perspectives, there has been a surprising lack of empirical evidence about whether new forms of coproduction enabled by communication technologies actually improve public services (see Loeffler and Bovaird, 2016;Nabatchi, Sancino and Sicilia, 2017;Lember, Brandsen and Tonurist, 2019).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Managers also might have to establish additional channels of communication with citizens to follow up on citizen reports, or otherwise significantly reorient work effort within their agency. Each of these tasks may require managers to make costly changes to the design and workflow of agencies, thereby undermining the promised cost-effectiveness of ICT-enabled coproduction (Laffin and Ormston, 2013;Liu and Yuan, 2015). If managers have other options for collecting information they perceive to be more cost-effective, they may choose to abandon ICT-enabled coproduction altogether.…”

Section: Quality Of Citizen-produced Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Processing new flows of data and turning them into information that can be used for decision-making requires new skills and capacities, potentially implying significant costs for public agencies. Being responsive to new information often requires a realignment of work effort, which can be administratively challenging, politically contentious, or limited by existing procedure (Laffin and Ormston, 2013;Liu and Yuan, 2015). Indeed, relying on citizen reporting entails more than just adopting a new technology or opening a new channel for feedback.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Challenges of Using Citizen Reporting to Improve Public Services: A Field Experiment on Solid Waste Services in Uganda

Buntaine

Hunnicutt

Komakech

2020

Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory

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Abstract Governments around the world are investing in technologies that allow citizens to participate in the coproduction of public services by providing monitoring and feedback, but there is little evidence about how these initiatives affect the quality of public services. We implemented a large-scale field experiment that involved organizing 50 citizen reporters in each of 100 neighborhoods across Kampala, Uganda, to provide weekly reports to the municipal government about the delivery of solid waste services via an SMS-messaging platform, resulting in 23,856 reports during the 9-month study period. Citizen reporting did not reduce informal waste accumulation as targeted, which would indicate improvements to formal services. Using our observations as participants in the development and deployment of the reporting platform and interviews with staff at the government agency receiving the citizen reports, we show how the public generated inconsistent information that did not fit existing decision-making processes. We generalize lessons from this field experiment by explaining how coproduction involving information sharing through information and communication technologies is likely to affect public services based on the alignment of citizen-produced data with the information problems managers face; the search costs of detecting public services failures; the quality of citizen-produced data; and the operating costs of citizen-reporting platforms.

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“…Given that the UK government is developing potentially contending policies in a conflicted NHS, how policy is implemented on the ground will help determine moves to full open book governance in the NHS. Thus staff opinion and the culture of NHS organisations are important to provide insights into the accessibility of financial data (Laffin and Ormston, 2013). However, given that we are considering Dunleavy's analysis of the potential centralising and decentralising impact of information communication technology -and the need to understand NHS costs in different localities by comparing with other areas -it is also important to gain insights into policy and opinion from national bodies.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public access to NHS financial information: From a freedom of information regime to full open-book governance?

Tunney

Thomas

2015

Soc Theory Health

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This paper investigates the access that health professionals, researchers, journalists and, ultimately, the public have to review spending in the English National Health Service (NHS). The ability of news organisations to inform debate and decision-making, particularly when hospitals face financial constraints, relies on accessible data. Theorists such as Patrick Dunleavy have suggested that developments in information communications technology induce a dialectical movement, involving changing governance and increasing transparency. Drawing on this premise, the article reviews the extent to which the NHS has moved from a 'freedom of information regime' to one of 'full open-book governance'. Its methodology includes a combination of documentary and freedom of information data analysis, as well as in-depth interviews with directors of commissioning and provider services and national agencies. It argues that, while increased dissemination of information might be consistent with the government's digital agenda, the NHS's quasi-market operation and its relationship to the Freedom of Information Act mean that significant data remains inaccessible or costly to obtain.

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Disconnected communities? ICT, policy learning and the lessons for central–local relations

Cited by 7 publications

References 20 publications

Enacting the internet and social media on the public sector's frontline

Enacting the internet and social media on the public sector's frontline

The Challenges of Using Citizen Reporting to Improve Public Services: A Field Experiment on Solid Waste Services in Uganda

Public access to NHS financial information: From a freedom of information regime to full open-book governance?

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