The 2010 United Nations E-Government Survey

The United Nations has performed a regular e-government survey since 2003 on a near-yearly basis.  This survey is the 5th of its kind.  While the full report, all 140 pages of it, can be viewed by reading this PDF, I wanted to highlight a couple of points that caught my attention.

The E-Government Development Index is the UN’s ranking system, from 0 to 1, used to indicate the level of maturity of e-government services.  The E-Participation index is a similar ranking system only it is used for measuring citizen engagement within each country.

What is interesting, as is noted in the report, is that some  developing countries, Bahrain for example, are catching up, having moved from 42nd place in 2008 to 13th in 2010. Through a combination of policy,  infrastructure development, and the power of mobile solutions the divide between the high-income countries and the developing countries is narrowing where these investments are made.

Also note that the top achieving countries are primarily english speaking democracies, but not exclusively.  Open government, e-government, government 2.0, and on and on, are valuable efforts for any country, but investment, real investment, is required. 

As we look ahead expect to see more African and Middle Eastern countries move into the top twenty as they are currently the ones with the largest room for growth and at least some of them are making the necessary strategic investments today to move ahead.