World e-Parliament Conference 2016 - Closing Summary

REFLECTIONS LESSONS LEARNED AND FUTURE

PERSPECTIVESDR ANDY [email protected]@andy_williamson

World e-Parliament Conference 2016 #eParliament

THEMES Strategic use of ICT Data and documentation Openness and Engagement Web and Social tools Supporting Parliaments


STRATEGIC USE OF ICT ICT is critical to parliaments and planning for it must be at the heart of what parliament does. Strategic planning is critical for managing change. Speed of technology change creates challenges for strategic investment and planning. The strategic process needs to consider the role of citizens in the work of parliament.


DATA AND DOCUMENTATION XML-based systems have technical and efficiency advantages in terms of efficiency of query processing. Open data is a critical tool for empowering parliamentary openness for for getting more people involved Moving parliamentary documentation from proprietary to open open standards creates significant benefits. Parliamentary data isn’t that ‘big’ and most isn’t complex.


OPENNESS AND ENGAGEMENT Parliamentary openness helps people feel they can be more involved in their parliament. Important to share all parliamentary information and consider at a high level how to engage the public more. Dialogue with civil society groups helps parliaments understand what is wanted and how to deliver effectively. Sharing code and schema through mainstream tools and platform such as Github.


WEB & SOCIAL TOOLS Rise of virtual parliaments and parliamentary functions. Use the tools the public already engages with. This is an eco-system and so consider how to move people along to the best tool for the job. Information overload and the high-volume nature of social media creates significant challenges. Sometimes we have a tendency to make digital solutions too complicated, often it is the simple ideas that work.


CHALLENGES XML, open data and managing social media requires new skills and knowledge. There is a real risk of the gap between high and low income countries because of cost and complexity. How do MPs who genuinely want to engage manage the workload and expectation of citizens? How do we ‘humanise’ the process and the people?


EMERGING TRENDS Digital is so embedded it will cease to be an independent domain. Joining up data from parliament and other sources needs new technologies, such as semantic web and ‘document-oriented’ data stores. Driving all our data via APIs so even you are the customer. What is the cultural impact on ‘everything is open’?


CONCLUSION Digital tools transform how parliaments work, both day-to-day and with new ways of thinking, innovative parliamentary practices and a stronger, more vibrant culture of openness and transparency. Sustainable development requires strong institutions that are open, trustworthy and transparent. Becoming open creates challenges so we need to work together to support parliaments to transform.

Government & Nonprofit

World e-Parliament Conference 2016 - Closing Summary