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nerships are essential tools in the fight against urban poverty.
ICT has created an unprecedented opportunity for local author-
ities to interact with their citizens as information and knowledge
sharing fosters participatory decision-making. A growing number
of cities and regions in the developing world have their own
websites. In Indonesia for example, half of the country’s 385
municipalities are now wired
2
. However, very few provide two-
way communications enabling the public to participate in or
vote on local policy decisions.
In recent years however, the concept of e-government has
dramatically evolved, leading to profound changes in what
people expect of their governments. In 2001, the United Nations
defined e-government as “utilizing the Internet and the WWW
for delivering government information and services to citizens”.
The current Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD)
3
definition is “the use of ICTs, and partic-
ularly the Internet, as a tool to achieve better government.” In
fact, European countries issued the European Charter of Rights
of Citizens in the Knowledge Society in July 2005, also known
as the Charter of e-Rights, which was signed by European local
authorities keen to promote wider Internet access. The Charter
urges them to foster the idea of e-democracy through online
consultations with the public on housing, healthcare services,
schools, transport, urban planning, the local environment, and
other areas of concern.
Greater public participation can lead to better rules, which
are less likely to be challenged in court and are more likely to be
accepted by the public. Unfortunately the lack of ICT infra-
structure, computer literacy and political will means many
developing countries are lagging behind but local governments,
particularly in Asia, have demonstrated positive results by taking
steps to create an enabling environment for generating and
disseminating information.
UN-HABITAT’s Global Campaign on Urban Governance is
based on the principles of subsidiarity, justice and transparency.
But the agency has found that while e-government has the poten-
tial to bring major improvements, this is by no means automatic
because of government controls or interference. The campaign
promotes interactive local information services complete with
facilities to receive and channel complaints from the public, elec-
tion and municipal administration monitoring, urban planning
maps using the latest satellite technology, properly computer-
ized property and revenue records and other urban management
methods that promote transparency and accountability.
To promote such transparency, 60 countries around the world
have implemented some form of freedom of information legisla-
tion, which sets rules on government secrecy. Over 40 others are
working towards introducing such laws. For example, in 2000
South Africa passed the Promotion of Access to Information Act,
intended to: “give effect to the Constitutional right of access to any
information held by the State and any information that is held by
another person and that is required for the exercise or protection
of any rights.
4
It covers information held by private bodies, and
has been widely welcomed by the public at large. It is interesting
to note, however, that while Singapore has been cited as being an
innovative leader in e-government, the authorities have electronic
censorship filters for academics, business and the general public.
5
Access to local authority information is often greatly limited
because of poor organization and management of administra-
tive records. An electronic record keeping system can facilitate
easy access to information by the public. Moreover, record
management systems can also guarantee that individual civil
servants can be held accountable for their actions. This mini-
mizes corruption.
An exemplary case study is that of Bellandur near Bangalore,
India.
6
Information technology through the implementation of
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A young Maasai in Arusha (Tanzania) being introduced to information technology
Photo: Anne Fraser/UN-HABITAT