Social Systems Design as a Vehicle Towards Local Public e-Services for and by Citizens

Abstract

The need for increased user participation and involvement in the process of designing and developing public e-Services has been emphasized in recent years. User involvement is critical to success in the development and implementation of public e-Services, and many visions and efforts are focused on citizen participation in the design and development process. In this article, concepts of Social Systems Design are analysed in the context of local public e-Services in order to improve potential to meet the requirements for user participation and involvement. Results show that the ideas of Social Systems Design, where applicable, can contribute to user-centred development of local public e-Services, and can form a foundation for the development of methods that utilize user participation and involvement. However, further research requires empirical studies.

Citizen-centricity in digital government research: A literature review and integrative framework

“…In studies assigned to this theme scholars have applied action-oriented approaches, presented tools for involving citizens as co-creators in participatory processes, or evaluated e-democracy initiatives (e.g., Lappas et al, 2017). Löfstedt (2007) proposed guidelines for designing citizen-centered digital government. Reddick et al (2017) studied interactions between citizens and governments on Facebook.…”

“…'Participatory' governments are less concerned with the production of services than engagement processes in which the citizen is not simply a passive recipient of government services, but plays an active role in decision-making and emancipatory processes. 'Ideal' participatory processes described in the papers included in this study include design approaches (Löfstedt, 2007), action research (Giesbrecht et al, 2016) and evaluation of processes for engaging with citizens (Lappas et al, 2017) as mentioned in Section 4.3. Participatory activities range from co-design of government features to engagement in public processes, and the establishment of e-democracy.…”

“…As governments have intensified their production of digital or electronic (e-)services in recent decades, scholars have explored ways to inform this production through design activities that include participatory elements. As noted by Löfstedt (2007), design approaches have evolved from experts designing with "users" to efforts to design from "within" with a range of stakeholders who are involved in and affected by the social system. Here, transformative modes of government are constituted by features from other types, such as high levels of service and responsiveness to the needs of citizens, enacted through participatory design efforts.…”

Design de interação em serviços inclusivos de governo eletronico

“…Entre outros, desafios nessa área são a escalabilidade e sustentabilidade de sistemas. Em termos de design, uma proposta interessante e a da Löfstedt (2007), que visa aplicar métodos do social systems design para a criação de serviços locais de eGov, isto é serviços de eGov no nível micro (e.g. prefeitura ou bairro).…”