Research Interest
My research focuses on e-government, that is, on the
intertwined processes of information and communication technologies (ICTs)
development/implementation, and of public sector reform. Within such a broad
field, my research questions the impact of ICT on public sector organisations
and on the nature of their activities. More precisely, it addresses questions
related to: (a) the proper frameworks to study the impact of ICT on the creation
of “public value”; (b) e-government as a barrier to political change; and (C)
risks, implications and outcomes of public sector outsourcing.
By and large, the e-government literature has drawn either on theoretical
frameworks developed to study the impact of ICTs on private sector
organisations, or on frameworks, such as New Public Management (NPM), that look
to private sector practices to provide guidance for public sector reforms. My
research, by focusing on the study of the public and political dimensions
underpinning e-government reforms, questions these approaches by looking at
e-government policies as mainly political decisions. The study of the political
dimension of e-government projects has often been relegated to the background of
mainstream e-government research which, instead, mainly focuses on the
short-term evaluation of economic and organisational outcomes associated with
the adoption of ICTs in public sector organisations. However, political drivers
are deeply intertwined with the deployment of e-government projects. My research
explores how e-government projects shape different governments’ political
reforms.
By so doing I research how e-government policies crystallize political values in
technological deployment. E-government projects are carriers of contingent
political intents designed into ICT functions to change both the nature and the
process by which public services are provided. Once these functions are
deployed, they are very difficult to change because of technological path
dependencies and standards stratification, for example. Consequently, ICTs carry
political interests that endure not only because they are enacted in social,
institutional, and organisational practices; but also because they are designed
and embodied in technological systems. This raises challenging questions
regarding the political implication of e-government strategies on future
political reforms.
My final strand of research examines public sector outsourcing policies.
Outsourcing in the public sector, especially in USA, Europe and Australasia, has
mainly considered marketization of public sector activities as the solution to
administrative inefficiency and bureaucratic failure. By calling for a
re-assessment of the impact of outsourcing on public sector bureaucracy and on
the “public values” they reflect new research opportunities emerge. Conceptual
and empirical perspectives are needed to question one of the prevailing and
growing practices in contemporary public sector management.