[rohrpost] Ten Practical Online Steps for Government Support of Democracy

[Steven Clift]

I recently publish a short article on government, the Internet, and 
democracy as part of an excellent 47 page collection to be published 
online shortly by the U.S. federal government.

For the short and long versions, a link to the General Service 
Administration's newsletters, or to be notified via DoWire.Org about the 
GSA's online release of the full collection, see:

http://www.dowire.org/notes/?p=383

Also, I am always interested in learning about examples that check off 
these steps from Germany and other parts of Europe. Drop me a note with 
examples: clift at publicus.net

In summary:

Ten Practical Online Steps for Government Support of Democracy

1. Timely, personalized access to information that matters.

2. Help elected officials receive and sort, then better understand and 
respond to e-mail.

3. Dedicate at least 10% of new e-government developments to democracy.

4. Announce all government public meetings on the Internet in a uniform 
manner.

5. Allow citizens to look-up all of their elected officials from the 
very local to national in one search.

6. Host online public hearings and dialogues (or “e-consultations” as 
they are known outside the U.S.)

7. Embrace the rule of law by mandating the most democratically 
empowering online services and rights across the whole of government.

8. Promote dissemination through access to raw data from decision-making 
information systems.

9. Fund Open Source sharing internationally across e-government.

10. Local up – Develop a strategic approach to building local democracy 
online.

Sincerely,
Steven Clift
E-Democracy.Org Chair and Ashoka Fellow
Editor, Democracies Online Newswire - DoWire.Org - join 2500 members from:
http://dowire.org/wiki/Newswire