Parliaments, citizens and technology

Technology as bridge between government and citizens helps the development of democracy leading parliaments to modernize processes and improve communication with citizens by producing knowledge for public policies and value.... [ view full abstract ]

Technology as bridge between government and citizens helps the development of democracy leading parliaments to modernize processes and improve communication with citizens by producing knowledge for public policies and value. The aim of this paper is to describe how parliaments contribute to develop democracy using technology for encouraging participation in building policies and engaging citizens as co-producers of public value.
Technologies enable public organizations to sustain public trust by encouraging an active citizenship and enhancing the interaction between citizens and public institutions. Creating and maintaining public value relies on searching for dialogue and building partnerships between public institutions and citizens as active co-producers of public value coherently with a public value management paradigm relying on restoring trust and legitimacy, producing outcomes as performance objectives [5]. Technology helps parliaments coping with the crisis of legitimacy of representative democracy by making available documents and information about legislative processes as to appear as democratic and accountable institutions effectively engaging citizens in the policy process. Technology as digital bridge between legislatures and citizens helps democratic processes leading parliament to modernize by managing information and knowledge in order to improve communication with citizens for producing knowledge for public policies and contribute to reinforce and revitalize democratic values and system. Technologies contribute to a networked co-production driving the transition from a government/agency-centered to community/citizen centered approach where citizens interact with government agencies to co-produce. The aim of this paper is to describe how technologies help parliaments to develop democracy as representative institutions encouraging participation and engaging citizens as co-producers of public value and contribute to develop policies. The study is based on archival and qualitative data drawn by a literature review about the use of the Internet and technologies of information and communication (ICTs) within parliamentary institutions. The contribution of this study is to propose a framework of analysis to identify a path driving parliaments to connect and interact with citizens for co-producing public policies and value for society and community. Technologies encouraging participation of citizens in policy making tend to orient different results in terms of services delivery and outcome, quality, efficiency and equity.