e-government of korea

1

“This is an excellent paper selected among those published in Informatization Policy. Informatization Policy provides the English version ofthis paper in order to promote The achievements and current status of korea’s informatization policies.”

The e-Government of Korea is cited as a major success case in numerous international

economic indexes, and has served as one of the most successful Best Practice models in the

global community. Korea’s IT development status, which lay somewhere between 1/5~1/8 the level of such

advanced nations as the USA and the UK in 1987, has achieved accelerated growth to such an extent that,

since 2007, Korea has been recognized as the world’s leading IT nation. Such an achievement over the past

twenty or so years is believed to be the result of appropriate interactions involving the environment, the

implementation of various government policies (political leadership as well as establishing visions, strategies,

and project priorities), transformations (implementing organizations, financial and technical resources), and

the reflection of feedback and learning experiences.

The e-Government of Korea, which evolved in three stages, was successfully achieved through the

consistent leadership of successive presidents. In addition, the necessary visions and objectives, established

with consideration of efficiency and effectiveness, were appropriately applied and progressed in sync with the

development of back-office, front-office, and e-Government infrastructure in the ever-changing environment

of supply and demand throughout the IT development process. The expansion of mass public services and

transparency in the administrative process as well as the election of the democratic government also

contributed to the advancement of Korea’s e-Government. Such rapid progress was achieved through the

formation of the appropriate implementation organizations, flexible distribution of financial resources of the

Informatization Promotion Fund, and the provision of a technical support network by the Ministry of

Information and Communication (MIC) and the National Information Society Agency (NIA).

Irrespective of these notable achievements, the e-Government of Korea is now confronted with new

challenges that require consideration of changes in demand, an architectural model for the integration of

multi-departmental governmental organizations, policies aimed at inter-agency process innovation and the

fostering of the IT industry, the restructuring of implementation organizations, and the distribution of financial

resources.

Keywords : Success (impact) factors, National Basic Information System Project, High-Speed Broadband Network

Project, Framework Act on Informatization Promotion, Informatization Promotion Fund (Information &

Communication Promotion Fund)

Abstract

Song Hee joon(Ewha Womans University)

E-Government of Korea- Achievements & Tasks -

Informatization Policy

Ⅰ. Introduction

e-Government1) refers to the government’s

efforts to transform both internal and external

governmental relationships through the use of

information technology such as the Internet

(OECD, 2004: 23, UNDESA, 2003: 1-2). The

successful progress of Korea’s e-government

since 1980 is not attributable to a drastic, short-

term measure taken at a certain point in time but

to the accumulated results of long-term,

progressive evolution. In other words, the

success of today’s e-government can be

interpreted as a process of dynamic growth

achieved through countless trials and errors over

a lengthy period of time.

If this is true, then identifying which

approaches the Korean government has taken

and why and how it took them to achieve such

success could be of inestimable value. Despite

the diversity of research (Song Hee-joon, 2002; O

Gang-tak, 2003; O Gwang-seok, 2005; Yun Sang-

o, 2002; Jeong Hong-sik, 2007; Hwang Jong-

seong, 2003; Ministry of Information and

Communication [MIC], 2003; National

Information Society Agency [NIA], 2005)

conducted on the developmental stages of

informationization and the mature level of

Korea’s e-government, detailed descriptions of

the effects of such achievements remain

insufficient.

This study seeks to explain the core success

factors or the impact factors of the success of

Korea’s informatization and e-government

achieved in two decades since the project was

first launched from the cause and effect

perspective. The e-government’s achievements

and the success factors will be explained in

accordance with the horizontal factor flow

(environment, input, transformation, output, and

feedback) as presented in the general system

theory. However, the study has its limitation of

approaching the evolution process of the e-

government from historical description method.

In other words, no scientific analysis methods

such as in depth analysis on specific cases or

statistical analysis on evidential data were

employed to conduct cause and effects

comparison among the success factors.

The study categorizes the development stages

of Korea’s e-government and analyzes the

factors that were applied for establishing visions

and project objectives per each stage, priorities,

leadership, implementation system, financial and

technical resource distribution, feedback, and

learning processes. Such analytical study is

hoped to contribute towards understanding the

cause and effect relationship of the success

factors of Korea’s e-government from historical

point of view.

Ⅱ. Achievements and Impact Factors of

e-Government

2


1) In this study, the national IT development and e-government shall be mix-used with equal concept. In general, the e-government is the termdescribing the Internet based civil service system or when civil and government interaction commences but since e-government service oradministrative handling is not possible without internally networked database or without IT infrastructure, it is difficult to differentiate theconcept with the IT development.

3

E-Government of Korea

1. Output and Achievements of e-Government

Korea’s e-government’s achievements can be

diagnosed by conducting international

comparison with competing nations. When

viewing the international level of IT

development measured in accordance with the

IT index that includes the data on IT facilities, IT

usage, and IT investment to compare the level of

IT development among nations during the ’80s,

Korea (58) prior to the launch of the National

Basic Information System Project in 1986, was

approximately between 1/4 and 1/8 of USA,

Japan, Germany, England, and France (National

Information Society Agency, 1994: 583). The

average annual growth rate of the IT

development between 1986~1992 for Korea was

at 14%, which was similar to those of advanced

nations, which was 11~16%. As shown above,

Korea’s informatization level at the starting stage

was significantly lower than those of advanced

nations and the growth rate, too, was only at

moderate level.

As of 2007, Korea’s informatization or the

nation’s e-government level has surpassed the

advanced nations and has reached the world’s

highest level. The number of high speed

broadband subscribers was at the highest in the

world for 4 years running (OECD, 2005), and

even the ITU Digital Opportunity Index (DOI),

which includes the areas of nationwide

infrastructure, cost of telecommunication

compared to consumption, and high speed

internet ratio was rated number 1 in the world

for 3 consecutive years. Even in the Readiness

Index of the United States and the National IT

Development Index of the National Information

Society Agency,2) Korea is at the forefront

(National Information Society Agency, 2007a). In

addition, the e-Procurement (G3PS) and other

projects pursued in Korea were also recognized

as some of the outstanding models by the

world’s IT community. Such global recognition

may not be the determining factors of Korea’s

2) The NIA selects world’s 50 major countries with consideration to various factors including the region and the national competitiveness fromthe statistics recorded in the ITU’s national information index database, and publishes the raw statistical data for self analysis.

* The numbers are relative comparison with Korea’s IT development in 1990 set to 100.* Source: National Information Society Agency (1994:583), White Paper - National IT Development.

Country 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 Growth Rate

Korea 58 60 69 89 100 109 123 14

USA 442 480 506 604 661 733 856 12

Japan 266 327 383 395 469 558 657 16

Germany 247 281 297 335 423 480 585 16

England 284 322 348 391 478 522 624 14

France 286 319 338 368 437 468 542 11

<Chart 1> National IT Development Index in the late ’80s (Unit: %)

4


e-government outcomes but it can be utilized as

an important assessment basis.

2. Success Factors of e-Government

The funnel theory (Hofferbert, 1974) among

various policy agenda models of a government is

characterized by very wide entry of historically

designated conditions to narrowing channels of

social economic structure, mass governing shape,

government policy, and elite behaviorism and

therefore, concrete and direct influences such as

the government policies and the habits of the

officials are emphasized to be highly important.

The agenda control theory presents any or all of

the mobilization model, which mobilizes

resources for aggressive administering of policies

by the governing body; the inside access model,

which is the policy lead by certain influential

organization(s) that has the access to the

governing body; and the outside initiative

model, which is the expansion of demand

initiative by civic groups or none governing

organization(s), all in accordance with the

characteristics of the policy issues and

subordinate systems of the policy agendas

(Cobb, Ross and Ross, 1976: 132; Cobb and

Elders, 1983: 151-159).

However, it is difficult to identify an

appropriate model that can explain the agenda

formation and implementation to e-government,

which actively evolves through mutual interaction

among the IT factors and the social factors. The

reason is that the success determining factors

become more complex in both structure and

appearance as the e-government evolves. In

general, the political background, economic and

technical environment, political leadership,

visions and policy objectives (i.e. integration of IT

development and administrative innovation),

strategic priority, implementing body and

the target of implementation, consumer

(approachability, governance participation, and

privacy protection), resource distribution (i.e.

budget, project management, etc.), communal

infrastructure and cooperation (cooperation

Index InstituteKorea’s Rank(# of Countries)

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

DOI ITU 1(40) 1(180) 1(181)

ISI IDC/WT 12(53) 8(53) 10(53) - -

IT Competitiveness EIU - - - - 3(64)

e-Gov. Readiness Index UN 13(191) 5(191) 5(191) - -

Nat’l Competitiveness (Tech Infra) IMD 27(59) 8(60) 2(60) 6(61) 6(55)

Nat’l Competitiveness (IT Index) WEF 11(102) 18(104) 11(117) 14(125) -

Nat’l IT Dev. Index NIA 12(50) 7(50) 3(50) 3(50) 3(50)

<Chart 2> Recent IT Indexes

* Source: Annual report published by each institute

among institutions, responsibility, inspection,

and assessment), and level of IT are presented as

the success factors for e-government (Dawes,

1996; Bannister, 2003; Song, 2002; OECD, 2001,

2002, 2004; US OMB, 2002).

As for the obstacles or failure factors of e-

government, political, financial and technical

environment and the project management risks

are generally presented. Some problems being

pointed out are legal and regulatory obstacles

(individual’s private information, information

security, technology standards, etc), annual

product budget system, information technology

(Legacy System, infrastructure sharing, and

adaptation to new technology), and information

gap (OECD, 2004: 48-65), as well as trend

of automation in work process, lack of federal

architecture, island of automation in

standardization, lack of reliability on privacy

protection and information security, more

institutional process and system operation hour

oriented rather than citizen’s demand and

output oriented rigid budget process, closed

institutional culture, bureaucratic hindrances,

and institutional individualism (US OMB, 2002:

5-12; US FCIOC, 2002: 55). In addition, the

governance issues associated with obtaining

consensus among various organizations, failure

risk associated with pursuing whale sized

projects rather than dolphin sized, risk of taking

on new technology, lack of risk awareness,

weakening leadership and responsibility,

irrespective of changes in business environment,

failing management of human and material

5


<Chart 3> Success Determining Factors of e-Government

System Factors Cat. Key Factors

Environment Environment- Political & Social Factors- Economic & Industrial Factors- Technical Factors

Input

Political Leadership - President’s Determination & Leadership

Vision & Strategy, Project Priority

- Vision & Strategy: Government Innovation and Fostering ITIndustry

- Project Priority: Back-Office, Front-Office, and Infrastructure

TransformationImplementation System & Resource Distribution

- Implementation Organization: Cooperative system amongthe committee, managing governmental agency, andinstitutions

- Technical Resource Distribution: Information Technologyand Supporting Network

- Financial Resource Distribution: Budget, Funds, etc.

Output Output & Achievements- International Level- Final Output

Feedback Feedback & Learning- Feedback: Efforts to improve on already developed system- Learning: Reflect on future plans

resources, and ignorance of end users were also

noted as major failure factors of e-government

(OECD, 2001).

There also exists self assessment of the success

factor of Korea’s e-government. Establishment of

effective implementation system, inducing private

sector’s participation through government’s

investment initiatives, establishment of

competitive market environment for telecom

service operators, creating demands through IT

development, and cultural environments (MIC &

NIA, 2003: 178-183) were identified as the success

factors for the high speed broadband network

project. As for the Phase 1 e-Government,

president’s keen interest and support, committee

chairperson’s leadership and professionalism of

the committee members, cooperation by the

congress and government invested research

institutes, outstanding project management

models, and sacrificial efforts by the participants

are pointed out as the success factors (Special

Committee on e-Government, 2003: 303-305).

In summary, the success factors of e-

government are political, social, economical and

industrial environment, political determination

and leadership, vision and policy objective,

project’s strategic priority, implementation

system, human and financial resource

distribution, cooperation among institutions,

common framework, feedback, and learning

(Song, 2002; 2004). When organizing these factors

from system perspective, the factors become

environment, input (political determination and

leadership, vision and policy objective, and

project priority), transformation (implementation

system, distribution of human, financial, and

technical resources, and cooperative structure

among institutions), output (performance), and

feedback (feedback and learning).

3. Development Phases of e-Government

Korea’s e-government has undergone

comparably notable development phases per

administration, technological advancement level,

and mid-long term planning. Characteristics

comparison of such development phases is an

important process in analyzing the changes of

the e-government success factors.

After the 1980s, the Korean government

launched various projects, all with different time

frames and strategies. These projects were

National Basic Information System Project

(1987~1996), High Speed Broadband Network

Project (1995~2005), Framework Plan for IT

Development (1996~current), and e-Government

Project (2001~current). The e-government, which

was first commenced as an effort to computerize

the administrative process, has gone through

significant enhancement process with the

advancement of information technology,

automation of work process, and linkage with

process innovation, as well as change in political

leadership, implementation organization, and

legal basis.

In 1983, the Chun Doo-hwan Administration

(1981~1987) established the National Basic

Information System Plan3) for building 5 major

6


3) The Economy Planning Board in charge of implementing the 5 Year Economy Development Plan recognized the necessity to develop and

national basic information networks by mid ’90s

as a part of the preparation project for the e-

government to raise the Korea’s IT infrastructure

to those of advanced nations’level.

The first stage of the e-government (1987~1995)

was launched as the 1st (1987~1991) and the 2nd

(1992~1996) National Basic Information System

Project in pursuant to the Act on IT Network

enacted in 1986. During the process, the IT

Network Development Committee lead the

automation of government administrative process

by building nation’s core DB on information of

citizens, real estate, and automobile and by

distributing PCs. The 2nd phase of the National

Basic Information System Project was pursued by

individual ministries and offices through

constructing interconnecting computer network

environment.

The 2nd stage of the e-government (1996~ 2000)

is the e-government growth process through

development projects in accordance with the IT

Development Framework Plan established in

pursuant to the IT Development Framework Act.

Particularly, the period is categorized as internet’s

explosive growth period as the social networking

that links the entire nation through mass

distribution of internet service and mobile

telecommunication service as a result of the high

7


advance science and technology and incorporated the informatization and computing industry development plan into the 5 Year Science andTechnology Development Plan.

* Source: PCGID (2005), MIC NIA (2005), Special Committee on e-Government (2003).

Year 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07

Administration Chun Doo-Hwan Noh Tae-Woo Kim Young-Sam Kim Dae-Jung Roh Moo-Hyun

ITDevelopmentPolicy

Nationwide IT

NetworkPlanning Phase 1 Phase 2

HighSpeed

NetworkPhase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3

ITDevelop

mentFramewo

rk Plan

Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3

e-Governm

entPhase 1 Phase 2

e-GovernmentPhase Category

PreparationPhase

1st Stage 2nd Stage 3rd Stage

Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 1 Phase 2

<Graph 1> Nationwide IT Development and e-Government Development Phase

speed broadband network project that was fully

launched in 1995.

The 3rd stage of the e-government (2001~2007)

is the maturity stage. On February 2001, the

Special Committee on e-Government under the

leadership of the president was established and

the importance and priority of the e-government

project was elevated as presidential agenda and

implemented throughout all the government

ministries and institutes. During this period, the

administration wide work process become

computerized through IT infrastructure and core

DB possessed by the government to improve the

civil service level provided to the citizens and to

maximize the internal administrative process.

The development phases displayed in period are

as shown in <Graph 1>.4)

Ⅲ. Success Factor Analysis

1. Environment

The IT development project was formed and

implemented in mutual interaction of needs and

seeds in the political & social as well as economic

& industrial technical environment.

Since the 1980s, globalization, free market, and

revolution in knowledge and information

provided necessary factors to the government’s

response efforts. The efficiency oriented New

Public Management (NPM) ideology and pursuit

of value (Hood and Jackson, 1991: 33-4; Martin,

2002: 130-131; OECD, 1995:28) by the advanced

nations as a result of oil crisis became the turning

point for the establishment of small and efficient

government. As a result, the Stage 1 e-government

project is comparably the starting point for

formation of small and efficient administration in

Korea.

The Stage 1 emphasized the formation of

small and efficient government as the transitional

method from dictatorship to democracy. The

Chun Doo-hwan Administration emphasized

reduction management and strengthening

market competitiveness. It benchmarked policy

objectives of the advanced nations and pursued


focused on human resource reduction and

improved productivity. During the same period,

the TDX Digital Switch, TICOM, high speed

semiconductors, CDMA, and other core

information technologies were consecutively

developed and the foundation for the growth of

IT industry was established. In addition,

universities’facilities and support for R&D

activities were expanded to foster professionals

in IT field and launched computer distribution

project for schools.

The Stage 2 was the period of mass public

distribution of Internet service through high

speed broadband network project to expand

national IT development efforts with strategy of

building small and efficient government,

globalization, free market and high speed

8


4) The National Information Society Agency (NIA) largely divides the Korea’s IT development history into the Basic Infrastructure DevelopmentPerior (1980-1986), Initial Informatization Period (1987-1994), Full Informatization Period (1995-2003), and Value Creation Period (2004-current) (NIA, 2006:3).

broadband network that surpasses those of other

advanced nations. In 1993, USA’s Clinton

Administration built the National Information

Infrastructure (NII) to form “a government that

works better and costs less”(US NPR, 1994), and

in response, Japan established New Social

Capital Plan and European Union pursued the

Trans-European Network (TEN). To proactively

respond to the globalization, the Kim Young-sam

Administration (1993~1997) actively participated

in the Uruguay Round, WTO and OECD and

presented a vision for formation of small but

powerful government for construction of New

Korea and New Economy. Together with political

and democratization activities, civic movements

became vitalized and medias promoted

campaigns themed “We may be behind in

industrialization but let’s lead in informatization”.

In addition, universities and corporations

implemented IT learning courses and

competitions and other activities for nationwide

expansion of informatization, such as

distribution of personal computers in local

communities, were implemented.

In addition to the needs that arose as a result

of the Asia’s financial crisis during the end of

1997, the Stage 3 reflects the demands of the

period, which was the vitalization of competitive

market and advancement of democracy, both

pursued by the Kim Dae-jung Administration

(1998~2002). The administration was the first

turnover in ruling political party in Korea. As the

measures for the economic crisis, which is

interpreted as a result of failure in manufacturing

industry, the government resorted to venture

industry policy and exerted efforts to expand

social application of information technology.

After the economic crisis and about the period

when restructuring of 4 major sectors were being

completed, the administrative process

innovation through e-government was selected

as the government’s new reform strategy. In

other words, the government selected the

strategy for establishing government innovating

program that will reduce the nationwide

hardship that accompanies manpower reduction,

privatization, and other physical restructuring

process while minimizing complaints from those

who became the target of restructuring and to

improve government’s productivity and enhance

the service provided to citizens. (Special

Committee on e-Government, 2003: 55). In

addition, around 2000, world’s leading IT icons

including Alvin Toffler, Bill Gates, and

Masayoshi Son, as well as international media

have praised Korea as a nation that has

succeeded in IT development and has no other

nations to benchmark from and suggested

Korea to identify and pursue its own unique

development model.

The 2002 World Cup, the Red Devil (the Korea

National Football Team Supporters Club), the

Anti-America Candle Light Vigil as a result of an

accident by US Armored Personnel Carrier,

which resulted in death of two junior high school

students, and other civil activities have

integrated with matured IT media including

internet and mobile telephones. Such social

movements combined with advanced

technologies became the driving force behind

9


10


social changes and have even contributed to the

election of Roh Moo-hyun Administration

(2003~2007).

As a result, for over past 20 years, Korea has

created dynamic conditions for maturing e-

government through mutual interaction of

enabling environment and necessity factors from

the political & social, economical & industrial,

and technological perspective.

2. Political Will and Leadership

In Korea’s political system, in which

presidential political power is so strong, the most

important factor for the success in pursuing e-

government project was the interest and will of

the president. When assessing from this

perspective, the National Basic Information

System as well as the e-Government Roadmap

were pursued with powerful wills and

determinations by all successive presidents.

Their wills were mostly implemented by

establishing Presidential Implementation

Committee or through the Chief of Staff Office.

In case of Chun Doo-Hwan Administration,

even though the National Basic Information

System Project, which was planned since 1983,

did not begun until the last year of his

presidency (1987), the President appointed the

Chief of Staff as the Chairman of the Information

Network Supervisory Commission and

displayed strong determination for the

implementation of the project.

Between 1992~1994 when the government

structure was in a transition period from

totalitarian government to congressional

government, the interest in IT development by

President Kim Young-Sam has somewhat

diminished but in with the launch of Information

Superhighway Project in USA in 1993, the

government solidified its will once more

by newly establishing the Ministry of

Communication (MIC) and through High Speed

Broadband Network Project. During 1998~2000,

right after the Asian financial crisis, President

Kim Dae-Jung’s interests were focused in

restructuring of 4 major sectors to recover from

the economic crisis and therefore, the president’s

interest in e-government project has lowered but

from 2001, the president’s will and interest

<Chart 4> Environment Factors

Stage Political & Social Factors Economical & Industrial Factors Technological Factors

Ⅰend of dictatorship government,

the ’88 Olympic Games

economic depression and demandfor government efficiency,

fostering of IT industryPC revolution, TDX, TICOM

Ⅱdemocratization and exposing of

government corruption

necessity of globalization andnational competitiveness, Asian

Financial Crisis

high speed broadband network,distribution of internet service,

CDMA Mobile Phones

Ⅲturnover in ruling political partyand participation, ’02 World Cup

restructuring of 4 major industries,fostering of IT venture industry

maturing of internet, advancement of SI industry

11


solidified the e-Government Project as the

strategic enabler with highest importance for

government innovation.

President Roh Moo-Hyun, who’s election can

largely be contributed to internet and cyber civic

movements and supports, established e-

Government Roadmap Project immediately after

his election and implemented government

innovation as the administration’s core objective.

President Roh also established committees,

subcommittees and special commission, and

received periodic advice on e-government.

In summary, the Chun Doo-Hwan

Administration pursued the National Basic

Information System Project through the

Presidential Information System Committee, the

Kim Young-Sam Administration implemented

the High Speed Broadband Network Project

through the IT Development Committee

established under the Prime Minister’s Office,

and the e-Government Project pursued through

the e-Government Committee under the

Presidential Order of both Kim Dae-Jung and

Roh Moo-Hyun all signifies that the fundamental

infrastructure and e-government were pursued

with the will and leadership among all

successive presidents. From this perspective, the

e-government’s decisive success factor is assessed

to be the determination and leadership by the

powerful presidents.

Regardless of the government form, be it

dictatorship or democratic, the reason for high

interest and implementation leadership shown

by the successive presidents in e-government can

be interpreted as a symbolic means for realistic

policy vision and goals, which will be interested

in the following section, but also to be the active

response measure in the future information

society environment and the lead such

environment. In other words, as the political

leader, the president utilized the e-government

as the presidential agenda that signified

administration which is fully preparing for and

leading the future information society.

3. Visions & Goals and Project Priority

1) Visions & Goals

The visions and goals of the e-government

presented by each administration are all the

results of mutual interactions of political, social,

economic and industrial, and technological

environment factors. In other words, the visions

and goals, while reflecting environmental

conditions, it also reflects the social needs for

overcoming the limitations and advancing such

environmental conditions. Although the 1st Stage

is launched under a small concept of achieving

efficiency and productivity as those of advanced

nation, the 2nd Stage adds service to citizens on

top of the efficiency and productivity and the 3rd

Stage progresses the IT development to add

transparency and strengthening of bi-directional

democracy by attracting citizens’participation.

In other words, the principal of e-government

evolved from efficiency to transparency and

responsibility, and then to include citizens’

participation from governance stand point.

The visions and goals of the 1st Stage e-

Government (1997~1995) was to achieve small

but efficient government. The project’s visions

and goals were set as improvement on public

service creation and delivery method, elevate

citizens’convenience, and improve national

competitiveness. The 2nd Stage Project set its

visions and goals as creation of small and

efficient government and achieving expedited

civil services. In other words, the 1st Stage set its

priority in improving productivity of the

administration process, creation of small

government, improving citizens’convenience,

and enhancing national competitiveness. The

facing agenda was to establish small and efficient

government to overcome government failures

such as stagflation as shown in advanced

nations’governments. The new information

technology including personal computers

provides new productivity enhancement

opportunities for both government and private

sector corporations that were at the verge of

competitiveness risk. The 1st Stage of Korea’s e-

Government Project was pursued based on the

new public management principals with efforts

in establishing small but efficient government

and as a part of the government’s efforts in

steadily progressing democracy and providing

social welfare service all at the same time while

continuously achieving pressurized growth.

The 2nd Stage was pursued with the addition

of enhancement of the service to the citizens and

improved efficiency of the Framework Plan for

the Promotion of IT Development. Establishing

customer service centers as the internet service

became widely distributed and strengthening the

sharing and openness of information are all

efforts on improving the service for the public.

The Phase 1 of the 3rd Stage e-Government

Project (2001~2002) had ambitious goals of

providing highest standard service to citizens,

maximize productivity and transparency,

provide most optimized corporate activity

environment, and achieve stability and reliability

of the IT infrastructure, all under the vision of

becoming one of the world’s top nation in the 21st

Century. It was the detailed plan of the national

vision of economic development and

advancement of democracy implemented

through e-government by the Kim Dae-Jung

Administration. The e-government was directly

managed by the presidential office as the

presidential agenda to prevent corruption in

government by improving transparency and to

provide the benefits of administrative process

reformation to citizens and corporations by

achieving one-stop civil service (Special

Committee on e-Government, 2003: 49, 55).

Roh Moo-Hyun Administration had the

vision of building world’s best open e-

government system. The administration set goals

to build networked government through

innovation in service delivery system,

establishment of knowledge based government

through improvement of administration

efficiency and transparency, and establishment

of citizens participating government that truly

acknowledges the rights of the people. The

administration pursued networking of

informatization and government innovation,

implementation of end user oriented projects,

establishment of performance objective and

12


performance management per phases, and

fostering of IT industries (Government Innovation

Decentralization Committee, 2005: 13-29).

The common characteristics of the visions and

objectives of the 1st and the 2nd Stage e-

Government Projects were: first, pursue world’s

highest quality e-government system based on

the advancements and achievements of the

information technology and second, the

principals of transparency and participation by

the people were added to the improved

efficiency of the administrative process and

government for the people through nationwide

civil service enhancement.

From economic and industry perspective, the

government incorporated IT development and

fostering of the IT industries as priority together

with the e-government objectives and

implemented the strategies to achieve sequential

achievements of the development objectives. The

IT Industry Fostering Committee, established in

1983, was merged into the IT Network

Commission established in 1987 with all its

industry fostering related projects being

absorbed by the IT Network Commission (Jung

Hong-shik, 2007: 300, 319) or the designation and

implementation of the IT industry fostering as

one of the roadmap objective of the 2nd Stage e-

Government Project commenced in 2003

(Government Innovation Decentralization

Committee, 2005: 28-29) can be noted as the

representative cases.

In summary, the visions and strategic objectives

of the e-government reasonably reflected both

domestic and international political and social

democratization, development of economy

and industry, as well as the technological

advancement process and contributed towards

the government efficiency and adaptation by the

society.

2) Project Priority

The information system growth stage theory

was focused on the automation process of the

organization during the ’70s ~ ’80s (Nolan, 1979;

King and Kraemer, 1985; Galliers and Sutherland,

1991). In the ’90s, information technology was

linked with rebuilding of administrative process

(Snellen, 1990; Venkatraman, 1994), and during

and after 2000, the efforts were changing towards

mutual interaction between work and customers

as well as participation by the general public

(UNDESA, 2005; OECD, 2004; UNESCO, 2005).

In addition, the results of benchmarking leading

nations’e-government were categorized as the

front office and back office management.5)

Korea’s e-government is comparably in line with

such information system’s maturity directions.

In other words, the project’s details and

characteristics progressed from simple

automation of back office process to interactive

online front office services of multi-department

or all-departments (Song Hee-joon, 2004: 13-14).

The project objective during this process evolved

13


5) The Central Information Technology Unit (UK CITY) of Great Britain categorized the e-government projects of major countries into thedemand (front office), the supply (back office), change management, and development of infrastructure (UK CITU, 2000; 2001), and the 11major projects of the e-Government Project implemented by the Special Committee on the e-Government during 2001~2003 was categorizedinto the front office, back office and e-government infrastructure project (Special Committee on e-Government, 2003:105).

from efficiency of government’s internal

administrative process to mass public service

and participation.

The Phase 1 of the 1st Stage Project (1987

~1991) involved building 5 major national

information DB of administration, finance,

education & research, national defense, and

national security. The 2nd Stage Project (1992~

1996) was the project for building 7 management

systems including public welfare, postal service,

meteorology, oceanic freight, and intellectual

property rights.

The administrative inter-department network

built as a part of the National Basic Information

System Project, internal process has made the

internal government process more efficient while

automating mass public civil services. For

example, the citizen’s registry management

process, which was previously conducted by a

civil service clerk at the dong-office via copying

the amended or full registry of the original

created manually, was changed to computerized

system and citizen’s reporting of change of

address was able to be conducted from distant

location thanks to the inter-department network

by district government branches. Such ability to

process administrative services from remote

locations through the inter-department network

is the significant achievement of the 1st Stage e-

Government Project (Song Hee-joon, Kim Jun-

han, 1991). Simultaneously, the 1st Stage

contributed transparency in economic activities

by implementing real name verification policy

for financial activities (Aug. 1993) for civil

services, real estate, and financial transactions

as well as the real estate real name verification

policy (Jul. 1995) (O Gwang-seok, 2005: 49).

However, there was the limitation of having such

verification certificates to be issued only by the

issuing agencies in their premises via visit in

person process because the internet service was

not yet widely distributed.

The 2nd Stage included the development of the

initial versions of homepages, document

distribution system, and e-approval system lead

by the MIC under the guidance of the IT

Development Committee. Through the

innovation of the Common Business Process

(CBP) (OECD, 2005: 69), which organized the

work activities networked through time and

space, the inter-department sharing and

communal usage was launched.

The 3rd Stage was primarily focused on the

multi-department front office services but its

priority elevated as the Presidential Order e-

Government Project. However, during the

formation and implementation process of the

e-government’s 11th project or the 31st roadmap,

it was implemented as the participatory

governance with active management by the

Special Committee on e-Government (Outside

Initiative Model, Cobb et al.). In other words, to

overcome the limitations of not being able to

seamlessly implement the Inside Initiative Model

as a result of lack of inter-department

cooperation and coordination and to pursue

projects in nationwide level, the president

utilized the professionalism of external

organizations and governance (Song Hee-joon,

2004). However, in the 3rd Stage, there are certain

14


differences in implementation strategies between

the Phase 1 and Phase 2 Projects. The former is

more inclined towards the centralized model

with the governance by the Special Committee

on e-Government until the completion of the

project but the Phase 2, although its agendas

are similar to the Phase 1, it is more inclined

towards the Inside Initiative Model with each

independent departments taking charge of their

portion of the project from implementation to

completion.

The 1st Stage e-Government Project was

composed of 11 segmented projects consisting of

4 front office related, 4 back office related, and 3

infrastructure related projects. Majority parts of

the 4 back office management process also

includes system for mass public service and it is

composed of multi-department projects such as

G4C and SIIS. The 2nd Stage e-Government

Project consisted of 4 sectors, 10 agendas, 31

major projects, and 45 unit projects. It’s roadmap

included first, integrate and expand the

infrastructure from multi-department network to

nationwide network; second, develop interactive

15


<Chart 5> Per Stage Evolution of e-Government Visions and Objectives

Stage Plan Vision Primary Objective Administrative Principal

Ⅰ

Phase 1 Information

Network (87-91)

Create SmallGovernment & Advanced

Economy

- Improve public service productivity &delivery method

- Enhance citizen’s convenience- Improve national competitiveness Efficiency

Phase 2 Information

Network (92-96)

Create Small But PowerfulGovernment

- Create small but efficient government- Achieve speedy response in civil service

Ⅱ

Framework Act on

InformatizationPromotion Plan

(96-00)

Create Small But Efficient

e-Government

- Innovation in civil service- Promote public’s utilization and

transparency of government information- Create infrastructure for the expansion of

usage of administrative information- Supplement and upgrade existing system

Efficiency +mass public service

Ⅲ

Phase 1e-Government

(01-02)

Become World’sTechnologically

Advanced Nation in the 21st Century

- Administrative service for mass public- Corporate friendly environment- Improved productivity and transparency

of administration- Achieve stability and reliability of

information infrastructure

Efficiency +mass public service +

transparency

Phase 2 e-Government

(03-07)

Create World’s Most

Advanced Open e-Government

- Create networked government throughinnovation in service delivery

- Create knowledge based government byimproving efficiency and transparency

- Create People’s Participating Governmentthat upholds citizen’s rights

Efficiency +mass public service +

transparency +participation

websites (Q&A, FAQ, etc.), and details for

stimulating participation by customers, relative

parties, civic groups, and general population in

government policy activities to ensure

transparency in civil service handling phases and

governance perspective; and third, the roadmap

includes advanced integrated design model for

government’s functions, duties, information

resource, and other core factors, applied in

all branches throughout the government

(Government Innovation Decentralization

Committee, 2005: 50-52).

After the ’80s, the Korea’s e-government well

grasped the social necessity of evolution of

information technology and innovation in

government process as well as the era’s

characteristics and established appropriate

project objectives, implementation strategies, and

resource distribution methods, which resulted in

accelerated development of IT industry to one of

the world’s most advanced level. The process

progressed from single department infrastructure

to networking of back office and front office and

then to networking of multi-departments

and finally, total integration of nationwide

government branches.

4. Implementation Organization & Resource

Distribution

1) Implementation Organization

The implementation organization is

organizational resource employed during the

implementation stage of the project. It is the

combination of government group and external

group mutually interacting the interests and

leadership of the president to achieve the policy

visions and strategies under the given political

and industrial, economic and industrial, as well

as technological conditions.

The core implementation structure of the


included the formation of the Information

Network Supervisory Commission chaired by

the Presidential Chief of Staff, appointment of

secretary for the Ministry of Post and

Telecommunication, and the enactment of

legislature, the Act on Expansion of Information

Network and Promotion of its Usage as the legal

basis. The most notable factor is that the

Presidential Chief of Staff, who in general, cannot

have any other official title, was appointed as the

16


<Chart 6> Formation of the Phase 1 and Phase 2 e-Government Project

Phase Front Office Back Office Build Infrastructure Total

Phase 1 e-Government 4 4 3 11

Phase 2 e-Government6) 9 13 9 31

6) Although the Stage 1 e-Government Project officially categorized and sub-grouped the project into 4 front office, 4 back office and 3infrastructure projects, the Stage 2 Project did not. Because the 31 roadmap projects either shared little bits of 3 sub-groups or is repletion ofsome, it is difficult to categorize them but the author of this thesis categorized in accordance with the priority of the project detail for theconvenience of the study.

Commissioner of the Information Network

Supervisory Commission for 2 years between

1987 to 1989 and managed overall aspects of the

National Basic Information System Project,

played a leading role in resolving inter-

department differences, supervised necessary

standardization and security issues associated

with sharing of information among departments,

integration of network, and sharing of computer

and telecommunication resources, as well as

obtaining financial resources for the project.

The Phase 2 Project, which was launched in

1992, did not achieve much success as a result

of weakened implementation organization,

obtaining resources, and change in

implementation methods. It was the result of

weakened presidential power during the Kim

Young-Sam Administration, whose presidency

was during the transitional democratization

period.7) As a result, the National Basic

Information System Project, from 1989 when the

Commissioner of the Information Network

Supervisory Commission was changed from the

Presidential Chief of Staff to the Minister of the

Ministry of the Post and Telecommunication, did

not had much influence until the commission

was merged into the IT Development

Implementation Committee, chaired by the

Prime Minister, in the second half of 1995.

Particularly, with the funding and operation

method changing from invest first, settle later to

budget oriented per each implementing

departments and ministries, there was the

problem of being put off during the budgeting

process due to lack of technological knowledge

by the executives of each departments and

ministries. Furthermore, there were also notable

difficulties in being able to make long term plans

because the budgeting process at the time was

done on an annual basis.

The 2nd Stage Project was reinforced with the

IT Development Implementation Committee

(Chairman: Prime Minister), the Ministry of

Information of Communication (implementation

body), as well as the Framework Act on

Informatization Promotion. Such transformation

of the Kim Young-Sam Administration was

influenced by the pursuit of high speed

broadband network projects in major countries

following the USA’s National Information

Infrastructure (NII) Project in 1993. In 1994, the

government established the High Speed

Broadband Network Project Plan and as the

implementation organization of the project,

reorganized the Ministry of the Post and

Telecommunication to the Ministry of

Communication (MIC) on December of 1994. In

addition, the government also enacted the

Framework Act on Informatization Promotion

in 1995 and established the Basic Plan for

Informatization Promotion8) and integrated all

the functions necessary for implementing the

2nd Stage Project. The Information Network

Supervisory Commission, which was chaired

17


7) Since the Kim Young-Sam Administration placed high importance in hardware type, or physical democratization, apart from the past’smilitary dictatorship government, during its initial administrative period (1993), the interest in IT development received lesser priority.

8) The 1st Stage IT Development Basic Plan (1996~2000) was implemented as a part of the 2nd Stage Basic Plan titled the Cyber Korea 21(1999~2001) and the 3rd Stage Basic Plan (2002~2006), titled the e-Korea Vision 2006 is currently being implemented.

by the Minister of the Ministry of Post and

Telecommunication, has been elevated and

renamed as the IT Development Implementation

Committee chaired by the Prime Minister.

However, with the order of the president, the

administrative control influence of the Prime

Minister for inter-department relationship and

the technical support resource of the MIC were

significantly limited. However, the MIC

appropriately utilized the Informatization

Promotion Fund and managed the IT development

projects with the support by the National

Information Society Agency (NIA).

Since 2001, the Kim Dae-Jung Administration

pursued the e-government project, which

required professionalism and centralization of

multi-departments, under the presidential

governance. To achieve successful implementation

of the project, the Special Committee on e-

Government, with leading role by the private

sector, was formed under the Government

Innovation Decentralization Committee and

appointed powerful authority with supervision

by the Secretary of Administration and Planning,

who reported periodically directly to the

president. This is the reinstatement of similar

structure as the Information Network Supervisory

Commission in the 1st Stage, which the chairman

was the Presidential Chief of Staff. Especially,

since the Special Committee had direct reporting

line to the president, it was able to be

independent from resistance by the individual

departments and none cooperation. In addition,

the Special Committee employed the cooperative

system of three important departments of the

Planning and Budgeting Office (government

innovation support), the MIC (technology &

financial support), and the Ministry of

Government Administration and Home Affairs

(cooperation of government organizations and

district government branches) and implemented

the multi-department projects (Special Committee

on e-Government, 2003: 25).

In 2003, the Roh Moo-Hyun Administration

implemented the e-government project under

the management of the Government Innovation

Decentralization Committee with purpose of

juxtaposition and reformation of administration,

decentralization of government authority,

reformation of personnel placement and

appointment, and reformation of finance and

taxation. Although the exterior formation of the

e-government project being integrated with the

government innovation efforts and being

elevated to presidential agenda is similar to that

of the Kim Dae-Jung Administration but the

authority of the Special Committee as well as

administrative and financial support to the

departments has been weakened (Government

Innovation Decentralization Committee, 2005:

37-48). In other words, even though the

establishment of projects in accordance with the

e-government roadmap and its implementation

was lead by the none government affiliated

experts to ensure professionalism and neutralism

among the departments, once the roadmap

projects have become established and confirmed,

the controlling influence of the Special Committee

on e-Government became limited and the actual

implementation functions were transferred from

18


the MIC to the MGAHA. Despite of increasing

integration and merging of inter-department

affairs, the controlling body being degraded to

the level of central government level made

coordination among the departments highly

difficult (Song, 2004).9) The unlike the 1st Stage e-

Government, which the project establishment

until the completion is supervised by the Special

Committee on e-Government, the 2nd Stage e-

Government Project is pursued in distributed

manner in which the Special Committee is only

involved with the establishing the project and

while each individual departments implementing

their pertaining part of the project under the

overall management by the MGAHA. It has

already been proven that under the government

management, it is highly difficult for a

government department to manage other equal

level departments on a single project which

accomplishments for individual department are

measured. It must be noted that US Federal

Government, as their e-government progressed

to the 3rd Stage, the Office of Management and

Budgeting (OMB) was made and independent

and single responsible organization in charge of

centralization and achieving inter-department

cooperation (Wolfe, 1999).

2) Information Technology & Supporting Network

e-Government is a social and technical system

requiring appropriate information technology

support. Korea’s e-government developed

through appropriate incorporation and

utilization of evolving technologies per each

development stage. In addition to the National

Basic Information System Project and distribution

19


<Chart 7> e-Government Implementation Body

Stage Plan Committee Chairperson Managing Organization

I

Phase 1 Network Information Network

Supervisory Commission(1987-1995)

Presidential Chief of Staff (87-89)

Ministry of Post andTelecommunication

Phase 2 Network

Minister of the Ministry of Post andTelecommunication

(89-95)

Ministry of Post andTelecommunication

Ⅱ

Framework Plan for IT Development

Promotion

IT DevelopmentImplementation

Committee(1996-current)

Prime Minister (96-current)

Ministry of Informationand Communication

Ⅲ

Phase 1 e-Government Special Committee

on e-Government(2001-current)

Civilian (Secretary ofPolicy Planning)

MIC, MGAHA, and OPB

Phase 2 e-Government

Civilian (Secretary ofInnovation Management)

MGAHA

9) Notably, the issue associated with selecting which Ministry, among the Office of Planning and Coordination, the MGAHA, and MIC, will bein charge of the multi-department related project among the 31st e-government roadmap, was put aside until the end of 2007.

of personal computers, the e-government’s

technological infrastructure was reinforced with

high speed broadband network for providing

online administrative services and information

including patents, taxes, and education to the

mass public and functioned as the mean for

delivering services of the e-government.

Furthermore, in line with the evolution of

technologies, the e-government was supported

with various IT strategies including the

Informatization Strategy Plan (ISP) and

Business Process Reengineering (BPR) (National

Information Society Agency, 2007b: 66-72).

The National Information Society Agency

(NIA), which was established in 1987 and have

since been providing technological support for

nation’s IT development and e-government

projects to this date, is evaluated to be one of the

success cases of the institution building. In

addition, there are government affiliated

research institutes such as the Korea Information

Society Development Institute (KISDI), Korea

Information Security Agency (KISA), and

Electronics and Telecommunications Research

Institute (ETRI) as well as KT and private sector

corporations related with the IT development

joined in the policy network and contributed

greatly towards policy making and providing

technological expertise to the e-government

projects. Particularly, the Informatization

Promotion Fund, established after the initiation

of privatization process of the telecommunication

sector in 1981, played an important role in

building the framework for information society

through the high speed broadband network and

research and development projects (MIC, 2003:

70-86).

3) Resource Distribution

Even from financial resource management

perspective, the e-government is evaluated to

have acquired sufficient resources which were

invested appropriately. In case of 1st Stage e-

Government Project, the finance resource

implementation was done via invest first, settle

later method but to supplement the weakness

and utilize the positive aspects of such method,

the Informatization Promotion Fund, financed by

the government funding, loan, funding by the

fixed and mobile telecommunication companies,

as well as by the dividend payout from shares of

Korea Telecom or selling of the corporate stocks,

were established in 1993 (Song, 2004: 83). The

fund, which was managed by the MIC, was

provided in a form of a matching fund to each

government branches for their IT development

projects and stimulated the incentive system for

pursuing risk associated projects. In an

environment where the success was not proven

and with low background of expertise, such

policy backed system played an important role

in promoting implementation of risky projects

by each department.

Such funding system, unlike the fixed budget

process, provided flexibility in financial

management for pursuing long-term projects

from investment perspective and contributed

towards launching of never before used or

experienced emerging technologies, even with

their associated risk of failure. Many of the

20


informatization projects were pushed aside or

placed in lower priority in many departments as

a result of low awareness and knowledge in the

technology or risk involved.10) Under such

conditions, the fund overcame the limitations of

budgeting and provided powerful incentive in

a form of matching fund. For example, the

procurement EDI Project, established as the

initiative to strengthen the national

competitiveness on August of 1995, received the

matching fund from the Informatization

Promotion Fund. It was implemented in

accordance with the EDI Framework Plan jointly

established by the Office of Procurement and

NIA. Built on to the EDI Project, the internet

based e-procurement system was developed as

part of the 11th e-Government Project in 2001,

which received the UN Public Service Award

(PSA) as the model success case in the world.

The fund’s principal mechanism is to be utilized

as flexible alternative to the existing budgeting

system for implementing long term IT

development projects in accordance with the

president’s agenda and IT industry’s policy

objectives.

One of the success factors in e-government is

implementation of performance oriented

investment policy similar to those employed in

enterprises which pursues innovation in work

process (OECD, 2004: 54). In fact, one of the

attributing factor to the success of the e-

government during its 2nd Stage even under the

government transitional period, was the

appropriate level of support provided through

incentive fund to those departments, universities,

and small and mid sized businesses which have

accomplished certain level of achievements.

However, since 2005, the fund was transformed

as the Information and Telecommunication

Promotion Fund, which was primarily focused

on the R&D efforts in information technology

and as the management of the e-government

became under the management of the MGAHA,

the budgeting for e-government projects was

incorporated into general budget process

(government investment) and settles as annual

budget category.11) Notably in 2005, the IT

Development Budgeting Committee, which is

chaired by the Director of the Office of Planning

and Budgeting, was established under the IT

Development Implementation Committee and

commenced overall management of the IT

21


10) When the Special Committee on e-Government was established in 2001, many senior officials of the government branches had highlyinsufficient level of knowledge in the concept of e-government and project objective. Some even stated during the meetings, “I do not knowmuch about the e-government,”and added, “But I hear about the e-government until my ears fall off from the president.”It was such keeninterest by the president that these officials had no choice but to place e-government in high priority (e-Government White Paper, 2003: 58).Prior to the 3rd Stage e-Government Project, except for the civil officials directly involved with the informatization project, interest andknowledge in e-government by general civil service employees and high positioned officials were generally low. However, as thereengineering of the inter-department work process became more widely expanded through the e-government and as the generalknowledge in information technology increased throughout general population, the adaptation of the e-government by the public serviceemployees has also expanded. However, since this research does not cover how the e-government was adopted by the public serviceemployees per each stage, there is a need for additional study to supplement such limitations.

11) As the fund from the liquidation of KT stocks and selling of IMT-2000 business license started to diminish, together with the transfer of the e-government project management from the MIC to MGAHA, the Informatization Promotion Fund seized to provide funding to e-government projects as of 2005 and policy was established for the fund to be utilized only for information and telecommunication relatedR&D projects.

development related budgets.

5. Feedback and Learning

The feedback and learning process are

activities for reflecting project achievement

assessment results towards improvement of

future activities. Since e-government project is not

a one time but an on-going project, improvement

efforts through such feedback and learning

process is important to enhance performance and

outputs. As the e-government progressed over

number of Stages, each stage was reviewed to

identify the success and failure factors and such

process minimized the failure risks while

maximizing the chances of success in the future

projects.

As an example for mid and long term strategy,

the 2nd Stage overcame the difficulties associated

with information sharing among administrative

institutions and implemented high speed

broadband network project to provide mass

public online service because the 1st Stage e-

Government resulted in low usage of available

information due to insufficient network

infrastructure (MIC and NIA, 2005: 34-35). As an

example of implementation structure, when the

Kim Dae-Jung Administration expanded the e-

government from single department oriented to

multiple inter-department oriented system, the

IT Development Implementation Committee

managed by the Office of Planning and

Coordination and the MIC was replaced with the

newly established Presidential Special Committee

on e-Government, which was the result of the

research on previous cases of project management

and implementation capability.

From development project perspective, the

2nd Stage e-Government Project included

modification and updating of already established

DB systems, such as citizens registry, real estate,

and finance, as part of the 10 major projects of the

Framework Plan for Informatization Promotion

(1996~1998) (MIC, 2003: 146). Some of the

projects outlined in the e-Government roadmap

of the Roh Moo-Hyun Administration also

included supplementing and technological

updating of the 11th e-Government Project of the

Kim Dae-Jung Administration (Government

Innovation Decentralization Committee, 2005:

53-54). Therefore, the learning of prior project

cases was not conducted on the past mid and

22


Period Funding Structure Managing Ministry Legal Basis

1987~1992Invest First, Settle Later

MPT Act on IT Network

1993~2004InformatizationPromotion Fund

MICFramework Act on Informatization Promotion

(General Provisions for Informatization)

2005~current General Budget MGAHABudgeting and Accounting Act (General

Accounting e?Government Investment Fund)

<Chart 8> e-Government Financial Support Structure

* Source: Government Innovation Decentralization Committee (2005:45), e-Government of the Participatory Government.

long term planning and individual projects but it

also involved reviewing of the implementation

organization and methods as well.

Particularly, during this feedback and learning

process, the NIA, KISDI, KISA, and relative

organizations conducted in depth individual and

group research on causes of failure of previously

implemented projects and by sharing the results

of such research, they played a leading

contributing role towards development of future

planning.12)

Ⅳ. Summary & Future Recommendations

The successful achievement of Korea’s IT

development and e-government is evaluated to

be the result of combined efforts in implementing

systemized and unified policies developed

through government initiative mid- and long-

term development strategies (NIA, 2005). This

study did not presume scientific priority order of

diverse influential factors that has contributed to

such accomplishment, nor did it point out which

played more or less contributing role. However,

the success can be interpreted as the results of

responding to the changing environment with

establishment of mid- and long-term goals,

formation of implementation organizations,

budgeting, establishment of legislative basis, and

provisioning information technology resources,

all backed by strong determination and

leadership of the president. Throughout the

process, the increasing social awareness and

interest in the efficiency of the information

technology is once again reflected as the

reinforced feedback on the next phase of the e-

government project. Among these, the common

success factors for all e-government projects can

be summarized as the determination and interest

by the president, flexible resource distribution

method, and technical support by relative

institutes such as the MIC and NIA.

In depth analysis of e-government

implementation organizations in Korea and

foreign nations shows that if the final decision

maker is involved deeply, then the formation of

agenda, distribution of human and material

resources are done in the order from authority

group to controlling interest group and

downwards but if the implementation

organization is government bureaucracy, then it

tends to have characteristics of having difficulties

in gaining cooperation among departments and

fierce competitiveness in obtaining resources

(Jung-Eun Park, Song Hee-joon , 2006: 126-127).

From this perspective, the success of e-

government is the result of organizing human,

material and technical resources through the

backing by the strong determination and

leadership of the president, which were

efficiently utilized to achieve the objective of

administrative efficiency, improve service to

mass public, improve administrative process

transparency, and citizens participation and

23


12) Since the personnel placement, H/R management and appointment of the public official under the government bureaucracy is fully relyingon the circulation assignment process, there was the weakness and limitations that the civil service employees were not able to accumulatethe IT development related technologies and experiences within the departments but the long term contractual employees of the sub-government organizations provided supplementing functions.

applied the advancing information technologies.

Simultaneously, information industry promotion

with the objective of advancing the IT industry

was also implemented in each stage of the project

as well as applying feedback and research results

of previous experience on the next phase

planning.

However, there still remains number of issues

that must be resolved before Korea’s e-government

can be assessed as total success in all aspects.

First, it can be summarized that the foremost

visions and the ultimate objectives of pursuing e-

government are improve government efficiency,

provide mass public service, and citizens’

participation. In this process, the government

efficiency in the form of reduction of civil service

employees and time, improvement on mass

public service, and transparency as well as

irresponsibleness of policies will be improved.

From this perspective, there is a necessity for on-

going interest to ensure appropriate utilization of

continuously evolving information technology

and reengineering of government work process.

Second, the performance management for

improving system usage must be strengthened

towards customer’s needs oriented rather than

provider’s preference oriented. As of 2007, the

usage rate survey (MOGAHA, 2007) showed e-

government usage to be below 50%. Precise

diagnosis must be conducted to determine the

needs of the citizens and provide consumer

friendly service based on such needs. To achieve

this, improvement must be made in the areas of

customer’s selectivity, approachability, and

stimulate usage.

Third, to integrate and enhance the effectiveness

of the networking of inter-department and inter-

ministry administrations in accordance with

the nationwide administrative branch design

model, there still remains a difficult hurdle in

overcoming the stovepipe vertical process flow

and territory guarding tendency by individual

departments and ministries. To overcome this,

there is a necessity to adapt the enterprise

architecture model that can overcome the

business reference model, which was adapted as

one of e-government roadmap project.

Fourth, the evolution of ubiquitous

information technology will bring forth a new

challenge to e-government. Particularly, the

future policies for the IT industry must pursue

strengthening of the development, distribution

and support of LINUX based software that can

be used on various e-government services and

administrative applications. Especially, the

strategies for organic integration of technology

demand and service distribution must be

reinforced with consideration to the fact that

prior government administration pursued

fostering of IT industry as a part of the e-

government strategies.

Finally, there is a necessity to overcome the

issues that arose with the transfer of the

managing organization from MIC to MGAHA,

as a result of restructuring of e-government

implementation structure by the Roh Moo-Hyun

Administration in addition to the redesigning of

the information technology support network to

be more efficient and technology oriented so that

it can actively provide support, as it has done so

24


in the past.

■ References

Bannister, Frank (2003). “Diverging Trajectories:Explaining Different Levels of Success inPublic Sector IC.”Governing Networks, IOSPress.

Cobb, Roger W., Ross, J.K. & Ross, M.H. (1976).“Agenda Building as a Comparative PoliticalProcess.”American Political Science Review,70:1.

Cobb, Roger W. & Charles D. Elder (1983).Participation in American Politics: theDynamics of Agenda-Building(2nd ed.),Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress.

Dawes, Sharon (1996). “Making Smart IT Choices.”Center for Technology in Government, NewYork.

Davenport, Thomas H., Robert G. Eccles, & LaurencePrusak (1992). “Information Politics.”SloanManagement Review, Fall, 53-65.

Davenport, Thomas H. (1993). Process Innovation:Reengineering Work through InformationTechnology, Boston, Harvard Business SchoolPress.

Dutton, William H. (1990). “The Political Implicationsof Information Technology: Challenge toPower?”Jacques Berleu(ed). The InformationSociety: Evolving Landscapes, Springer-Verlag, 173-195.

Galliers & Sutherland (1991). “Information SystemsManagement and Strategy Formulation: The

‘Stages of Growth Model’Revisted.”Journalof Information Systems, 1: 2, 89-114.

Government Innovation Decentralization Committee(2005). 「e-Government of the ParticipatoryGovernment」.

Hong-Shik Jung (2007).「20 Years of Korea’s ITPolicies」, Seoul: e-News.

Hood, Christopher & Michael Jackson (1991).Administrative Argument, Aldershot,Dartmouth.

Hwang Jong-sung (2003). “Structure and DevelopmentPath of Korea’s IT Development Policy.”

「KISDI」, 10(2). ITU (2006). Measuring Digital Opportunity. King, J.L. & Kenneth Kraemer (1985). The Dynamics

of Computing, Columbia University Press,New York.

KISDI Edition, 「 Information Society and ITDevelopment Policy」, 2: 39-98, Seoul: BeupYoung Publishing Co.

Martin, Steve (2002). “Best Value: New PublicManagement or New Directions?”KateMcLaughlin, Stephen P. Osborne and EwanFerlie(eds.), New Public Management: CurrentTrends and Future Prospects, Routledge,London, 129-140.

MGAHA (2007). “Implementation Strategy for NextGeneration e-Government.”

MIC (2003). 「IT Development Strategy of Korea」. MIC, NIA (2005). 「History of the Development

Projects for High Speed Nation」. Nak-Il Sung (2003). “ Accomplishments and

Remaining Issues in Korea’s IT DevelopmentPolicies.”「 Korea Information SocietyDevelopment Institute」, 10(2).

NIA (1996). “ 1996~2000 Framework Plan forInformatization Plan Guideline.”

NIA (1998). 「White Paper — IT Development of Korea1998」.

NIA (2007a). 「White Paper — IT Development ofKorea 2007」.

NIA (2007b). 「Into U-World Embracing IT: NIA 20Years」.

Nixon, Paul & Vassiliki N. Koutrakou (2007).EGovernment in Europe: Re-booting the State,

25


Routledge, London. Nolan, R.L. (1979). “Managing the Crises in Data

Processing.” Harvard Business Review,March-April, 115-136.

OECD (1995). Governance in Transition: PublicManagement Reforms in OECD Countries,Paris.

OECD (2001). “ The Hidden Threat to EGovernment:Avoiding Large Government IT Failures.”PUMA Policy Brief, March, No.8.

OECD (2002). OECD E-Government Project: KeyIssues and Findings.

OECD (2004). The e-Government Imperative. OECD (2005). e-Government for Better Government,

OECD e-Government Studies. Oh Kang-tak (2003). “Korea’s e-Government Level

Assessment in Accordance with the Integratede-Government Development Model andFuture Development Strategies.”「Korea PolicyAcademy Society News」, 12(1): 325-350.

Oh Kwang-seok (2005). “Today and Future of theNational IT Development Policy.”

Park Jung-eun, Song Hee-joon (2006). “InternationalComparative Study on the Relationshipbetween e-Government ImplementationOrganization and Policies.”「Korea PolicyAcademy Society News」, 15(4): 111-142.

Snellen, Ignace (1990). Information Strategy for PublicPolicy, Elsevier Science Publisher. Snellen,Ignace (2005). “E-Government: A Challenge forPublic Management.”in Ferlie, Ewan, Lynn, Jr.Laurence E. and Pollitt, Christopher (eds.), TheOxford Handbook of Public Management,Oxford University Press, 398-421.

Song Hee-joon, Kim Joon-han (1991). “Analysis on theEffects of the Administrative Network Project:Focused on the Recruitment ManagementNetwork Project.”「Korea Policy AcademySociety News」, 25(1): 69-92.

Song Hee-joon (1998). “Decisive Factors and

Implementation Strategies of High SpeedBroadband Network Development Policy:Comparative Study of Korea, USA, and Japan.”

「Korea Policy Academy Society News」, 7(1):73-96.

Song Hee-joon (2002a). “Visions and Path for New ITDevelopment Policies.”「IT DevelopmentPolicy」, 9(4): 123-142.

Song Hee-joon (2002b). “Analysis on the ImprovedEffects of Administrative Transparency of thee-Government.”「Administrative Treaties」,40(4): 109-134.

Song Hee-joon (2002c). “ Prospects and Limitations ofthe E-Government Initiative in Korea.”International Review of Public Administration,7:2, December, 45-53.

Song Hee-joon (2004a). “e-Government Organizationand Governance.”「Information ScienceNews」, 22(1): 13-20.

Song Hee-joon (2004b). Building E-Governancethrough Reform, Ewha Women’s University.

Special Committee on e-Government (2003). 「WhitePaper — e-Government」.

UK CITU (2000). Information Age Government:Benchmarking Electronic Service Delivery.

UK Office of the e-Envoy (2001). E-Government:Benchmarking Electronic Service Delivery.

UNDESA (2005). UN Global E-GovernmentReadiness Report 2003, New York.

UNESCO/NIC (2005). E-Government Tool Kit forDeveloping Countries, UNESCO, New Delhi.

US Federal CIO Council Best Practices Committee(2002). Value Measuring Methodology: How-To-Guide, Highlights.

US National Performance Review (1994). Creating aGovernment that Works Better and Costs Less,Status Report.

US OMB (2002). E-Government Strategy. Venkatraman, N. (1994). “ IT-Enabled Transformation:

From Automation to Business Scope

26


Redefinition.”Sloan Management Review,Winter.

Wolfe, Laurence (1999). “ Transforming Accountabilityfor Government Information TechnologyProjects: the Impact of New US Legislation.”inRichard Heeks (ed.). Reinventing Governmentin the Information Age: International Practicein IT-enabled Public Sector Reform, London,Routledge, 231-252.

Yoon Sang-ho (2002). “Study on the Developmentand Application of e-Government MaturityAssessment Model.”「Korea Policy AcademySociety News」, 11(4): 243-271.

27


e-government of korea

Documents