On 21 November, ERA Chair and Professor of E-Governance Vincent Homburg attended the 26th Dutch ECP Conference, a platform where politicians, civil servants, academics and business representatives meet to discuss the future of digital societies. Prof Homburg contributed to a series of expert advice on digitalisation, including a chapter 'Immersion, key to success?', which was published in a book Unfiltered expert advice for the digital government.
Professor Homburg's chapter discusses digitisation policy in the Netherlands, emphasising the importance of public service and the need for better coordination, data sharing and use of standards. It highlights the complexity of the organisational changes required for digitisation and suggests looking at successful examples from Estonia and Denmark. These countries prioritise citizens' experience of digital services, using mobile identification methods such as MitID and SmartID to streamline access to different services.
The paper recommends focusing on citizens' digital experiences to create urgency and readiness for change in policy and implementation. It also stresses the importance of considering the European dimension in digital services, using frameworks such as SDGR, eIDAS and EUDW to facilitate cross-border service delivery. Finally, the paper cautions against over-reliance on chatbots and virtual assistants, and argues for maintaining the human aspect of public service encounters despite technological advances.
During the conference, the book was presented to the Dutch Vice-Minister for Digitalisation, Zsolt Szabó (in the middle of the photo).
Please find an in-depth description of the report and the PDF full text here.
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