Page 159 - Introduction to Electronic Commerce and Social Commerce

140 5 Innovative EC Systems: From E-Government to E-Learning, Knowledge Management, E-Health, and C2C Commerce

Government-to-Citizens Note that over 20 countries block some websites for
political, social, or other reasons (e.g., China, North Korea,
The government-to-citizens (G2C) category includes all Iran, Syria). For more on G2C, see usa.gov/Citizen/Topics/
the interactions between a government and its citizens that All- Topics.shtml. For an overview of major citizens’ groups
take place electronically. G2C can involve dozens of differ- and the services provided to them by the U.S. Department
ent initiatives. The basic idea is to enable citizens to interact of Labor, see dol.gov/_sec/e_government_plan/p41- 43_
electronically with the government from anywhere and at appendixe.htm.
anytime. G2C applications enable citizens to ask questions Two popular examples of G2C are provided next.
of government agencies and receive answers, pay taxes,
receive payments and documents, and schedule services, Electronic Voting
such as employment interviews and medical appointments.
For example, in many U.S. states, residents can renew driv- Voting processes may be subject to errors, manipulation, and
er’s licenses, pay traffic tickets, and make appointments for fraud. In many countries, there are attempts to “rig” the votes;
vehicle emission inspections and driving tests—all online. in others, the losers want a recount. Voting may result in
The major features of government websites are: informa- major political crises, as has happened in several countries.
tion on how to contact the government, public notices to citi- Problems with the U.S. 2000 and 2004 presidential elections
zens, links to other sites, educational material, publications, have accelerated the trend toward electronic voting.
statistics, legal notes, and databases. The major areas of such The voting process encompasses a broad spectrum of
G2C activities are social services, tourism and recreation, technological and social activities from voter registration
public safety, research and education, downloadable forms, and voter authentication to the casting of ballots and subse-
discovery of government services, tax filing, information quent tallying of results. For an example of this process, see
about public policy, and advice about health and safety Figure 5.2. Electronic voting automates some or all steps in
issues. G2C is now available on mobile/wireless devices in the process.
many countries and local governments. Fully electronic voting systems have raised considerable
Another area of G2C activity takes place by solving citi- controversy because of a variety of relevant factors, such as
zens’ problems. The government (or a politician) can use the proprietary nature of the software. Typical issues are the
CRM-type software to assign inquiries and problem cases to difficulties in selling the systems to voters, complex audit-
appropriate staff members (as shown on ict.govt.nz). ing, and the lack of experience in some steps of the process.
Subsequently, workflow CRM software can be used to track Note: A debatable issue is the possibility of fraud in elec-
the progress of the problems’ resolution. tronic voting (Madden 2015).

Figure 5.2 The process of
using a voting machine