eGovernment Standards: who is in charge of what?

1. @METIS Kick-Off Meeting Sophia Antipolis, 30-31 March 2005 eGovernment Standards:who is in charge of what? Peter F Brown Chair CEN/ISSS eGov Focus Group

2. Overview • Introduction • Background to the Focus Group • Introduction to the Focus Group’s work • Initial concerns • Possible approaches • Relationship with Austrian “VCeGov” initiative

3. Personal Background • Head of Service responsible for Information Architecture and Data Standards, European Parliament , until 2004 • Advisor to UN on Pan-African Parliamentary Interoperability Framework • Advisor on eGovernment Strategy, Austrian Government Federal Chancellor’s Office • Member of OASIS Technical Committees: • eGovernment • Service Oriented Architecture Reference Model • Chair of CEN/ISSS eGovernment Focus Group

4. Background to Focus Group • Plenty of work (being) done: • No shortage of eGov initiatives • Rich landscape of projects, policies and practices • Many agencies involved: • Public, private, industry, mixed • Standards bodies, consortia, “communities of interest” • Many levels of authority: • Formal norms, specifications, recommendations, best/good practice frameworks, guidelines, etc. • But, a sense that “something” is missing…

5. What’s missing • Rarely any explicit agreement over “who does what” • Limited visibility of whole eGov landscape: • Duplication of effort • Missed opportunities • Limited economies of scale • eGov standards are rarely mandatory or backed by legal mechanisms (except nationally in some cases) • Growing demand for cross-border services without corresponding pan-European authority (risk of a “free for all”)

6. Focus Group - Vision • “determine the role that standards should play in eGovernment” • “identify what measures are required to achieve this goal” • “contribute to the debate on how to ensure a permanent framework concerning eGovernment activities at a pan-European level” From the Focus Group Terms of Reference

7. Focus Group - Mission • “prepare proposals and/or recommendations to CEN and other standardization bodies, the European Commission and its agencies, national administrations and industry and other market players concerning standardization issues in the field of eGovernment” From the Focus Group Terms of Reference • We have only just started – patience please! • But…we do have some starting points

8. Initial concerns • Lack of persistence • Much work is project-focussed. Once complete, there is little opportunity to use or re-use a particular "deliverable", as its visibility may die with the project's completion • Lack of governance • no single body has either de facto or de jure authority for providing persistence, continuity or connection between projects and initiatives • Lack of maintenance • there is no single or federated infrastructure in place to act as a repository for work that is available for use or re-use by other administrations.

9. Complex landscape • Many actors involved • Standards bodies (different geographic scope) • Consortia and Alliances • Government agencies • Industry bodies • Many overlapping areas • eProcurement • eID • Security • … • No agreement on what is a “standard”

10. Possible approaches • It (maybe) doesn’t matter who does what: • There is enough to be done for everyone to be involved • Keep creative energy flowing • Don’t waste resources on assessing what is out there • “Darwinian” approach: • Good initiatives & practices will get noticed • Bad ones will die off or be killed off • but: • Need to know who is doing what, particularly at EU-level • Need a mechanism to “resolve” possible overlapping and redundant initiatives • Need to gain acceptance for reference authorities

11. A federated, virtual authority ? • Reference • An agreed reference point for all eGov “standards” • Could be a virtual centre • Important that it is visible, known and accepted • Repository • A resource to contain these standards • All content described using standard metadata • Semantics and associations are important • Registry • A system to register content in the repository • Need for unambiguous definitions and terminology • Need for associations between repository content

12. A federated, virtual authority ? • Process • An agreed method for including new standards, covering: • RFPs; • candidate to approval cycle • Minimum standards of interoperability • (possibly) reference implementations • (possibly) certification and/or conformance testing • Authority • A body with a clear responsibility of managing the process, the repository and the registry • Could be de jure or de facto authority • Importance of recognition & acceptance

13. VCeGov Proposal • Origins of the Austrian Government proposal • Originated at the 2003 EU Ministerial Conference on eGovernment, Como, Italy • “create a virtual centre for eGovernment standards and excellence in Europe” • Desire to see pragmatic and rapid progress

14. VCeGov Proposal • Proposal involves: • Full cooperation with CEN/ISSS eGov Focus Group • Development of a prototype “Virtual Centre” - VCeGov • Using “best of breed” registry/repository technologies • Offering a proof of concept for federated model • Identifying problem issues for implementation • Outlining governance model and resource requirements • Involving several EU administrations • Presentation of findings and technology assessment to high-level eGov leaders conference (February 2006, Vienna) • Input to Commission communications on eGovernment “sustainability” and interoperability (2005-2006) • Preparation of Council Presidency conclusions (June 2006)

15. Conclusions • Enough eGovernment initiatives to keep us busy • Not enough visibility or use made of existing work • Poor coordination of initiatives and agencies • We don’t need “turf wars” but we do need to see and know the landscape • A complex landscape (of agencies, standards, projects, etc) does not need a complex map • Interoperability of standards is not enough • We need also standards of interoperability • Keep it manageable and simple

16. @METIS Kick-Off Meeting Sophia Antipolis, 30-31 March 2005 Thank you peter@justbrown.net peter.brown@cio.gv.at www.XMLbyStealth.net/uid/0057