Digitalization, one of the major advents of the time, has brought about simplifications and ease to our day to day life.
As Marshall McLuhan in his book, Media, the Extension of Men, clearly described, a human being is preparing extensions for his or her sense organs and body parts to buy energy and make his or her activities easier, in digitalization. So much so that! Digitalization stands for the contemporary phase of communication technologies, one that follows 19th century print culture and 20th century electronic broadcast culture, and that is deeply amplified and accelerated by the popularity of networked computers, personalized technologies and digital images, making the world as a global village.
We are living in a world where everything is performed in the support of digital technology. A showcase, we are no longer supposed to carry paper money for our day to day exchanges. Living in the digital age, we simply use our phone or credit card to buy, sell or exchange. E-commerce is another area where digitalization takes it to another level of achievement. Now, one can buy material goods, clothing and even fried meal ordering online.
On-line commerce makes it possible to invert the traditional form of the market from selling large amounts of a few things, to selling small amounts of a large number of things. Living in the global village at the age of digitalization, nation has a must do task to transform its social, economic and societal endeavors to digitally assisted one. Far beyond that, having inefficient and tedious bureaucratic service delivery system, e- governance is one of the novel tools to basically effectuate governance.
Besides, it is the right response for prolonged public clamor of mal administration and bureaucratic inefficiency. Different countries employed e-governance to realize amenity in the service sector and scored tremendous results. E-Governance offers a great potential and opportunity for developing countries like Ethiopia to improve governance and citizen satisfaction.
E-Governance reduces costs, increases transparency and citizen participation in decision-making processes, strengthens accountability, improves service delivery, etc. The e-governance, which curbs the tedious service delivery trend, is yet not well implemented nationwide. The state’s task here is not merely institutionalizing the system, but familiarizing public servants and the public with it. No matter how much modern and sophisticated mechanism is employed, it wouldn’t be effective without ensuring effectiveness in the human capital.
On top of that, being novice to the system, nation needs to carry out the task carefully in a way that mitigates cyber-crimes and frauds. The cybercrime and other frauds related to the technology are among the time’s challenges of the globe. Thus, learning from frontiers in the sector and employing sound strategies need to be state’s assignment.
The Ethiopian Herald, January 2/2018
