#publicadministration — Public Fediverse posts

Digital sovereignty does not begin with the operation of software, but right from the specifications stage.

But can open source be specifically required in public tenders?

Our new article shows how public contracting authorities can embed digital sovereignty into their procurement processes in practical terms.

Read the blog post: https://opencloud.eu/en/achieving-digital-sovereignty

#DigitalSovereignty #OpenSource #PublicAdministration #Procurement #PublicSector

Digital sovereignty does not begin with the operation of software, but right from the specifications stage.

But can open source be specifically required in public tenders?

Our new article shows how public contracting authorities can embed digital sovereignty into their procurement processes in practical terms.

Read the blog post: https://opencloud.eu/en/achieving-digital-sovereignty

#DigitalSovereignty #OpenSource #PublicAdministration #Procurement #PublicSector

Is Nepal Moving Toward a Socialism-Oriented Federal State or a Capitalist Economy? A Systems-Level Reflection on Nepal’s FY 2026/27 Budget

The Constitution of Nepal defines Nepal as a “socialism-oriented federal democratic republican state.” Multiple election cycles since the Maoist insurgency suggest that democracy has matured considerably. Political parties broadly operating within the republican democratic framework have consistently remained at the center of political competition. The most recent election, following the Gen-Z movement, arguably strengthened the foundations of the republican system. Political actors advocating a return to monarchy remained on the margins and failed to translate public unrest into electoral dominance. Historically, pro-monarchy sentiment tends to gain visibility when governments fail to deliver expected outcomes. The Gen-Z movement represented perhaps the strongest expression of dissatisfaction with the status quo political order. If the Nepali public genuinely favored restoration of monarchy, that election cycle would have provided an ideal opportunity for monarchy-supporting forces to emerge as a dominant political alternative. Instead, voters largely endorsed parties committed to republican democracy, reinforcing the democratic republican trajectory of the country. Yet another constitutional question remains unresolved: while Nepal appears committed to republican democracy, is it also moving toward becoming a socialism-oriented federal state? This article adopts a devil’s advocate perspective to examine whether the latest fiscal budget advances that constitutional aspiration or whether it reflects a different economic direction.

The Budget Represents a Development-State Strategy

Viewed from a systems perspective, the budget rests on a coherent developmental logic. Its central objectives are to accelerate growth through productive investment, strengthen state capacity through reform and digitization, and attract domestic, diaspora, and foreign investment. The underlying diagnosis appears reasonable. Nepal’s challenge is not merely a shortage of money but low productivity, weak state capacity, fragmented development efforts, and bureaucratic friction. The budget attempts to connect infrastructure, energy, agriculture, tourism, technology, and investment into a more integrated economic architecture. Borrowing is presented not as a tool for consumption but as an instrument for productivity-enhancing investment. From this perspective, the budget is essentially a wager on state capacity. If government institutions become more effective, projects are completed on time, corruption is reduced, and investment translates into economic growth, then higher borrowing may be justified. Many countries such as South Korea and Vietnam that successfully modernized followed versions of this strategy. The budget therefore deserves credit for attempting to move the conversation beyond annual expenditures toward a broader development framework.

Is the Budget Fundamentally a Trickle-Down Strategy?

A central question is whether the budget’s theory of change resembles a form of trickle-down economics. Much of the strategy focuses on investment promotion, infrastructure expansion, digitization, regulatory reform, business facilitation, and productivity growth. The implicit assumption appears to be that economic growth will eventually spread throughout society through employment generation, enterprise creation, and broader economic opportunities. The concern is not whether growth is desirable. The concern is whether the benefits of growth will reach marginalized populations quickly and equitably enough. Critics may reasonably ask whether the budget places greater emphasis on investors, businesses, and the middle class than on direct improvements in the economic conditions of vulnerable communities. If economic gains remain concentrated among those already positioned to benefit from investment opportunities, the constitutional aspiration of a socialism-oriented state becomes harder to reconcile with actual policy outcomes.

Do Specific Policy Choices Reflect a Capitalist Rather Than Socialism-Oriented Direction?

Several policy signals raise broader questions about the state’s economic philosophy. First, taxes imposed on education and health services are likely to be passed on to consumers unless strong regulatory mechanisms prevent it. If the objective is to increase reliance on public education and public healthcare, improving the quality and competitiveness of those services may be a more effective first step than creating additional costs within private alternatives. Second, electricity consumption thresholds before tax appear low relative to the growing electrification of modern households. As families adopt induction cooking, electric vehicles, heat pumps, and other appliances, many middle-income households could exceed these thresholds. The result may unintentionally encourage continued reliance on gas, firewood, or other fossil-fuel alternatives. If the objective is to redirect electricity toward industrial use, expanding generation capacity may be more sustainable than discouraging household consumption.

Third, enthusiasm for data centers, AI, remote work, and digital services raises a deeper strategic question. Is Nepal building on its own long-term comparative advantages, or is it once again responding primarily to incentives created elsewhere? Nepal previously moved away from potentially transformative assets such as electric public transport systems, ropeways, and large-scale reservoir hydropower development, and  increasingly relied on labor export. The concern is not that digital industries are undesirable, but whether Nepal is repeating a pattern of chasing externally driven opportunities without a clearly articulated national development vision.

These examples create an impression that the budget may be nudging Nepal toward a model closer to contemporary market capitalism than toward the socialism-oriented framework envisioned by the constitution. Ironically, some parts of the capitalist Americas are currently witnessing renewed interest in democratic-socialist ideas and stronger social welfare policies, while Nepal appears to be emphasizing investment-led growth and market incentives.

The Real Debate may not Socialism Versus Capitalism

As the world is witnessing a renewed interest in democratic-socialist ideas and stronger social welfare, the deeper issue may not be whether Nepal is becoming socialist or capitalist country. The more important question is whether the assumptions underpinning the strategy prove correct. Several unintended consequences deserve attention. First, the key question is whether Nepal can finally convert borrowing into productive assets rather than accumulating debt without generating sufficient returns. Second, growth alone does not guarantee broad-based prosperity. The strategy assumes that gains from investment will spread through jobs, enterprise creation, and economic opportunity reaching marginalized communities. History suggests this outcome is possible but far from automatic. Third concern is about governance. The budget assumes improvements in administrative efficiency, project execution, corruption control, bureaucratic coordination, and institutional discipline. If these governance preconditions fail, borrowing could become another source of fiscal stress and public resentment rather than a catalyst for development. Fourth, the budget contains numerous concepts—corridors, processing, digitization, investment facilitation, infrastructure, tourism, and energy. Yet the overarching economic vision remains somewhat implicit. It is unclear whether these initiatives are components of a strategic coherent national development strategy or simply a collection of individually attractive policies held together by optimism rather than a clearly articulated economic vision. The assumption appears to be that combining these fragments will naturally produce prosperity, which deserves scrutiny.

The fifth concerns Nepal’s long-term development challenge. For more than four decades, billions of rupees have been invested in expanding road access into hill and mountain districts. While connectivity improved significantly, many districts continue to experience population decline as young people migrate to cities or overseas employment. Agricultural land is increasingly abandoned, wildlife pressures have intensified, and local economic opportunities remain limited. This experience suggests that infrastructure alone does not guarantee development. The more fundamental challenge may be employment generation, entrepreneurship, agricultural modernization, and innovation. A clearer budgetary focus on urban and rural entrepreneurship could potentially provide a more direct response to youth migration. Finance, training, vocational education, pilot programs, market access, digital economy initiatives, grants, loans, mentoring, and long-term support mechanisms could then function as supporting pillars around that central objective.

Finally, Nepal’s strategic location between India and China remains an underdeveloped dimension of national economic planning. The bridge-economy concept appears indirectly through investments in connectivity, energy, logistics, and regional development, but it remains insufficiently explicit. Positioning Nepal within the evolving economic geography of Asia may ultimately prove as important as any individual budget allocation.

Concluding, the budget reflects a serious attempt to accelerate growth, strengthen state capacity, and attract productive investment. Those objectives are difficult to oppose. However, important questions remain: are some policy choices moving Nepal closer to a market-capitalist model and trickle down economy than to a socialism-oriented nation; is there a sufficiently explicit economic vision connecting the many initiatives contained in the budget; can Nepal finally overcome its historic weakness in execution?The ultimate test will not be the size of the budget, the ambition of the plans, or the sophistication of the theories behind them. It will be whether the strategy creates productive employment, broad-based opportunity, stronger institutions, and a development pathway that keeps young Nepali invested in the country’s future. Efficiency can accelerate development. But democratic legitimacy, social inclusion, and long-term national purpose ultimately determine whether development becomes sustainable.

Note: This article is inspired by the article “New Team, New Budget: Nepal’s Big Development Bet [Part 1: Big Budget. Big Dreams. Big Assumptions.” published by Dr. Alok Bohora in his Substack website “Nepal Unplugged”. I was acknowledged in his successive article for contributing to the discussion. This article combines my thoughts and my synthesis of above mentioned article.

Rate this:

Is Nepal Moving Toward a Socialism-Oriented Federal State or a Capitalist Economy? A Systems-Level Reflection on Nepal’s FY 2026/27 Budget

The Constitution of Nepal defines Nepal as a “socialism-oriented federal democratic republican state.” Multiple election cycles since the Maoist insurgency suggest that democracy has matured considerably. Political parties broadly operating within the republican democratic framework have consistently remained at the center of political competition. The most recent election, following the Gen-Z movement, arguably strengthened the foundations of the republican system. Political actors advocating a return to monarchy remained on the margins and failed to translate public unrest into electoral dominance. Historically, pro-monarchy sentiment tends to gain visibility when governments fail to deliver expected outcomes. The Gen-Z movement represented perhaps the strongest expression of dissatisfaction with the status quo political order. If the Nepali public genuinely favored restoration of monarchy, that election cycle would have provided an ideal opportunity for monarchy-supporting forces to emerge as a dominant political alternative. Instead, voters largely endorsed parties committed to republican democracy, reinforcing the democratic republican trajectory of the country. Yet another constitutional question remains unresolved: while Nepal appears committed to republican democracy, is it also moving toward becoming a socialism-oriented federal state? This article adopts a devil’s advocate perspective to examine whether the latest fiscal budget advances that constitutional aspiration or whether it reflects a different economic direction.

The Budget Represents a Development-State Strategy

Viewed from a systems perspective, the budget rests on a coherent developmental logic. Its central objectives are to accelerate growth through productive investment, strengthen state capacity through reform and digitization, and attract domestic, diaspora, and foreign investment. The underlying diagnosis appears reasonable. Nepal’s challenge is not merely a shortage of money but low productivity, weak state capacity, fragmented development efforts, and bureaucratic friction. The budget attempts to connect infrastructure, energy, agriculture, tourism, technology, and investment into a more integrated economic architecture. Borrowing is presented not as a tool for consumption but as an instrument for productivity-enhancing investment. From this perspective, the budget is essentially a wager on state capacity. If government institutions become more effective, projects are completed on time, corruption is reduced, and investment translates into economic growth, then higher borrowing may be justified. Many countries such as South Korea and Vietnam that successfully modernized followed versions of this strategy. The budget therefore deserves credit for attempting to move the conversation beyond annual expenditures toward a broader development framework.

Is the Budget Fundamentally a Trickle-Down Strategy?

A central question is whether the budget’s theory of change resembles a form of trickle-down economics. Much of the strategy focuses on investment promotion, infrastructure expansion, digitization, regulatory reform, business facilitation, and productivity growth. The implicit assumption appears to be that economic growth will eventually spread throughout society through employment generation, enterprise creation, and broader economic opportunities. The concern is not whether growth is desirable. The concern is whether the benefits of growth will reach marginalized populations quickly and equitably enough. Critics may reasonably ask whether the budget places greater emphasis on investors, businesses, and the middle class than on direct improvements in the economic conditions of vulnerable communities. If economic gains remain concentrated among those already positioned to benefit from investment opportunities, the constitutional aspiration of a socialism-oriented state becomes harder to reconcile with actual policy outcomes.

Do Specific Policy Choices Reflect a Capitalist Rather Than Socialism-Oriented Direction?

Several policy signals raise broader questions about the state’s economic philosophy. First, taxes imposed on education and health services are likely to be passed on to consumers unless strong regulatory mechanisms prevent it. If the objective is to increase reliance on public education and public healthcare, improving the quality and competitiveness of those services may be a more effective first step than creating additional costs within private alternatives. Second, electricity consumption thresholds before tax appear low relative to the growing electrification of modern households. As families adopt induction cooking, electric vehicles, heat pumps, and other appliances, many middle-income households could exceed these thresholds. The result may unintentionally encourage continued reliance on gas, firewood, or other fossil-fuel alternatives. If the objective is to redirect electricity toward industrial use, expanding generation capacity may be more sustainable than discouraging household consumption.

Third, enthusiasm for data centers, AI, remote work, and digital services raises a deeper strategic question. Is Nepal building on its own long-term comparative advantages, or is it once again responding primarily to incentives created elsewhere? Nepal previously moved away from potentially transformative assets such as electric public transport systems, ropeways, and large-scale reservoir hydropower development, and  increasingly relied on labor export. The concern is not that digital industries are undesirable, but whether Nepal is repeating a pattern of chasing externally driven opportunities without a clearly articulated national development vision.

These examples create an impression that the budget may be nudging Nepal toward a model closer to contemporary market capitalism than toward the socialism-oriented framework envisioned by the constitution. Ironically, some parts of the capitalist Americas are currently witnessing renewed interest in democratic-socialist ideas and stronger social welfare policies, while Nepal appears to be emphasizing investment-led growth and market incentives.

The Real Debate may not Socialism Versus Capitalism

As the world is witnessing a renewed interest in democratic-socialist ideas and stronger social welfare, the deeper issue may not be whether Nepal is becoming socialist or capitalist country. The more important question is whether the assumptions underpinning the strategy prove correct. Several unintended consequences deserve attention. First, the key question is whether Nepal can finally convert borrowing into productive assets rather than accumulating debt without generating sufficient returns. Second, growth alone does not guarantee broad-based prosperity. The strategy assumes that gains from investment will spread through jobs, enterprise creation, and economic opportunity reaching marginalized communities. History suggests this outcome is possible but far from automatic. Third concern is about governance. The budget assumes improvements in administrative efficiency, project execution, corruption control, bureaucratic coordination, and institutional discipline. If these governance preconditions fail, borrowing could become another source of fiscal stress and public resentment rather than a catalyst for development. Fourth, the budget contains numerous concepts—corridors, processing, digitization, investment facilitation, infrastructure, tourism, and energy. Yet the overarching economic vision remains somewhat implicit. It is unclear whether these initiatives are components of a strategic coherent national development strategy or simply a collection of individually attractive policies held together by optimism rather than a clearly articulated economic vision. The assumption appears to be that combining these fragments will naturally produce prosperity, which deserves scrutiny.

The fifth concerns Nepal’s long-term development challenge. For more than four decades, billions of rupees have been invested in expanding road access into hill and mountain districts. While connectivity improved significantly, many districts continue to experience population decline as young people migrate to cities or overseas employment. Agricultural land is increasingly abandoned, wildlife pressures have intensified, and local economic opportunities remain limited. This experience suggests that infrastructure alone does not guarantee development. The more fundamental challenge may be employment generation, entrepreneurship, agricultural modernization, and innovation. A clearer budgetary focus on urban and rural entrepreneurship could potentially provide a more direct response to youth migration. Finance, training, vocational education, pilot programs, market access, digital economy initiatives, grants, loans, mentoring, and long-term support mechanisms could then function as supporting pillars around that central objective.

Finally, Nepal’s strategic location between India and China remains an underdeveloped dimension of national economic planning. The bridge-economy concept appears indirectly through investments in connectivity, energy, logistics, and regional development, but it remains insufficiently explicit. Positioning Nepal within the evolving economic geography of Asia may ultimately prove as important as any individual budget allocation.

Concluding, the budget reflects a serious attempt to accelerate growth, strengthen state capacity, and attract productive investment. Those objectives are difficult to oppose. However, important questions remain: are some policy choices moving Nepal closer to a market-capitalist model and trickle down economy than to a socialism-oriented nation; is there a sufficiently explicit economic vision connecting the many initiatives contained in the budget; can Nepal finally overcome its historic weakness in execution?The ultimate test will not be the size of the budget, the ambition of the plans, or the sophistication of the theories behind them. It will be whether the strategy creates productive employment, broad-based opportunity, stronger institutions, and a development pathway that keeps young Nepali invested in the country’s future. Efficiency can accelerate development. But democratic legitimacy, social inclusion, and long-term national purpose ultimately determine whether development becomes sustainable.

Note: This article is inspired by the article “New Team, New Budget: Nepal’s Big Development Bet [Part 1: Big Budget. Big Dreams. Big Assumptions.” published by Dr. Alok Bohora in his Substack website “Nepal Unplugged”. I was acknowledged in his successive article for contributing to the discussion. This article combines my thoughts and my synthesis of above mentioned article.

Rate this:

I’m pleased that my work was cited in this important journal article. #PublicAdministration #PeerReview https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10841806.2026.2635780

I’m pleased that my work was cited in this important journal article. #PublicAdministration #PeerReview https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10841806.2026.2635780

Conferência #APDSI
Transformação Digital, Intervenção Social e Cidadania: Conceitos, Desafios e Cenários Futuros

https://apdsi.pt/2026/ultimas-inscricoes-conferencia-transformacao-digital-intervencao-social-e-cidadania-conceitos-desafios-e-cenarios-futuros/

#Portugal #Lisboa #evento #ISCSP #ParticipaçãoCívica #AdministraçãoPública #PublicAdministration #CitizenParticipation

Conferência #APDSI
Transformação Digital, Intervenção Social e Cidadania: Conceitos, Desafios e Cenários Futuros

https://apdsi.pt/2026/ultimas-inscricoes-conferencia-transformacao-digital-intervencao-social-e-cidadania-conceitos-desafios-e-cenarios-futuros/

#Portugal #Lisboa #evento #ISCSP #ParticipaçãoCívica #AdministraçãoPública #PublicAdministration #CitizenParticipation

Workshop OGW 2026: Cidadania e Poderes Públicos

20 de maio | 14:00 -17:30 horas (Lisboa)
Campus XXI, Lisboa

https://apdsi.pt/eventos/workshop-ogw-2026-cidadania-e-poderes-publicos/

#Portugal #eventos #lisboa #OGP #PublicAdministration #transparency #CitizenParticipation #AdministraçãoPública #ParticipaçãoCívica

Before government formation, Kerala sees sweeping mass transfers in key departments https://english.mathrubhumi.com/news/kerala/kerala-government-mass-transfers-before-new-administration-ng75p8tr?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon #Kerala #GovernmentTransfers #PublicAdministration #Alappuzha

#Internships at #GHIWashington

📌 for #Students of #History, #PoliticalScience, #PublicRelations and #PublicAdministration at German and US #Universities | three-month stay in #Washington

📅 Deadline: July 31, 2026

🔗 https://www.ghi-dc.org/programs/research-internships

#Internships at #GHIWashington

📌 for #Students of #History, #PoliticalScience, #PublicRelations and #PublicAdministration at German and US #Universities | three-month stay in #Washington

📅 Deadline: July 31, 2026

🔗 https://www.ghi-dc.org/programs/research-internships

Fernstudium Infomaterial bietet umfassende Informationen zum Master of Public Administration als Fernstudium. Der berufsbegleitende Studiengang dauert 2-4 Semester und vermittelt Kompetenzen in öffentlichem Recht, Finanzen und Personalmanagement. Ideal für Berufstätige mit Karriereambitionen im öffentlichen Sektor. Einstiegsgehälter: 2.500€-4.800€. #FernstudiumInfomaterial #PublicAdministration https://fernstudium-infomaterial.de/fernstudium/master-of-public-administration/

#CfA #Internship at #GHIWashington

📌 three-month stay in 2027 | for students with a BA-degree or equivalent certification | in the departments of #History, #PoliticalScience, #PublicRelations or #PublicAdministration

📅 Deadline: July 31, 2026

🔗https://www.ghi-dc.org/programs/research-internships

#CfA #Internship at #GHIWashington

📌 three-month stay in 2027 | for students with a BA-degree or equivalent certification | in the departments of #History, #PoliticalScience, #PublicRelations or #PublicAdministration

📅 Deadline: July 31, 2026

🔗https://www.ghi-dc.org/programs/research-internships

If you have a manuscript ready to submit to a peer reviewed journal in Public Administration, I’m willing to give it a collegial review before you submit to the journal. Practitioners are especially welcome. I’ll recuse myself if it comes to a journal I edit or review for. #PeerReview #PublicAdministration

If you have a manuscript ready to submit to a peer reviewed journal in Public Administration, I’m willing to give it a collegial review before you submit to the journal. Practitioners are especially welcome. I’ll recuse myself if it comes to a journal I edit or review for. #PeerReview #PublicAdministration

@tinker Funnily, #publicadministration in Spain keeps using it. Even more, some of them are abandoning #OpenSource web tools and going for #adobe . I've been working for tech companies for 30 years and I keep finding these decissions on our Public Admin.:
- Unreasonable
- Dangerous
- anti-European
- Expensive and with no future

:ablobabducted:

@tinker Funnily, #publicadministration in Spain keeps using it. Even more, some of them are abandoning #OpenSource web tools and going for #adobe . I've been working for tech companies for 30 years and I keep finding these decissions on our Public Admin.:
- Unreasonable
- Dangerous
- anti-European
- Expensive and with no future

:ablobabducted:

"The federal government shut down on Wednesday as President Donald Trump threatened mass federal layoffs. Republicans are blaming Democrats for the shutdown, while Democrats are refusing to support a Republican spending bill without guarantees to extend Obamacare provisions set to expire and reverse GOP health care cuts earlier this year.

“Democrats are … trying to reverse some of the cuts from the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ that was passed earlier this year to Medicaid,” says Intercept politics reporter Jessica Washington. “So what Democrats are really trying to message here is that they’re fighting for health care, both to reverse some of these Medicaid cuts and also to ensure that the Affordable Care Act subsidies continue.”

This week on The Intercept Briefing, senior politics reporter Akela Lacy speaks to Washington about the government shutdown and the impact it will have on public services, including essential services and federal workers.

We’re also following a federal court case where an appointee of Ronald Reagan blasted the Trump administration for unlawfully targeting pro-Palestine students for protected speech."

https://theintercept.com/2025/10/02/podcast-government-shutdown-free-speech/

#USA #Trump #GovernmentShutdown #FreeSpeech #Censorship #PublicAdministration

"The federal government shut down on Wednesday as President Donald Trump threatened mass federal layoffs. Republicans are blaming Democrats for the shutdown, while Democrats are refusing to support a Republican spending bill without guarantees to extend Obamacare provisions set to expire and reverse GOP health care cuts earlier this year.

“Democrats are … trying to reverse some of the cuts from the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ that was passed earlier this year to Medicaid,” says Intercept politics reporter Jessica Washington. “So what Democrats are really trying to message here is that they’re fighting for health care, both to reverse some of these Medicaid cuts and also to ensure that the Affordable Care Act subsidies continue.”

This week on The Intercept Briefing, senior politics reporter Akela Lacy speaks to Washington about the government shutdown and the impact it will have on public services, including essential services and federal workers.

We’re also following a federal court case where an appointee of Ronald Reagan blasted the Trump administration for unlawfully targeting pro-Palestine students for protected speech."

https://theintercept.com/2025/10/02/podcast-government-shutdown-free-speech/

#USA #Trump #GovernmentShutdown #FreeSpeech #Censorship #PublicAdministration

"-“In Trauma”: A key Trump adviser says a Trump administration will seek to make civil servants miserable in their jobs.
- Military: In private speeches, he laid out plans to use armed forces to quell any domestic “riots.”
- 1776 and 1860: He likened the country’s moment to those fractious periods in American history."

https://www.propublica.org/article/video-donald-trump-russ-vought-center-renewing-america-maga

#USA #Trump #MAGA #PublicAdministration

"-“In Trauma”: A key Trump adviser says a Trump administration will seek to make civil servants miserable in their jobs.
- Military: In private speeches, he laid out plans to use armed forces to quell any domestic “riots.”
- 1776 and 1860: He likened the country’s moment to those fractious periods in American history."

https://www.propublica.org/article/video-donald-trump-russ-vought-center-renewing-america-maga

#USA #Trump #MAGA #PublicAdministration

Este meu artigo traz um inventário sobre o que as administrações públicas de cerca de duas dezenas de países estão fazendo para garantir soberania digital, um dos pontos mais estratégicos da agenda geopolítica.

O texto aborda tanto serviços digitais prestados aos cidadãos, e a infraestrutura para garantir isso, quanto ferramentas que os funcionários públicos utilizam para a realização de suas tarefas.

https://www.mobiletime.com.br/colunistas/03/10/2025/james-soberania/

#digitalsovereignty #publicadministration #bigtech #digitalservices

Este meu artigo traz um inventário sobre o que as administrações públicas de cerca de duas dezenas de países estão fazendo para garantir soberania digital, um dos pontos mais estratégicos da agenda geopolítica.

O texto aborda tanto serviços digitais prestados aos cidadãos, e a infraestrutura para garantir isso, quanto ferramentas que os funcionários públicos utilizam para a realização de suas tarefas.

https://www.mobiletime.com.br/colunistas/03/10/2025/james-soberania/

#digitalsovereignty #publicadministration #bigtech #digitalservices

🤔 How can artificial intelligence become true "community intelligence"?
The challenge isn't just technological but organizational: we need an approach that puts people and collaborative processes at the center to transform data into shared value.
A paradigm shift that can revolutionize how we work together 👥

Learn more ➡️ https://relaia.org/en/blog/community-intelligence

#ArtificialIntelligence #DigitalTransformation #SmartCity #PublicAdministration #Innovation

🚨 We’re thrilled to share our new piece on #algorithms in #publicAdministration. This time, diving into the Spanish healthcare system 🤖🩺

We explore how medical diagnostic support systems fail, and the serious bias issues they carry.

It was definitely a challenge (the terminology was particularly tricky to translate into visuals), but honestly, I’m so proud of the result! #dataviz 🌈

👇 Check it out here
🇬🇧 In English:
https://civio.es/sanidad/2025/07/03/mole-or-cancer-the-algorithm-that-gets-one-in-three-melanomas-wrong-and-erases-patients-with-dark-skin/

🇪🇸 In Spanish:
https://civio.es/sanidad/2025/06/26/inteligencia-artificial-algoritmos-sanidad-sesgos-discriminacion/

🚨 We’re thrilled to share our new piece on #algorithms in #publicAdministration. This time, diving into the Spanish healthcare system 🤖🩺

We explore how medical diagnostic support systems fail, and the serious bias issues they carry.

It was definitely a challenge (the terminology was particularly tricky to translate into visuals), but honestly, I’m so proud of the result! #dataviz 🌈

👇 Check it out here
🇬🇧 In English:
https://civio.es/sanidad/2025/07/03/mole-or-cancer-the-algorithm-that-gets-one-in-three-melanomas-wrong-and-erases-patients-with-dark-skin/

🇪🇸 In Spanish:
https://civio.es/sanidad/2025/06/26/inteligencia-artificial-algoritmos-sanidad-sesgos-discriminacion/

"Why is Sir Keir Starmer so absolutely hellbent on turning us into, in his wince-makingly gauche phrase, ‘an AI superpower’; so keen to jump the gun that he hadn’t even allowed the public consultation on AI and copyright to conclude before he pushed the government’s recommendations – which were, basically, to let copyright holders be damned. He seems to have been seduced by the blandishments of the salespeople for this technology, whose main sales tool is FOMO. AI is a solution in search of a problem. Big tech has invested so much in it that they’re trying to brute-force it into every area of life, and they are succeeding.

Of course, one can see how – for instance – using AI to minute meetings or draft memos can save costly man-hours. But the way to integrate it into the machinery of Whitehall is, or should be, with extreme caution and on a case-by-case basis, not with the panicky haste of someone who’s been persuaded by a lobbyist that if you don’t go all-in on this exciting new technology as fast as possible you’re going to be left behind. It seems something of a tell, for instance, that Principle 8 in the government’s own AI Playbook is: ‘You work with commercial colleagues from the start.’

As Sir Humphrey would say: ‘No, Prime Minister.’"

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/does-anyone-really-want-ai-civil-servants/

#UK #PublicAdministration #AI #GenerativeAI #Bureaucracy #BigTech

"Why is Sir Keir Starmer so absolutely hellbent on turning us into, in his wince-makingly gauche phrase, ‘an AI superpower’; so keen to jump the gun that he hadn’t even allowed the public consultation on AI and copyright to conclude before he pushed the government’s recommendations – which were, basically, to let copyright holders be damned. He seems to have been seduced by the blandishments of the salespeople for this technology, whose main sales tool is FOMO. AI is a solution in search of a problem. Big tech has invested so much in it that they’re trying to brute-force it into every area of life, and they are succeeding.

Of course, one can see how – for instance – using AI to minute meetings or draft memos can save costly man-hours. But the way to integrate it into the machinery of Whitehall is, or should be, with extreme caution and on a case-by-case basis, not with the panicky haste of someone who’s been persuaded by a lobbyist that if you don’t go all-in on this exciting new technology as fast as possible you’re going to be left behind. It seems something of a tell, for instance, that Principle 8 in the government’s own AI Playbook is: ‘You work with commercial colleagues from the start.’

As Sir Humphrey would say: ‘No, Prime Minister.’"

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/does-anyone-really-want-ai-civil-servants/

#UK #PublicAdministration #AI #GenerativeAI #Bureaucracy #BigTech

Czech Republic: Petition for open source in public administration

https://portal.gov.cz/e-petice/1205-petice-za-povinne-zverejneni-zdrojovych-kodu-softwaru-pouzitych-ve-verejne-sprave

#HackerNews #CzechRepublic #OpenSource #PublicAdministration #DigitalGovernance #Transparency

Czech Republic: Petition for open source in public administration

https://portal.gov.cz/e-petice/1205-petice-za-povinne-zverejneni-zdrojovych-kodu-softwaru-pouzitych-ve-verejne-sprave

#HackerNews #CzechRepublic #OpenSource #PublicAdministration #DigitalGovernance #Transparency

"Many of the new hurdles, federal workers said, stem from changes imposed by the U.S. DOGE Service, Elon Musk’s cost-cutting team, which burst into government promising to eradicate waste, fraud and abuse and trim staff and spending.

The team’s overarching goal was in its name: DOGE stands for Department of Government Efficiency, although it is not part of the Cabinet. But as Musk departed government on Friday, many federal workers said DOGE has in many ways had the opposite effect.

DOGE’s intense scrutiny of federal spending is forcing employees to spend hours justifying even the most basic purchases. New rules mandating review and approval by political appointees are leaving thousands of contracts and projects on ice for months. Large-scale firings spearheaded by DOGE have cut support offices — especially IT shops — that assisted federal workers with issues ranging from glitching computers to broken desk chairs. And the piecemeal reassignment of staff is causing significant lags in work in some agencies, notably Social Security, as inexperienced workers adjust to new roles.

Meanwhile, most everyone, across every agency, is dealing with fallout from new policies or executive orders — even as colleagues continue to resign or retire, increasing the workload for those who remain."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/06/02/doge-vowed-make-government-more-efficient-its-doing-opposite/

#USA #Trump #DOGE #Bureaucracy #Austerity #PublicAdministration

"Many of the new hurdles, federal workers said, stem from changes imposed by the U.S. DOGE Service, Elon Musk’s cost-cutting team, which burst into government promising to eradicate waste, fraud and abuse and trim staff and spending.

The team’s overarching goal was in its name: DOGE stands for Department of Government Efficiency, although it is not part of the Cabinet. But as Musk departed government on Friday, many federal workers said DOGE has in many ways had the opposite effect.

DOGE’s intense scrutiny of federal spending is forcing employees to spend hours justifying even the most basic purchases. New rules mandating review and approval by political appointees are leaving thousands of contracts and projects on ice for months. Large-scale firings spearheaded by DOGE have cut support offices — especially IT shops — that assisted federal workers with issues ranging from glitching computers to broken desk chairs. And the piecemeal reassignment of staff is causing significant lags in work in some agencies, notably Social Security, as inexperienced workers adjust to new roles.

Meanwhile, most everyone, across every agency, is dealing with fallout from new policies or executive orders — even as colleagues continue to resign or retire, increasing the workload for those who remain."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/06/02/doge-vowed-make-government-more-efficient-its-doing-opposite/

#USA #Trump #DOGE #Bureaucracy #Austerity #PublicAdministration

Mussolini and Fidel Castro would be proud...

"Federal job applicants will soon be quizzed on their favorite Trump administration policy as part of the hiring process, according to the Office of Personnel Management’s new “merit hiring plan.”

“How would you help advance the president’s executive orders and policy priorities in this role?” asks one of four essay questions that job seekers must answer if they are seeking any federal position GS-5 or above. “Identify one or two relevant executive orders or policy initiatives that are significant to you, and explain how you would help implement them if hired.”

The federal government’s dedicated HR agency published the plan via a joint memo from Vince Haley, director of President Trump’s Domestic Policy Council and acting OPM Director Charles Ezell. The document is a hodgepodge of bipartisan reforms developed under both Trump and former President Biden to accelerate and improve the hiring process, alongside plans to eradicate longstanding efforts to make the federal workforce more reflective of the American populace.

“The American people deserve a federal workforce dedicated to American values and efficient service,” they wrote. “Yet, federal hiring criteria long ago abandoned any serious need for technical skills and adherence to the Constitution. Instead, the overly complex federal hiring system overemphasized discriminatory ‘equity’ quotas and too often resulted in the hiring of unfit, unskilled, bureaucrats.”"

https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2025/05/opm-merit-hiring-plan-includes-bipartisan-reforms-politicized-new-test/405687/

#USA #Trump #BrainWashing #Propaganda #Ideology #Authoritarianism #Dictatorship #PublicAdministration

Mussolini and Fidel Castro would be proud...

"Federal job applicants will soon be quizzed on their favorite Trump administration policy as part of the hiring process, according to the Office of Personnel Management’s new “merit hiring plan.”

“How would you help advance the president’s executive orders and policy priorities in this role?” asks one of four essay questions that job seekers must answer if they are seeking any federal position GS-5 or above. “Identify one or two relevant executive orders or policy initiatives that are significant to you, and explain how you would help implement them if hired.”

The federal government’s dedicated HR agency published the plan via a joint memo from Vince Haley, director of President Trump’s Domestic Policy Council and acting OPM Director Charles Ezell. The document is a hodgepodge of bipartisan reforms developed under both Trump and former President Biden to accelerate and improve the hiring process, alongside plans to eradicate longstanding efforts to make the federal workforce more reflective of the American populace.

“The American people deserve a federal workforce dedicated to American values and efficient service,” they wrote. “Yet, federal hiring criteria long ago abandoned any serious need for technical skills and adherence to the Constitution. Instead, the overly complex federal hiring system overemphasized discriminatory ‘equity’ quotas and too often resulted in the hiring of unfit, unskilled, bureaucrats.”"

https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2025/05/opm-merit-hiring-plan-includes-bipartisan-reforms-politicized-new-test/405687/

#USA #Trump #BrainWashing #Propaganda #Ideology #Authoritarianism #Dictatorship #PublicAdministration

Free chapters of the book "Parliamentary politics in the Netherlands" , for people like me interested in government and public administration.
https://scholarlypublications.universiteitleiden.nl/access/item%3A4177619/view
#politics #publicadministration #parliament #netherlands

Free chapters of the book "Parliamentary politics in the Netherlands" , for people like me interested in government and public administration.
https://scholarlypublications.universiteitleiden.nl/access/item%3A4177619/view
#politics #publicadministration #parliament #netherlands

Finally, someone from DOGE admits it...:

"Now that he’s there, he says he finds himself surrounded by people who “love their jobs,” who came to the government with a sense of mission driving their work.

“In a sense, that makes the DOGE agenda a little bit more complicated, because if half the government took [a buyout offer], then we wouldn’t have to do much more,” he says, implying software can replace departing employees. “We’d just basically use software to plug holes. But that’s not what’s happening.”

Lavingia’s skills with automation, which have helped keep Gumroad lean, are what he hopes to bring to the VA. But when it comes down to it, what he’s found is a machine that largely functions, though it doesn’t make decisions as fast as a startup might.

“I would say the culture shock is mostly a lot of meetings, not a lot of decisions,” he says. “But honestly, it’s kind of fine—because the government works. It’s not as inefficient as I was expecting, to be honest. I was hoping for more easy wins.”"

https://www.fastcompany.com/91330297/doge-sahil-lavignia-gumroad?mvgt=rGOBmdaQxIAe

#USA #Trump #DOGE #Musk #PublicAdministration

Finally, someone from DOGE admits it...:

"Now that he’s there, he says he finds himself surrounded by people who “love their jobs,” who came to the government with a sense of mission driving their work.

“In a sense, that makes the DOGE agenda a little bit more complicated, because if half the government took [a buyout offer], then we wouldn’t have to do much more,” he says, implying software can replace departing employees. “We’d just basically use software to plug holes. But that’s not what’s happening.”

Lavingia’s skills with automation, which have helped keep Gumroad lean, are what he hopes to bring to the VA. But when it comes down to it, what he’s found is a machine that largely functions, though it doesn’t make decisions as fast as a startup might.

“I would say the culture shock is mostly a lot of meetings, not a lot of decisions,” he says. “But honestly, it’s kind of fine—because the government works. It’s not as inefficient as I was expecting, to be honest. I was hoping for more easy wins.”"

https://www.fastcompany.com/91330297/doge-sahil-lavignia-gumroad?mvgt=rGOBmdaQxIAe

#USA #Trump #DOGE #Musk #PublicAdministration

"At the Environmental Protection Agency, research at 11 laboratories has ground to a halt because the Trump administration has not approved most new lab purchases.

At the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, key work on weather forecasting has slowed to a crawl because Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick must sign off personally on many contracts and grants. And at the Social Security Administration, some employees are running out of paper, pens and printer toner because the U.S. DOGE Service has placed a $1 spending limit on government-issued credit cards. (DOGE stands for Department of Government Efficiency, though it is not a Cabinet-level agency.)

Across the federal government, Trump officials are halting a wide range of operations by declining to approve key funds. This unofficial hold on many activities has incapacitated many agencies’ divisions, even though they remain technically intact.
This account of how the administration and DOGE are stalling government operations is based on interviews with more than a dozen federal employees across eight agencies, as well as several internal emails and documents reviewed by The Washington Post. The employees spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/11/trump-government-operations-halt-funding-cuts/

#USA #Trump #DOGE #PublicAdministration #FundingCuts

"At the Environmental Protection Agency, research at 11 laboratories has ground to a halt because the Trump administration has not approved most new lab purchases.

At the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, key work on weather forecasting has slowed to a crawl because Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick must sign off personally on many contracts and grants. And at the Social Security Administration, some employees are running out of paper, pens and printer toner because the U.S. DOGE Service has placed a $1 spending limit on government-issued credit cards. (DOGE stands for Department of Government Efficiency, though it is not a Cabinet-level agency.)

Across the federal government, Trump officials are halting a wide range of operations by declining to approve key funds. This unofficial hold on many activities has incapacitated many agencies’ divisions, even though they remain technically intact.
This account of how the administration and DOGE are stalling government operations is based on interviews with more than a dozen federal employees across eight agencies, as well as several internal emails and documents reviewed by The Washington Post. The employees spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/11/trump-government-operations-halt-funding-cuts/

#USA #Trump #DOGE #PublicAdministration #FundingCuts

"At the Department of Housing and Urban Development, a college undergrad has been tasked with using AI to find where HUD regulations may go beyond the strictest interpretation of underlying laws. (Agencies have traditionally had broad interpretive authority when legislation is vague, although the Supreme Court recently shifted that power to the judicial branch.) This is a task that actually makes some sense for AI, which can synthesize information from large documents far faster than a human could. There’s some risk of hallucination—more specifically, of the model spitting out citations that do not in fact exist—but a human needs to approve these recommendations regardless. This is, on one level, what generative AI is actually pretty good at right now: doing tedious work in a systematic way.

There’s something pernicious, though, in asking an AI model to help dismantle the administrative state. (Beyond the fact of it; your mileage will vary there depending on whether you think low-income housing is a societal good or you’re more of a Not in Any Backyard type.) AI doesn’t actually “know” anything about regulations or whether or not they comport with the strictest possible reading of statutes, something that even highly experienced lawyers will disagree on. It needs to be fed a prompt detailing what to look for, which means you can not only work the refs but write the rulebook for them. It is also exceptionally eager to please, to the point that it will confidently make stuff up rather than decline to respond.

If nothing else, it’s the shortest path to a maximalist gutting of a major agency’s authority, with the chance of scattered bullshit thrown in for good measure."

https://www.wired.com/story/doge-is-in-its-ai-era/?utm_brand=wired&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=aud-dev

#USA #Trump #Musk #DOGE #AI #Austerity #PublicAdministration

"At the Department of Housing and Urban Development, a college undergrad has been tasked with using AI to find where HUD regulations may go beyond the strictest interpretation of underlying laws. (Agencies have traditionally had broad interpretive authority when legislation is vague, although the Supreme Court recently shifted that power to the judicial branch.) This is a task that actually makes some sense for AI, which can synthesize information from large documents far faster than a human could. There’s some risk of hallucination—more specifically, of the model spitting out citations that do not in fact exist—but a human needs to approve these recommendations regardless. This is, on one level, what generative AI is actually pretty good at right now: doing tedious work in a systematic way.

There’s something pernicious, though, in asking an AI model to help dismantle the administrative state. (Beyond the fact of it; your mileage will vary there depending on whether you think low-income housing is a societal good or you’re more of a Not in Any Backyard type.) AI doesn’t actually “know” anything about regulations or whether or not they comport with the strictest possible reading of statutes, something that even highly experienced lawyers will disagree on. It needs to be fed a prompt detailing what to look for, which means you can not only work the refs but write the rulebook for them. It is also exceptionally eager to please, to the point that it will confidently make stuff up rather than decline to respond.

If nothing else, it’s the shortest path to a maximalist gutting of a major agency’s authority, with the chance of scattered bullshit thrown in for good measure."

https://www.wired.com/story/doge-is-in-its-ai-era/?utm_brand=wired&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=aud-dev

#USA #Trump #Musk #DOGE #AI #Austerity #PublicAdministration

"The market economy will not grow in a socially desirable direction on its own. Rather—as my book The Entrepreneurial State stressed over 10 years ago—a dynamic, capable public sector with a decentralized network of public institutions across the innovation chain can shape the direction of growth toward more socially desirable outcomes. The public sector needs to develop competent and well-equipped national, regional, and local governments that can work together to deploy tools like outcomes-oriented procurement and strategic public investment. Unfortunately, the new government initiative so-called the Department of Government Efficiency appears to be a regurgitation of new public management theory—the idea that private-sector management practices should be applied to the delivery of public services, based on the assumption that the government’s attempts to make things better for people could actually make them worse. This contradicts what we need to do: invest in our public sector to develop the dynamic capabilities necessary to foster innovation-led sustainable and inclusive economic growth. And ultimately, this is not about the state doing everything itself—it is also about having the capacity required to work well with others, including private sector actors."

https://rooseveltinstitute.org/blog/mission-oriented-framework-for-economy/

#PublicInvestment #State #EntrepreneurialState #PublicAdministration #PublicPolicy

"The market economy will not grow in a socially desirable direction on its own. Rather—as my book The Entrepreneurial State stressed over 10 years ago—a dynamic, capable public sector with a decentralized network of public institutions across the innovation chain can shape the direction of growth toward more socially desirable outcomes. The public sector needs to develop competent and well-equipped national, regional, and local governments that can work together to deploy tools like outcomes-oriented procurement and strategic public investment. Unfortunately, the new government initiative so-called the Department of Government Efficiency appears to be a regurgitation of new public management theory—the idea that private-sector management practices should be applied to the delivery of public services, based on the assumption that the government’s attempts to make things better for people could actually make them worse. This contradicts what we need to do: invest in our public sector to develop the dynamic capabilities necessary to foster innovation-led sustainable and inclusive economic growth. And ultimately, this is not about the state doing everything itself—it is also about having the capacity required to work well with others, including private sector actors."

https://rooseveltinstitute.org/blog/mission-oriented-framework-for-economy/

#PublicInvestment #State #EntrepreneurialState #PublicAdministration #PublicPolicy

"The problem is that governments and businesses serve vastly different purposes. If public policymakers start mimicking business founders, they will undermine their own ability to address complex societal challenges.

For startups, the highest priority is rapid iteration, technology-driven disruption, and financial returns for investors. Their success often hinges on solving a narrowly defined problem with a single product, or within a single organization. Governments, by contrast, must tackle complex, interconnected issues like poverty, public health, and national security. Each challenge calls for collaboration across multiple sectors, and careful long-term planning. The idea of securing short-term gains in any of these areas doesn’t even make sense.

Unlike startups, governments are supposed to uphold legal mandates, ensure the provision of essential services, and enforce equal treatment under the law – more important today than ever. Metrics like market share are irrelevant, because the government has no competitors. Rather than trying to “win,” it should focus on expanding opportunities and promoting the diffusion of best practices. It must be long-term minded, while achieving nimble and flexible structures that can adapt."

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/government-should-not-act-like-a-startup-or-business-by-mariana-mazzucato-and-rainer-kattel-2025-04

#Governments #StartUps #PublicPolicy #PublicAdministration #PublicInterest