OECD Peer Review of E-Government in Denmark - ePractice.eu

8. Monitoring and evaluation
Denmark has set clear e-government targets for all public sector organisations, and backed these
up with measures for assessing achievement of the targets. Organisations, while having some concerns
over how achievements will be measured, have found these targets helpful. However, the effect of
monitoring and evaluation against the targets is yet to be seen. It is not clear how monitoring will
relate to achievement of goals, and how the results of monitoring will be used to inform future
e-government developments or to manage organisational performance. It is also not clear what
consequences there are for non-participation, either in the overall achievement of the strategy, or in its
various objectives and initiatives (e.g. uptake of interoperability standards).
E-government initiatives in Denmark are not generally proposed, monitored and evaluated on the
basis of a sound and consistently applied approach to developing a business case detailing their
expected financial, economic and social costs, benefits and risks. This problem, which is widely
believed by government organisations to have a negative effect on the overall quality of e-government
projects, has been addressed in the current e-government strategy. Some tools to assist organisations in
improving their performance in this area have been developed by the Digital Task Force and the
Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. However, their use is not mandatory, and they
require further development and communication.
Overall, there is an apparent lack of demand and supply of rigorous monitoring and evaluation of
e-government, either by the Parliament or the Government, which stands in contrast to the practices of
many other OECD countries. Monitoring and evaluation of e-government is a largely discretionary
activity given relatively low priority by many Danish government organisations. The monitoring and
evaluation work being undertaken is biased towards individual organisations and the users of their
services, and is undertaken internally rather than externally to a very significant degree. Results of
monitoring and evaluation are not widely diffused outside most organisations, and there appears to be
little external demand for this type of information. It should be noted, however, that the question of
robust ex post evaluation of e-government is just starting to emerge as a major issue in leading OECD
e-government nations. Any efforts Denmark might make to improve its performance in this area
would be in advance of the majority of its peers.
There has been no explicit monitoring of e-government by the National Audit Office (NAO) so
far. This means that the Parliament is not as strongly positioned to exercise its role in ensuring the
accountability of the executive for achieving e-government goals as it could be, and the public has
little independent information available about the progress of e-government. If the NAO or any other
body does conduct an audit of e-government, it is important that its approach be congruent with both
the objectives and design of the e-government strategy, in order to ensure that the Parliament is not
provided with spurious assessment of the Danish e-government programme.
Finally, there is a proposal to establish an independent municipal “evaluation institute” as part of
the Structural Reform. There is strong consensus that this should contribute to improved performance
of local government. However, it is not clear whether the institute will focus on e-government as part
of its activities. It would seem sensible that, if e-government is to become an area of focus for the new
institute, then the approach taken should reflect awareness of the whole-of-government context for
local e-government efforts, and be designed to support collaboration across different levels of
government.
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