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very poor impact assessment activities are made by public
administrations in the previous “Step 5” [4]; [39].
In theory, policy makers can start policy planning life cycle once a
policy cycle is completed and move on to a new one with new
strategic objectives [10]. In practice this might not happen
because the Policy Planning Process is highly context-dependent
and extremely affected by contingencies and needs that might be
present on the territory and that have a high degree of urgency.
Unfortunately cases from unsuccessful adoption of eGovernment
tell us how difficult it is to define a structured and comprehensive
implementation of such process and its maintenance over time
[60]. Table 2 shows the key barriers to an effective execution of a
Policy Planning Cycle. This is particularly true at the local level
where Policy Makers and Civil Servants are very close to citizens
and stakeholders [13]; [76], and the presence of a well organized
Policy Evaluation Process could produce more direct and
trustworthy effects on eGovernment adoption [4]; [14]; [42]; [55].
Table 2 – Barriers to eGovernment Policy Planning Cycle
execution
eGovernment
Policy
Planning
Cycle
Policy
Strategy
Formulation
Policy
Guidelines
Definition and
Approval
Policy
Implementatio
n Plan (∑ i-n=
Project ideas)
Design and
Approval
Policy
implementatio
n through
Projects
Barriers
• lack of evaluation and measurement of policy
strategy [4]; [39];
• lack of stakeholders and beneficiary involvement
in needs identification [10]; [13]; [43]; [47];
• lack of comprehensiveness and continuity of
policies and programmes [8];
• lack of clear vision [42]; [44];
• lack of exAnte evaluation approach [12];
• lack of a structured evaluation process circle with
an effective engagement of stakeholders and
beneficiaries [22]; [46];
• difficulties in linking policy decision with
outcomes objectives [3]; [9]; [76]
• lack of stakeholders and beneficiary participation
in policy objectives definition [10]; [7]; [43];
• unclear policy management strategy [42]; [44];
• mismatching between policy outcomes (if
•
defined) and project objectives [12]; [74];
project selected on expected outputs and not on
expected outcomes [17];
• lack of stakeholders and beneficiary involvement
in projects design and specification [13]; [43];
[47];
• lack of coordination and/or strategic planning
[8];
• lack of coordination and cooperation between
departments and among administrations [40];
[42]; [44];
• lack of structured risk management procedures
[11];
• lack of stakeholders and beneficiary involvement
in project development [18] [43]; [47]; [54]; [66];
[68];
• lack of project management expertise [54; [74];
• lack of knowledge and skills for assessing the
risk and making contingency plan [7]; [68];
• resistance to change [65];
• Government departments failing to agree and
implement common procedures and standards to
provide shared networked eGovernmnet services
Policy and
Projects
monitoring
and Gap
Analysis
[9];
• Lack of motivation of public managers in sharing
and opening data amongst organization and to
public [7];
• project monitored on achieved outputs and not on
achieved outcomes [17];
• Lack of evaluation and measurement procedure
[4]; [39];
• Lack of measurement system on eGovernment
process performances and outcomes [7]; [52];
[65]; [66];
• Lack of involvement of citizens and stakeholders
in monitoring projects and policies and for
supporting their sustainability [23];
• Lack of transparency of the monitoring process
and its results on project impacts [23]; [66].
5. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE RESEARCH
Our analysis underlines how in the mature government (see the
MM described in Figure 1) technological barriers to eGovernment
adoption have been significantly reduced, but eGovernment
services are far away to be adopted and there are no clear
evidences of which benefits ICT can offer to citizens. Resistance
to change by civil servants and policy makers are now considered
the most important barriers, causing an evident lack of
trustworthiness in the citizens towards political institutions. The
consequences of these barriers is an unstructured and
untrustworthy decision making process, that slow down adoption,
which in turn weaken the capability to effectively and timely
absorb and use public funds.
292
Two fundamental barriers emerge from our study:
� lack of full involvement of stakeholders and beneficiaries
since the very beginning of the Planning Process;
� lack of an evaluation process that should be conducted in
parallel with each step of the Policy Planning Process itself.
This is especially true at the local level that on the contrary might
benefit more thanks to the proximity among Policy decision
makers, civil servants and citizens [14]; [55]; [57]. However as
[65] and [71] clarify, the two key barriers to an effective Policy
Planning Process are not independent from each other, but rather,
they are the two faces of the same coin:
Good Governance implies stakeholders and citizens participation
that cannot be guaranteed without transparency in the decision
making process; high level of transparency cannot be achieved
without a trusted and robust evaluation process.
Figure 4 shows the circularity of both planning and evaluation
processes and their interaction with the stakeholders and
beneficiaries. As described in the figure, the inner circle
represents the Policy Planning Process, while the outer one
describes the Evaluation Process where the ex-Ante evaluation
receives as input the results of the ex-Post evaluation of the
previous Policy Planning Cycle and then, it produces as output the
objectives of the new Policy Planning, that will be subject to both
an in-itinere evaluation and a new ex-Post one. The middle circle
defines the links between the two other circles. The two processes
run in parallel and the key aspect of both is the active involvement
of stakeholders [23]. Moreover the evaluation process that has the
aim to assess the Public Value of a given Policy Strategy, by
measuring the degree of achievement of the Policy