Digital government problems during the COVID-19 pandemic

What is it about?

This article focuses on the implementation and problems of digital government in Indonesia at the central and local levels, as well as the issues these governments have faced in their efforts to deal with the COVID-19 Pandemic. This article uses a public communication perspective as the tool of analysis. It elucidates the main principles of digital government and highlights the vital position of public communication during pandemics and other public health crises. It also underscores the importance of reaching beyond technology to understand digital government, which is ultimately not only a question of technology but also one of communication between the government and the public.

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Photo by Headway on Unsplash

Photo by Headway on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This article finds that the problem of digital government during the COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia is related to technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration. This article finds that the problem of digital government during the COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia is related to technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration. In terms of technology, the main problem is the gap between the quantity of technology developed by the government (central and regional) and the quality of its implementation. Relate to transparency, the government’s choice (especially the central government) to confine information for the public from the early phase of the crisis has negatively impacted public trust and the efforts to handle the pandemic in general for a year. The third aspect shows the lack of data integration and the weak collaboration between levels of government (central and regional governments) and between the government and the public.