AN

ARTICLE ON

IMPACTS OF E-GOVERNANCE
ON PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

By

GUGULOTHU SRINU
MA, (Ph. D) UGC-NET

Department of Public Administration

Osmania University,
HYDERABAD-500007
Contact No: 9959995669

1
INTODUCTION:

Traditional administration, traditional theories, traditional thoughts and classical administrative

principles has been affected due to emergence of e-governance. After 1990s the old concept of state has been
reinvented, government started to re think about its objectives and restructure in administration also take place
due to introduction of liberalization, privatization and globalization concept all over the world. All these
changes leads to technological changes in administration. Because of this technological change administration
became e-administration and e- administration is nothing but e-governance

GENERAL BACKGROUND:

Administration at the time of ancient period led by monarchy which was developed on the base of authority
of the king which never consideration of democratic norms and king enjoys all three powers legislative,
executive and judiciary so king became supreme no body questioned him. This type of state regarded as
autocratic state of feudal state which gave rise to feudal administration. Later at the time of Platoe and Aristotle
the state emerged as political state on the base of political ideologies and administration merged with political
interests of the some the elite groups interests. In this era administration done for achievements of some bodies
political interests. in this era administration completely merged with politics that is there was no difference in
between political science and public administration

After wilsonian dichotomy public administration emerged as separate discipline which deals with
administrative matters only not with policy matters that means policy matters are separate and administrative
matters are separate in executions, so wilsonian dichotomy regarded as first paradigm in public administration
And this was also regarded as first inventing in public administration. After this number of administrative
thinkers developed their contribution for public administration. among of all those thinkers Max weber was one
of the thinker who developed bureaucratic theory, which was gave rise to bureaucratic administration on
weberian line,this was called as ‘bureaucratic state’ and second paradigm in public administration ,later Dwight
waldo developed his concept “administrative state” based on one question that is why should rule? who should
rule?and why they should rule. And also he was added two more organs of government besides three organs of
government. that is electorate and administration, this was third paradigm in public administration

WHY TRADITIONAL ADMINISATION REINVENTED? :

why because traditional bureaucratic administration framed based on an impersonal administration and
inhuman administration which never considered the human elements and human values in administration. And
weberian bureaucracy consisting with lot of restrictions and rigidity and gave importance to rule oriented
administration rather than goal oriented administration. Peoples aspirations ,expectations has been increased
no government able to fulfill the needs of the people and no government able to reach the aspirations of the
people so this was the need of the reforms the administration

2
 Because of traditional rule oriented administration extremism, fundamentalism and naxalism has been
increased,to ensure the needs and expectation of the people traditional rule oriented bureaucratic administration
must be converted in to situational goal oriented administration. to reform the traditional administration
in 1990s David Osborne & Tead Gabler wrote a book “Reinventing government” in their contribution they
demanded that we need no more government we need better government and they gave a slogan reinventing the
state, Rethinking the government and restructure the administration. due to this reason the concept of
liberalization, privatization and globalization emerged, this LPG concept was created lot of changes in
administration. As a result private type of management take place in public sector, this type of state called as
“managerial state”

According to managerial state goal oriented administration important rather than rule oriented administration
in rule oriented administration efficiency and economy concepts were there but in goal oriented administration
not only efficiency and economy concepts are there but also effectiveness added which means applications of
knowledge in administration is necessary. So state stated to reinventing to decrease the unhappiness among the
citizens, government started to rethinking about its objectives and goals because no single national political
party able to form government at central level and first time local parties playing major role in formation of
government at national level, this was need to rethinking the government about its objectives and goals

Administration also suffered with lot of corruption, nepotism, inefficiency and in sufficiency because of
traditional efficiency and economy administration gave importance to rule oriented administration rather than
effectiveness goal oriented administration. To prevent all above things administration also started to restructure
itself as result debureaucratization take place, out sources allowed in administration, permit raj quota cancelled.
Due to this reason lot of technological changes take place allover the world all these technological changes
produced different equipments, all of the equipments computer technology is one of the equipment which
finally leads to cybernetic administration which is now considering as “cybernetic state”

In cybernetic state there is no difference in between public administration and political science both were
remerged and created lot of administrative changes both technologically as well as theoretically which intended
to speedy disposal of administrative information and decreased uses of traditional equipments like pen, paper
etc this cybernetic state may be regard as fourth paradigm in public administration in future. Cybernetic
administration is nothing but e-governance. and e-governance is nothing but e-administration .present we are in
cybernetic state.

3
Following technological as well as theoretical changes occurred in administration

To known the various impacts of e-governance on administration both technically as well as theoretically
Technical impacts also called as practical impacts and theoretical impacts also called as functional impacts

THEORITICAL IMPACTS OF E- GOVERNANCE:

Traditional theories and traditional principles of public administration are main affected areas about e-
governance, theoretical impacts occurs gradually and changes the shape of the administration on theoretical
aspect rather than practical aspect, theoretical impacts occurs in to two manner in positive manner and negative
manner, following administrative principles affected due to emergence of e-governance

CENTRALIZATION AND DECENTRALIZATION:

The principle centralization was given importance by classical thinkers but human relationists gave
importance to decentralization due to encourage of democratic norms that means centralization became
decentralization but after emergence of e-governance decentralization again decentralized and became again
centralization .but this change occurred only in functionally or operationally but not politically, that means the
chief executive can issues the orders directly to subordinates who works at field level and gets the information
directly without delay, that is in e-governance administrative objective of the superior achieved immediately
and simultaneously ensures the need of the client immediately

CONCENTRATION AND DECONCENTRATION:

Most of the field offices at district level India created on the principle of deconcentration. Earlier the concept
of concentration existed but after development of democratic norms deconcentration has been encouraged ,for
eg :in India the offices of district collector created on the principle of deconcentration .in France prefects
created on the principle of concentration. But in India after emergence of e-governance deconcentration became
concentration again through reconcentration process

IMPACT ON HIERARCHY :

Due to emergence of e-governance the principle hierarchy has been abolished, with abolition of hierarchy
red tapism, rigidity avoided in administration and easy movement of file, speedy disposal of work and
efficiency of the organization increased. But main draw back of e-governance on hierarchy is that relation in
between subordinate and super ordinate has been abolished and it leads to in efficiency in the organization

4
UNITY OF COMMAND :

As a result of e-governance unity of command became as e-commands that means orders passes through
cybernetic system after introduction of the concept of e-commands(unity of command) the multip licity of
command emerged as powerful organ,that is number of subordinates receives e- commands simultaneously
from one superior. E-commands encourages speedy disposal of work but simultaneously it increases distance in
between superior and subordinates

SPAN OF CONTROL:

Due to emergence of e-governance the span of control of superior increased personally due to technological
factor and decreases man power in administration because of extra subordinates removed by the management,
That means men were replaced by machineries, so there are number of subordinates decreases to control by
superior.

DIVISION OF WORK:

This was the highly impacted principle by e-governance. Actual division of work takes place in
organization based on activities but after emergence of e-governance all these activities merged in to a single
activity that is cybernetic activity that means those activities which performed by group of members now
replaces by group machines. This type of technological trend may leads to unemployment among the youth
But work efficiency of the organization increases and expenditure up on the subordinates decreases

COORDINATION:

Direct coordination that is man to man coordination not possible in administration because of
E-governance, that is direct coordination replaced by indirect coordination, why because in e-governance
synchronization of efforts possible only through e-commands and e-contacts and coordination possible only
through video conference. Teleconference etc.in e-governance man to man coordination and man to man
contacts replaced e-coordinations and e-contacts respectively

5
PRACTICAL IMPACTS OF E-GOVERNANCE ON ADMINISTRATION:

Practical impacts also called as technical impacts. due to emergence of these technological impacts radical
changes occurred in administration
Following radical changes occurred in administration

ABOLITION OF 3Ps :

Earlier an office consisting with pen, person and paper but after emergence of e-governance 3Ps has been
abolished that is no paper no person and no pen

EMERGENCE OF E-OFFICES:

The old concept of offices has been abolished and new offices came in to existence, an office is without
officer with 24 hours without persons eg: bank ATMs

WORLD WIDE WEBSITE (WWW):

The world wide website change total world as a global village , whatever administrative information insert
In the system can available any where and every where all over the world, that is availability of the information
is the main fetching of the e-governance

MOBILE COMMUNICATION REVOLUTION (MCR):

Mobile communication service totally changed the administrative shape of the world. due to emergence of
MCR whatever information occurs any where all over the world passes very rapidly and keep alerts

E-BUSINESS AND E-COMMERCE:

Now a days business, trade and commerce every thing done by cybernetic technology .accounting matters
money matters, finance matters every thing is deals by digital technology only

CONCLUSION:

What about the future of public administration and future of E-governance?

Traditional public administration replaced by new public management, in traditional public administration
administrators works on the principles of rules regulations, but in new public management only coordinators
,organizers and managers and computer operators are there .that means public administration replaced by new
public management , new public management replaced by private management similarly in e-governance
public administration replaced by e-administration means e-governance in future e-governance will be replaced
by e management every thing will be done by e management

The people who will not known about the e learning they will be treated as e illiterates in future the general
term literacy will be replaced by e-literacy

6
7