Abstract
Information and communication technologies (ICT) shape our everyday lives both as consumers as well as in the work place. But it is of a rather recent date that ICT also show a more than trivial impact on the political sphere, which is characterized by collective decision-making. Assessing the potential influence of ICT on policies, politics and polities thus is the focus of this paper. ICT are not a set of uniform technologies, but consist of a number of separate technological components which are still evolving. This paper provides a clear conceptual approach in analysing and evaluating the on-going processes of change at the different levels ICT brings about. By applying an evolutionary economics approach, we discuss ICT in regard to its potential with respect to policies, politics and polities. We firstly ask what impact ICT have on policies as the outcome of the policy-making process under given political institutions. Secondly, we analyse what influence ICT have on the policy-making process itself, again assuming given political institutions defining this process. Finally, we also touch the question what impact ICT have on the underlying constitutional institutions defining the polity. We conclude with a summary and an outlook on further research questions.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Aichholzer, G., & Rose, G. (2020). Experience with digital tools in different types of e-Participation. In L. Hennen, et al. (Eds.), European E-democracy in practice (pp. 93–140). Cham/Switzerland.
Alcaide Muñoz, L., & Rodríguez Bolívar, M. P. (Eds.). (2018). International E-government development. Cham/Switzerland.
Anderson, D., et al. (2015). E-Government strategy, ICT and innovation for citizen engagement, New York.
Barlai, M. (2013). Politischer Extremismus und Populismus in Europa - Fester Bestandteil einer E-Öffentlichkeit? FPÖ und Jobbik im Web, In P. Filzmaier, et al. (Eds.), Wir sind EU-ropa. Von vielen Eu-Öffentlichkeiten zu einer europäischen Öffentlichkeit. Edition netPOL. Politische Kommunikation, Vol. 4 (pp. 60–72). Wien.
Biselli, A. (2017). Lieber auf zu neuen Ufern: Über den Zustand der Piratenpartei. Netzpolitik.org. September 18, 2017, https://netzpolitik.org/2017/lieber-auf-zu-neuen-ufern-ueber-den-zustand-der-piratenpartei/. Last access March 08, 2021.
Breier, C., Meyer, M., & Baumann, M. (2017). Smart Government: Was macht eine smarte Verwaltung aus? Eine Literaturanalyse. Yearbook of Swiss Administrative Sciences, 8, 168–184. https://doi.org/10.5334/ssas.113
Chaminade, C., Lundvall, B.-Å., & Haneef, S. (2018). Advanced introduction to national innovation systems. Cheltenham.
Charalabidis, Y., et al. (2018). The world of open data. Cham/Switzerland.
Cimoli, M., Dosi, G., & Yu, X. (2020). Industrial policies, patterns of learning, and development. In A. Oqubay, et al. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of industrial policy (pp. 92–124).
Coleman, S. (2009). E‐democracy: The history and future of an idea. In R. Mansell (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of information and communication technologies (pp. 362–382).
Demaj, L. (2018). Smart Government: Die Verwaltung und den Staat der Zukunft denken. Informatik Spektrum, 41, 123–137. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00287-018-1098-x.
Dencik, L., et al. (2019). The ‘golden view’: Data-driven governance in the scoring society. Internet Policy Review [online], 8. https://doi.org/10.14763/2019.2.1413.
Dosi, G. (1982). Technological paradigms and technological trajectories. A suggested interpretation of the determinants and directions of technical change. Research Policy, 11, 147–162. https://doi.org/10.1016/0048-7333(82)90016-6.
Dosi, G., & Nelson, R. R. (2020). Technological paradigms and technological trajectories. In M. Augier & D. V. Teece (Eds.), The Palgrave encyclopedia of strategic management (pp. 1–12). https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-94848-2_733-1.
Dwyer, T. (2020). Privacy from your mobile devices? In R. Ling, et al. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of mobile communication and society (pp. 546–562).
EU Commission. (2003). The role of eGovernment for Europe’s future. Communication {SEC(2003) 1038}, Brussels, 26.9.2003 COM(2003) 567 final. http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2003:0567:FIN:EN:PDF. Last access March 08, 2021.
EU Commission. (2019). Digital economy and society index report 2019, digital public services, DESI Report EU 2019, https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/digital-economy-and-society-index-desi-2019. Last access March 03, 2021.
Everling, O. (Ed.). (2020). Social Credit Rating. Reputation und Vertrauen beurteilen. Wiesbaden.
Fagerberg, J. (2005). Innovation. A guide to the literature. In J. Fagerberg, D. C., Mowery, & R. R. Nelson (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of innovation (pp. 1–28).
Fagerberg, J., Mowery, D. C., & Nelson, R. R. (Eds.). (2005). The Oxford handbook of innovation, Oxford et al.
Fransman, M. (2010). The new ICT ecosystem: Implications for policy and regulation, Cambridge et al.
Freedom House. (2021). New report: The global decline in democracy has accelerated. Press Release, March 3, 2021, https://freedomhouse.org/article/new-report-global-decline-democracy-has-accelerated. Last access March 08, 2021.
Freeman, C. (1987). Technology policy and economic performance. Lessons from Japan. London.
Freeman, C., & Louca, F. (2002). As time goes by: From the industrial revolution to the information revolution. Oxford, New York.
Frissen, V., et al. (2007). The future of eGovernment. An exploration of ICT-driven models of eGovernment for the EU in 2020, European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Institute for Prospective Technological Studies, Luxembourg, http://ftp.jrc.es/EURdoc/eur22897en.pdf. Last access July 11, 2013.
Guckelberger, A. (2019). Öffentliche Verwaltung im Zeitalter der Digitalisierung. Analysen und Strategien zur Verbesserung des E-Governments aus rechtlicher Sicht, Baden-Baden.
Hintz, A. (2020). Digital citizenship in the age of datafication. In S. J. Yates, & R. E. Rice (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of digital technology and society (pp. 525–546).
Interaktive Demokratie. (2013). Liquid feedback. Interactive democracy, http://liquidfeedback.org/. Last access March 08, 2021.
Kneuer, M. (2019). E-government im internationalen Vergleich. In J. Hofmann, et al. (Eds.), Politik in der digitalen Gesellschaft, Bielefeld (pp. 189–204).
Kneuer, M., & Datts, M. (2020). E-democracy and the matter of scale revisiting the democratic promises of the internet in terms of the spatial dimension. Politische Vierteljahresschrift, 61, 285–308. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11615-020-00250-6.
Lang, J., & de Sterck, H. (2014). The Arab spring: A simple compartmental model for the dynamics of a revolution. Mathematical Social Science, 69, 12–21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mathsocsci.2014.01.004
Lindner, R., & Aichholzer, G. (2020). E-Democracy: Conceptual Foundations and Recent Trends. In L. Hennen, et al. (Eds.), European E-democracy in practice, Cham/Switzerland, (pp. 11–45).
Meier, A., & Slembeck, T. (1998). Wirtschaftspolitik. Ein kognitiv-evolutionärer Ansatz, München, Wien, 2.ed.
Metcalfe, S. J. (1988). The diffusion of innovations: An interpretative survey. In G. Dosi, et al. (Eds.), Technical change and economic theory, London (pp. 560–590).
Metcalfe, S. J. (1998). On rival concepts of competition and the evolutionary connection. In S. J. Metcalfe (Ed.), Evolutionary economcis and creative destruction, London et al. (pp. 10–39).
Nelson, R. R. (1995). Recent evolutionary theorizing about economic change. Journal of Economic Literature, 33, 48–90.
Neumayer, C. (2020). Political protest and mobile communication. In R. Ling, et al. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of mobile communication and society (pp. 243–256).
OECD. (1997). National systems of innovation, http://www.oecd.org/science/inno/2101733.pdf. Last access March 08, 2021.
OECD/International Telecommunications Union. (2011). M-Government: mobile technologies for responsive governments and connected societies. https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264118706-en.
Persson, T., & Tabellin, G. (2002). Political economics: Explaining economic policy, Vol. 1, Cambridge/MA.
Promberger, K., Bernhart, J., & Früh, G. (2010). E-Government. In K. Promberger, J. Bernhart, & G. Früh (Eds.), E-Government. Konzepte, Modelle und Erfahrungen, Wien (pp. 1–35).
Ronchi, A. M. (2019). e-Democracy. Cham/Switzerland.
Saeed, S., Ramayah, T., & Mahmood, Z. (2019). User centric E-government. Cham/Switzerland.
Schradie, J. (2019). The revolution that wasn’t. How digital activism favors conservatives. Cambridge/MA.
Schumpeter, J. A. (1952). Theorie der wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung. Eine Untersuchung über Unternehmergewinn, Kapital, Kredit, Zins und den Konjunkturzyklus, Berlin, 5.ed.
Smith, A., et al. (2019). Publics in emerging economies worry social media sow division, even as they offer new chances for political engagement, pew research center, May 2019, https://www.pewresearch.org. Last access March 08, 2021.
Stember, J., Eixelsberger, W., & Spichiger, A. (2018). Wirkungen von E-Government. Wiesbaden.
Suri, P. K., & Sushil. (2017). Strategic planning and implementation of E-governance. Singapore.
Szostek, D. (2019). Blockchain and the law. Baden-Baden.
UNESCO. (2013). art. E-Governance, http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=3038&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html. Last access March 08, 2021.
United Nations. (2020). 2020 United Nations E-government survey. Digital government in the decade of action for sustainable development. With addendum on COVID-19 response, https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/publication/2020-united-nations-e-government-survey. Last access March 03, 2021.
von Bloomberg, M. (2020). The social credit system and china’s rule of law. In O. Everling (Ed.), Social credit rating. Reputation und Vertrauen beurteilen. Wiesbaden (pp. 111–137).
von Hippel, E. (1998). The source of innovation. Oxford.
Wei, R. (2020). Mobile media and political communication. In R. Ling, et al. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of mobile communication and society (pp. 228–243).
West, D. M. (2005). Digital government: Technology and public sector performance. Princeton.
Wikipedia. (2013a). Art. List of Pirate Parties, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Pirate_Parties. Last access July 11, 2013.
Wikipedia. (2013b). Art. Pirate Party, online http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_Party. Last access July 11, 2013.
World Bank. (n.d.). BRIEF Digital Government for Development, https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/digitaldevelopment/brief/digital-government-for-development. Last access March 03, 2021.
World Bank. (2015). BRIEF e-Government, May 19, 2015 https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/digitaldevelopment/brief/e-government. Last access March 03, 2021.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Eckardt, M. (2021). The Impact of ICT on Policies, Politics, and Polities—An Evolutionary Economics Approach to Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). In: Herberger, T.A., Dötsch, J.J. (eds) Digitalization, Digital Transformation and Sustainability in the Global Economy. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77340-3_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77340-3_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-77339-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-77340-3
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)