Introducing The Commonwealth Centre for e-Governance
The Commonwealth Centre for e-Governance (CCEG) is a think tank operating under the auspices of an e-Governance program of the Commonwealth Secretariat in London, UK. CCEG is a legal entity incorporated in the United Kingdom and Canada in November 2000. It operates on a global scale, with a board of Directors and Advisory Council from around the world. Members come from government, the private sector and civil society. The Chair of the Advisory Council is Michael Turner, Assistant Deputy Minister, Information Technology Services Branch, Public Works and Government Services Canada. The Vice-Chair of the Council, and cofounder of CCEG is Rogers W’Okot-Uma, former Chief Programme Officer, Management and Training Services Division, Commonwealth Secretariat, London, UK and now an e-Governance practicing specialist in London. The Chair of the Board, and cofounder of CCEG is Thomas B. Riley, President of Riley Information Services Inc. Canada
The purpose of the Commonwealth Centre for e-Governance is to provide insight and knowledge on the changing nature of governments in our growing technology infrastructures. The CCEG is working to develop sets of best practices on how best to use technologies to implement the goals and objectives of public administration. It is the goal of CCEG to work with governments and international organizations to contribute to the growing knowledge base on e-government, e-Governance and eDemocracy. CCEG continues to contribute to developments in these subjects in both a theoretical and practical manner. Part of CCEG’s mandate is offering workshops and seminars in developing countries throughout the world on various aspects of e-government. Much of the focus of CCEG is on the multitude of information and administrative policies that will be needed as developing countries increasingly implement new technologies.
To date, CCEG has conducted a multitude of international studies on the nature of electronic governance and what tools governments need to compete in the knowledge economy. These studies can be found at: www.rileyis.com and on this web site: www.electronicgovindia.net/pubs/index.html. CCEG has also hosted a workshop called the Electronic Library Project in London, UK. This was to explore the possibilities of governments sharing information and knowledge with each other on a global basis. (The minutes of this workshop can be found at: www.electronicgovindia.net/pubs/workshop_reports/index.html)
CCEG has also conducted a series of workshops on electronic governance in Kenya, Ghana, South Africa, India, Mauritius, London, England (4), Malaysia and Canada. CCEG will continue to conduct such studies and workshops and will also be holding an annual conference in different countries around the world.
CCEG CEO Thomas Riley has conducted lectures and workshops in countries around the world. In 2004 he was a key lecturer at the Administrative College of India in Hyderabad, Adwar Pradesh. His lectures dealt on e-Governance and were delivered to students from governments around Southeast Asia. CCEG also lead a team to Mauritius to assist on the development of that country's Master Plan for E-government. The project took place in 2002 and 2003.
The first annual conference of the Commonwealth Centre for e-Governance was held in February 2002. Conference papers on this conference and on a subsequent seminar on privacy, held in October 2002 and organized and hosted by CCEG, can be found at: www. electronicgovindia.net/pubs/workshop_reports/ index.shtml and www.rileyis.com/seminars/seminarseries.htm
The Commonwealth Centre for e-Governance has been working with a number of international organizations on various aspects of e-government, e-Governance and eDemocracy. In 2002 CCEG produced a series of international tracking reports that analyzed the ways governments are moving towards e-government and implementation of new technologies in services delivery and government programs. The 2002 project included comparative studies of international developments of e-government and policies driving developments in e-government. Some of the papers can be found on this site at: www.electronicgovindia.net/pubs/index.html
A further set of studies were conducted in 2003, with a total of five international comparative reports and a series of policy analysis on various aspects of e-Governance as well as an international comparative study on the impact of security and antiterrorism laws on privacy legislation.
In 2004 CCEG continued to produce reports and analysis of various aspects of e-Governance including papers on E-government and Privacy and Security laws. CCEG also researched and wrote a paper entitled: E-government: The Digital Divide and Information Sharing: Examining the Issues. CCEG also publishes guest papers on their web site from authorities on e-government, e-Governance and eDemocracy. All these reports and more can be found at: www.electronicgovindia.net/pubs/index.html