Summary of Gov 2.0 Presentation
I had the privilege of attending the Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington DC a few weeks ago, and the following is what I shared at the WebSG meetup last night in an attempt to summarise the ideas that are relevant to our local climate.
It was a difficult presentation to put together because it combines such a broad range of areas, from technology, culture and mindsets, and all the way to political ideology. This is accentuated by the fact I straddle both the role of citizen and civil servant. It is my hope, however that this duality help us understand both perspectives.
For the purposes of this presentation, there is a need to define the word “citizen”, a term which will come up often in any discussion of government and even more so in government 2.0. For the purpose of this presentation I’m going to define citizen as “anyone who has thrown their lot in with us”. I think it is as absurd, in this day and age of globalisation that we should continue to define people by where they were born, as it is to judge a person by the colour of their skin. Instead, citizens should be seen as the people who have decided to share a collective fate and a common destiny. People who look at Singapore simply as a stepping stone or springboard need not apply.
In order to understand what Gov 2.0 is, we must first define what Gov 1.0 was, in order to effectively move away from the old model.
