E-MANAGEMENT

e-management

e-management

1. Introduction

Currently, we can note three tendencies:

? Increased involvement of the public in the decision-making process: Public decision makers try to involve citizens in decision- making process without excessive costs and loss of efficiency, but do not know how to do it (Farmer, 1995; Saul, 1992 ; Aydelotte and al, 2000 ; Callon, Barthe, Lascoumes, 2000 ; Reich 1998 ; Thomas, 1995).

? Development of Citizen Relationship Management: Public organizations seek to improve the services rendered to the citizen, by reducing the cost and time, and are looking for tools (Kotler, 1993 ; Berman, 1997 ; Cohen and Henry, 1997).

? Emergence of e-management: The emergence of e-management shows that the integration of ICTs in organizations makes it possible to generate new practices and services and to reduce the cost and the time of the services rendered (Kalika and al., 2002).

2. The field of research: Interactions between citizens and local government

2.1 Definition of citizenship in management Given that the notion of citizenship is ever- changing and constantly being debated, the definition that Leca gave in 1986 presents us with a kind of universal structure in the sense that it considers citizenship as a whole, composed of rights and duties, of a role and moral values.

2.2 Citizen relationship management The 1958 French Constitution states that the very principle of the Republic consists of a “government of the people, by the people and for the people”.

Thus when referring to a government “for the people”, we refer to the first vision of citizenship, i.e. the citizen is a consumer of rights and public services. In this case, the underlying logic for the “government for the people” would be to improve services. “Government of the people” would refer to a citizen as a passive agent. The representatives would then have to improve the chances of success for a policy by making the citizens' adherence easier. Finally, the “government by the people” emphasises the participation facet and considers the citizen as part and parcel of the processes of politics. The goal is then to encourage debate and their participation.

2.3 The local territory as a relevant scale Some authors have taken interest in a national vision, even a supra-national one, of citizenship (Chadwick and May, 2003; Laudon, 1977). As Assens and Phanuel (2001) or Vedel (2001) did, we want to underline the advantages of taking the local level as the reference. The local level approach reinforces the representatives' legitimacy. The local level is thus represented as “the most relevant scale for recovering citizens' trust” (Lefevre, Nonjon, 2003). The local scale makes many strategies possible: “The easiest way to reach government of the people by the people is the city” (Voilin, 1929, cited by Paillart, 2003). In a “government by the people” perspective, the mayor has to protect freedom of speech and regulate the structures in order to ensure good conditions for debate and participation of the citizens, who are then actors in the ...