key: cord-0783191-vh1dywox
authors: Warf, Barney
title: 4 Southeast Asia
date: 2017-12-31
journal: E-Government in Asia
DOI: 10.1016/b978-0-08-100873-7.00004-0
sha: b6e5bfcc25270ad160f90187ef81da3cde7700d5
doc_id: 783191
cord_uid: vh1dywox

Abstract Southeast Asia exhibits an enormous diversity in types and levels of sophistication of e-government. Singapore has one of the world's best-developed systems. At the other end of this spectrum lie impoverished states such as Laos, Cambodia, and Myanmar, where e-government barely exists. Malaysia and Thailand occupy positions in between. The Philippines is an interesting case where e-government centers largely around text messaging.

After decades fighting French, Japanese, and American occupations, Vietnam established a rigid, single-party communist dictatorship in the 1970s that in many respects imitated that of China, with strict socialist controls and severe political repression. However, gradually, starting in the 1980s a series of steps, such as the doi moi reforms, led to a quasimarket-based economy. It also began to loosen the government's grip and open the country to the world economy, including joining ASEAN and the World Trade Organization in 2006. Its economy is still largely agricultural, but it has developed burgeoning industries in garments and food production. While a relatively poor country, its population of 90 million is well educated.

Vietnam ranks relatively low in terms of IT usage. Its 2015 e-government readiness score was a mediocre 0.5217, and Internet penetration stood at 51%. There are only five Internet service providers (ISPs) in the country, including Vietnam Data Communications, a subsidiary of the state monopoly, Vietnam Post and Telecommunications. Mobile phone usage is common and constitutes one of the main avenues for accessing the Internet. It is also one of the world's most severe Internet censors. E-participation was rated at a mere 0.1053, indicating a society not yet positioned to reap the fruits of the Internet. Five ISPs serve the country.

Vietnam got a very late start in implementing e-government, and did so precisely as reformers began the gradual shift to a more market-based society. Early efforts were supported by the French government (Thao and Trong, 2015) . At the behest of the e-government steering board, ministerial websites were completed, but not until 2003. In 2002, it formed the Ministry of Post and Telematics to oversee IT development in the country. In 2010, the government passed Act Number 43, which promoted the shift of government services online. The state has attempted to create an e-customs facility, with limited success.

At the simplest level of e-government-web pages that provide information-Vietnam has made several gains. All 64 provinces developed their own websites, to various degrees of functionality. Virtually all public offices are connected to the Vietnam Wide Area Network (CPNet), built in 1997 in the LotusNotes environment, which supports e-mail, searches of journals, and exchanges of documents. Vietnamese e-government is most evident in cities such as Hanoi, Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City), and Danang (Tsai et al., 2009) . It is there the government has taken tentative steps toward online registration and licensing. Hanoi allows online registration of births and deaths. Hanoi and Saigon introduced the "tale of two cities" project (Desai and Magalhaes, 2001) , portals that inform potential investors of how to start a business there. However, many government websites are not user-friendly, are not updated sufficiently frequently, and provide few opportunities for user feedback. They are thus "supply driven" rather than user driven. In 2006, the government launched the official Vietnam government information portal (www.vietnam.gov.vn) using Oracle technology. The Vietnam digital government webpage (http://egov.org.vn/2016/en/homepage/) is relatively sophisticated, with announcements of conferences and seminars. Despite considerable investment, e-government in Vietnam has fallen far below popular expectations (Khanh et al., 2015) . Vietnam has suffered its share of disappointments in e-government. Its first major foray was a disaster. In 2001, Vietnam launched the widely heralded Project 112, at a cost of $220 million, to integrate government software across the country, train personnel in IT, and link government agencies through a shared network of linked databases. However, the project never really got off the ground and never confronted the country's severe digital divide between cities and rural areas. Project 112 disappointed its government backers (Obi and Hai, 2010) and collapsed in 2007 when several high-ranking administrators were arrested on charges of receiving kickbacks from software companies (AmCham Vietnam, n.d.) . In 2012, the project was discontinued. To be fair, however, failures of e-government projects are not uncommon in the developing world (Dada, 2006) , where they are particularly painful given the limited resources at their disposal.

More recently the country has enjoyed modest successes. In 2007, the state began the ICT Development Project with World Bank funding. It yielded several fruits, such as allowing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to issue visas online inside of Vietnam and at 95 overseas diplomatic offices. Similarly, Microsoft's CityNext project funded the growth of interactive municipal websites in the country as well as e-health programs and a cloud computing e-government platform. In 2014, Vietnam took steps toward establishing an e-procurement system modeled after that in Chile and installed by South Korean experts in an exchange brokered by the World Bank.

The same year Danang developed Vietnam's first municipal e-government system with input from South Korea, offering 1500 services online, such as license applications, land use registration, water quality monitoring, and free wireless Internet. In the same vein, Hai Phong City launched an e-government program in 2015 that allows residents to use secure user names, pay fees, and submit comments. The city also has a networked environmental management system that provides online data about air quality, which is also displayed on a large digital bulletin board in the central market (Mol, 2009 ).

Vietnam's lack of success in e-government reflects, among other things, the country's relatively low rate of Internet penetration; for many people in rural areas, IT is simply unaffordable. Nguyen and Shauder (2007) concluded that vast swaths of the populations were simply unprepared to use the Internet effectively. Large shares of the population have never heard of e-government or used available services (Obi and Hai, 2010) . As Việt Nam News (2013) notes, "Government online services fail because of problems with internet connections, font errors, documents and systems, lack of online announcements, and feedback and support." IT standards are often not the same, limiting interoperability. Moreover, the government generated insufficient technically skilled personnel, inadequate funding, poor protection of intellectual property, and lacked clear, decisive leadership. Many policies focused on implementing hardware without due consideration of staff and users' needs. But Vietnam's problems have another, deeper cause. In totalitarian states, governments fear the potentially democratizing effects of the Internet and the access to media channels outside of officially sanctioned ones that it offers. Vietnam's Leninist state has long pursued a rigid path of Internet censorship (Pierre, 2000) , or what is sometimes called the "Bamboo Firewall" in homage to China. Surborg (2008) notes that the government uses its censorship tools selectively to maximize its flexibility in its control of cyberspace. The Ministry of Public Security rigorously monitors web pages for content it deems offensive. Despite the liberalizing efforts known as doi moi, the Vietnamese Communist Party keeps a firm grip on cybertraffic, particularly Internet sites considered to be "offensive to Vietnamese culture" (Human Rights Watch, 2002) . The state uses a complex system of firewalls, access controls, and strenuously encouraged self-censorship. Websites that express views on human rights, religion, or the views of the Vietnamese diaspora are routinely blocked, as are those that carry Radio Free Asia. In 2003, the government lashed out at Reporters Without Borders after the organization listed the country as one of the world's 15 worst censors of the Internet. The country's sole ISP with a license for international connections, Vietnam Data Communications, is a subsidiary of the government telecommunications monopoly. Domestic content providers must obtain special licenses from the Ministry of the Interior and lease connections from the state-owned Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Corporation. E-mail is regularly monitored by searches for key words. Vietnam has imprisoned those who dare to use the Internet to speak out against the government: bloggers such as Phan Thanh Hai, Paulus Lê Sơn, Lu Van Bay, Pham Minh Hoang, and Nguyễn Văn Hải have been repeatedly arrested, all for calling for democracy. A 2010 law requires owners of cybercafes to install software that monitors users' actions. Owners who permit searches of unauthorized websites by their clients face fines of five million dong, roughly US$330 (Kalathil and Boas, 2003) .

In short, Vietnam's strategy appears to offer the patina of transparency without democracy. It is thus caught in the classic "dictator's dilemma," i.e., it needs the Internet and the benefits it offers but is fearful of the emancipatory opportunities it inevitably generates.

A small and impoverished state (population 14 million) devastated by years of warfare, including the American invasion in the 1970s and horrendous Khmer Rouge genocide, Cambodia has struggled to find a footing in the global economy. Overwhelmingly rural and agricultural, it has incipient industries in garments and back offices. Literacy stands at only 69%. One might not expect Cambodia to have any e-government presence whatsoever. In 2016, its Internet penetration was only 25%, well below the world and Asian averages. However, 94% of Cambodians claim to have a cell phone, of whom 39% use smartphones (Phong and Sola, 2015). As the bulk of the population lives in rural areas, the digital divide is severe (Wijers, 2010) , and rates of e-literacy are low. As of 2011, it had 37 ISPs and 229 Internet cafes. Oddly, Prime Minister Hun Sen decreed that 3G mobile phones would not be allowed to support video calls. Like many poor Southeast Asian states, its e-participation index was not measurable.

Cambodia is in the very earliest stages of e-government. In 2000, the government established the ICT Development Authority, which was charged with the creation of information networks there. The government has since issued a series of plans to promote ICT use, with limited success. The latest plan, the New National ICT Policy of 2015, includes calls to promote IT literacy, improve the rate of use by women, and reduce the digital divide (Kevreaksmey et al. 20l5) . Sang et al. (2009) identify multiple challenges policy implementation, including lack of an IT infrastructure, poor management, inequality in access, and insufficient digital privacy and security. In 2001, the state initiated the e-government project to build a Wide Area Network to service 27 government ministries in Phnom Penh, with plans to extend it in phases to cities lower in the urban hierarchy. An incipient fiber backbone system tentatively connects the major cities. In Ratanakiri province, an innovative project links remote villages to the Internet via a Wi-Fi access point mounted to motorbikes; the e-mail system allows the provincial hospital to use the system for referrals to Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School in Boston, with digital cameras for long-distance diagnoses (Borzo, 2004) .

Most Cambodian e-government consists of simple one-way flows of information via websites, the most primitive form. The National Information Communication Technology Development Authority built a website (www.nida.gov.kh) in 2000 to offer information to the minority of citizens with Internet access. However, IT adoption is very uneven among government agencies due to varying leadership styles and availability of qualified personnel (Cambodian National Information Communications Technology Development Authority and Japan International Cooperation Agency, 2009). Even ministries with websites often do not update them sufficiently. However, this situation may be changing: the Ministry of Foreign Affairs launched e-Visa, which allows for tourist visas to be obtained online.

The country's most significant venture into e-government is the Government Administration Information System (GAIS), which started in 2000 and was designed to include an electronic document exchange system as well as registration systems for real estate transactions, residents (for keeping track of jobs, school attendance, and tax payments), and vehicle registrations, including taxes, registrations, and safety inspections (Sang et al., 2009 (Sang et al., , 2010 . It also includes bulletin boards and electronic document management tools. However, as yet the system does not enjoy widespread use, and measures to guarantee transparency and accountability have fallen short.

Internet censorship in Cambodia is minimal, although the government does occasionally block some blogs, ostensibly on moral grounds. The constitution protects free speech, although this is not always the case in practice. The state has blocked access to the hosting service Blogspot. It also periodically monitors cybercafes, including surveillance cameras, and has threatened to close cafes too close to schools. Some NGOs have complained about limitations on Internet service as well.

Laos is a small (population 6 million), impoverished, landlocked state that holds the dubious distinction of being the most-bombed country in human history. One of the poorest in Asia, it relies heavily on subsistence agriculture. The government remains a rigid communist dictatorship.

Laos's 2015 e-government readiness score was merely 0.2935, Internet penetration in mid-2016 stood at 19.9%, but cell phone usage reached 80%, including cheap phones using pirated software, and mobile Internet use has been growing. A fiber backbone stretches over the country, built in phases. The Internet is administered by the National Internet Committee under the prime minister's office, and censorship is minimal. Most of the telecommunications operators are state owned, but there are two private ISPs. As with many highly undeveloped states, most people live in rural areas with little to no Internet access, and technical skills are rare. IT equipment is uncommon and Internet service is also quite expensive. The government lacks a clear IT strategy, and its implementation has been slowed by in-fighting among ministries and agencies. However, it launched its own satellite, LaoSat-1, in November 2015. Like Cambodia and Myanmar, its e-participation is so low as to be not measurable.

Despite these structural impediments, Laos has taken tentative steps toward e-government implementation. The Lao E-government Action Plan in 2006 implemented the Lao National E-Government Project. An optical fiber network runs throughout the capital. In Vientiane, it erected a national e-government service center to coordinate digital communications among agencies, and founded 16 provincial e-government service centers throughout the land. The National Bank of Laos has slowly moved toward e-banking. The National University of Laos began distance-learning courses for students in remote villages. The Ministry of Public Security implemented a national electronic citizen ID card system. The Lao Decide Info project has online databases for census, housing, agriculture, and mining and hydropower. It has initiated steps for interactive websites, although this capacity is largely lacking to date. In 2013, the government allowed businesses to submit applications for operational and trade licenses online. The same year, the Lao Ministry of Post and Telecommunication's National Internet Center launched the Lao Computer Emergency Response Team, a unit focused on battling cybercrime. Laos also joined the Greater Mekong Sub-region Information Superhighway Network, which also includes China, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, and Myanmar, and whose purpose is to promote IT adoption in the region. It also established cooperative agreements with India and South Korea toward that end.

Formerly Burma, Myanmar has long been one of Southeast Asia's poorest and most isolated countries. A corrupt, repressive government, the State Peace and Development Council inhibited economic and social development through mismanagement, although since 2011 it has taken small steps to becoming more open and democratic. Sanctions have been eased and foreign investment has grown. As with many Southeast Asian countries, the population is overwhelmingly rural. Given this context, the telecommunications infrastructure is poorly developed; its 2015 e-government readiness score was an abysmal 0.2703, and in 2016 Internet penetration was only 19.3%. Shortages of equipment and technical skills are endemic. Myanmar has no coherent national IT strategy or e-government policy, and e-participation was essentially zero.

Against all odds, e-government has taken root in Myanmar (Oo and Than, 2008). As early as 1996, it passed the Myanmar Computer Science Development Law. Under the junta, with little to no Internet access or IT experience, programmers developed a font so that they could communicate in their language, the zawgyi standard, which is not Unicode compliant; as a result it inhibited integration into the computer systems of multinational corporations and the broader global Internet. The Ministry of Science and Technology developed and implemented several IT master plans. By 2003, some ministries had developed their own web pages, and over the next decade almost all 32 had done so. The state passed the Electronic Transactions Law in 2004 to lay the legal basis for the digitization of government programs, including electronic records and signatures as well as punishment of computer crimes (Blythe, 2010) .

Under the military junta, the government of Myanmar, according to the OpenNet Initiative (2006, p. 4), "implement[ed] one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control." The junta barred 84% of sites "with content known to be sensitive to the Burmese state" (p. 4). It also excluded e-mail sites such as Hotmail and Yahoo because they cannot be monitored for political criticism, and pornography. The 1996 Computer Science Development Law required that all network-ready computers be registered with the Ministry of Communications, Posts and Telegraphs. To implement its censorship, the government purchases software from the U.S. company Fortinet to block access to selected websites and servers. At times, the state resorted to blunter instruments: when it sought to silence demonstrators in 2007, it switched off the country's Internet network altogether for 6 weeks.

With the collapse of the junta in 2011, the pace of change accelerated. The government set up an e-National Task Force to draft cyberlaws and sought to increase the number of IT professionals. It partnered with the Asian Development Bank in 2013 to develop a systematic plan for e-governance. Many municipalities have developed their own web pages. Most public websites were developed by Myanmars.net, a longstanding Burma-based web developer. The state initiated an e-procurement system (Xinhuanet, 2004) , and the government now accepts online applications for visas. More recently it developed the Myanmar Basic E-government System project with a $10 million from the Daewoo International Corporation and KCOMS Company of South Korea. The government also partnered with InfoSys, Microsoft, and Cisco to develop the necessary hardware and expertise. The e-passport project uses an RFID tag to verify a person's identity with technology from the Malaysian Image Retrieval Identification System. The government has also used IT in selected parts of the education sector (Mar, 2004) . Burma/Myanmar has only two ISPs and both outlets charge high prices for e-mail accounts. Some cities, such as Yangon and Mandalay, have gingerly approached the use of IT through their respective development councils. Some agencies have even begun to make their web pages citizen centered (Misra and Das, 2014).

One of the second generation "mini-dragons" or "new tigers," Thailand has since the 1990s experienced rapid and sustained economic growth, as the perpetual traffic jams in Bangkok attest. A large, skilled middle class, high rates of literacy, and considerable disposable income attracted significant sums of foreign investment. All told, Thailand was ripe for the creation of an IT infrastructure and e-government. In 2016, its Internet penetration rate was 60.1%, and its 2015 e-government readiness index stood at 0.5953. E-participation was rated 0.3158 but improving. In terms of e-government variables, Thailand thus stands ahead of countries such as Cambodia or Myanmar, but behind states such as Singapore and Malaysia. Broadband is available in all the large cities but much less so outside of them.

Thailand got an early start in e-government. In 1986, it established the National Electronics and Computer Technology Center, reorganized in 1991 as the National Science and Technology Development Agency. In 1993, Chulalongkorn University initiated Internet connections. Its e-government initiatives date back to 1994, when the Sub-Committee of Promotion of Utilization of Information Technology in Public Organization began to push for the computerization of public offices and the promotion of IT training for employees. Soon thereafter the state promoted the use of electronic data interchange among public agencies. In 1996, the government announced its first National IT Policy, called IT2000, which accelerated development of the government's information network (a high speed virtual private network), the SchoolNet program to introduce the Internet into schools, and the legal infrastructure that makes digital transactions safe, private, and secure. Relevant legislation included an Electronic Transactions Bill, an Electronic Signature Bill, and a Computer Crimes Bill. In 2001, this effort was updated as IT2010, or "IT Policy 2.0," the country's vision of a future information-based society. On the heels of ASEAN's 2000 declaration that IT and e-government were regional priorities, the e-Thailand program was born, which emphasized rapid response, rural coverage, and round-the-clock service. Since 2007, the e-government interoperability framework has guided the slow initiation of digital communications among different government agencies (Kawtrakul et al., 2011; Funilkul et al., 2011) .

The state has worked assiduously with private firms to develop a well-integrated telecommunications structure. In addition to the country's fiber network, Thailand has four satellites in geostationary orbit, launched by the Shin Corporation, that provide television and Internet services to remote rural areas. One, iPSTAR, offers broadband service. A number of Wi-Fi hotspots can be found in hotels and airports. The Government Information Technology Service (GITS) established a cloud computing center for use by Thai government agencies.

Thailand's e-government initiatives have earned a modicum of success. For example, the Royal Thai government's primary webpage, www.thaigov.net, was designed as a one-stop, citizen-centric portal. Besides links to ministries, it offers daily news feeds, a public forum, and an array of services, including digital payments and procurements. In 2001, the Thai Customs department eliminated manual processing of import and export documents (Wescott, 2001) . The e-Revenue program has gradually shifted a large share of corporate, personal income, and value-added tax payments online through its website (www.rd.go.th). One of the brightest spots of Thailand's e-government concerns health care. All of Thailand's 92 provincial hospitals have access to the Internet. All 9000 district health centers have dial-up Internet access. The Ministry of Public Health launched its first telehealth pilot program in 1994. The state also erected e-health services that can be accessed by smartphone, a program aimed largely at the elderly. Its distance-learning initiatives currently connect 22,738 primary schools, 152 tertiary educational centers, 413 vocational institutes, and 37 IT campuses (Rattakul and Morse, 2005) , although the digital divide has hindered development in rural schools. The Government Information Technology Service (GITS) provides Internet access for all public offices, while the Office of Information Technology Administration for Education Development serves its universities. The state's e-procurement program has proceeded relatively smoothly. The National Spatial Data Infrastructure provides geographic information systems services for the government.

In other areas, however, the country has suffered setbacks. For example, consider the Smart ID cards that contained the owner's personal demographic and economic data, and were intended to substitute for telephone, debit, and credit cards. Initiated in 2002 at a cost of 800 million baht ($23 million), the program was implemented first in Bangkok and subsequently in the outer provinces (Krairit et al., 2004) . It failed utterly due to its haphazard, insufficient security, unsystematic implementation, and uncontrolled enrollment, and was halted in 2007 (Gunawong and Gao, 2010) . Similarly, efforts to implement an e-parliament suffered because most ministers preferred information on paper rather than digitally. These failures have a real human cost. For example, following the 2004 tsunami, rescue efforts were hampered by interoperability problems among government agencies.

Finally, the digital divide in Thailand is severe, although mobile phones offer a plausible route to alleviate it (Srinuan et al., 2012) . To improve IT literacy, the state launched a "People's PC" initiative in 2003, and installed kiosks in convenience stores such as 7-Eleven and True Shops. The TOT Corporation Public Company provides free Internet service for Thai citizens. Chulalongkorn, Chiangmai, and Kasetsart universities all offer free web training to acquire IT skills.

While it is a democracy, the Thai government is not above authoritarian impulses and engages in periodic Internet censorship, primarily through its Ministry of Information and Communication Technology. Most of its efforts have focused on blocking pornography. The number of blocked websites jumped markedly after the military coup of January, 2006. Messages to users attempting to access blocked sites made it appear like a network failure. Upon declaring a state of emergency, the state shut down numerous ISPs. When YouTube posted a silly 44-second video ridiculing King Bhumibol Adulyadej in 2007, the government temporarily banned the website entirely throughout the country and deported the producer, a Swiss national, back to his country. Following the 2014 coup, censorship underwent another rise. Websites that oppose the coup, and those that support the southern Muslim insurgency, are routinely blocked, as are video-sharing sites like Camfrog.

In short, while Thailand's e-government programs are competent, they are uninspiring. The country has not shown decisive leadership on the issue, municipal programs are virtually nonexistent, and with a few successes (e.g., schools, health care), it has introduced only a few programs out of the possible range of applications.

A well-regarded model of a Muslim democracy and growing economic powerhouse, Malaysia has enjoyed rapid growth, rising incomes, trade surpluses, and an expanding middle class. One of the second generation newly industrializing countries, it has witnessed considerable economic and political changes, including the growth of a robust electronics sector as well as petroleum.

In 2015, Malaysia's e-government readiness score was a respectable 0.6703, and in 2016, Internet penetration stood at 68.1%. Broadband penetration is at roughly 20%, and cell phones, including smart ones, are very popular. As befits a rapidly growing economy, its e-participation rate was 0.50.

Malaysia has a long track record of successfully pursuing IT as a national development strategy. It established the National Information Technology Council in 1993. The Communications and Multimedia Commission formulated and implemented IT policy objectives and the regulatory framework for the relevant industries. Rarely has e-government been so explicitly harnessed to national development goals as in Malaysia. Its introduction in the 1990s coincided with a wholesale reform of government that launched the country into an aggressive path of globalization, with considerable success. E-government forms a core part of Malaysia's ambitious Vision 2020, a strategy to become a fully developed economy by the year 2020 that centers in large part on the adoption of IT (Ghani et al., 2012) . Malaysia's government online efforts come under the umbrella of the Administrative and Modernisation Planning Unit, which mandates that all agencies must have an e-government strategy. In 1994, the state created the Civil Service Link to disseminate information to the public, which was subsequently upgraded and renamed the Malaysian Civil Service Link. To lay the legal groundwork, the Malay government passed a series of laws in the late 1990s, including the Communications and Multimedia Act (1998), the Digital Signature Act (1997), the Computer Crimes Act (1997), the Copyright Amendment Act (1997), the Telemedicine Act (1997), and the Personal Data Protection Act (2004).

In 1996, the government launched the famed Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC), essentially an enormous technology park that stretches for 50 km from Kuala Lumpur to two new cities, Putrajaya and Cyberjaya, connecting them with a high speed broadband fiber cable. Cyberjaya, a 7000 ha development, was started in 1999 as an e-commerce center. These became the nucleus of a cluster of IT corporations that went far toward transforming Malaysian society, economy, and government. As part of this project, the next year, 1997, saw the dawn of formal e-government legislation, known simply as e-government, as one of the MSC flagships, which revolved around several interlocking goals: generic office environment, to promote a collaborative, paperless public workspace; electronic procurement through three modules (the enterprise-wide information management, communications, and collaboration systems); the project monitoring system, to coordinate managerial functions of numerous statutory bodies on diverse public projects and to facilitate the exchange of best practices; the Human Resource Management information system, to enhance government employee functionality; the Electronic Labour Exchange renamed JobsMalaysia, launched in 1999, which is an online job matching site used by 35,000 people annually; e-Syariah, to upgrade services in the 102 Syariah courts and the effectiveness of the Islamic Affairs Department; and e-Land, to make the National Land Administration more accurate. e-Land includes the e-Tanah project of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, begun as a pilot project in Penang, which oversees land registration and sales to facilitate land transactions (Kaliannan et al., 2007) . e-Syariah, begun in 2002, became fully functional in 2005 and centers on a portal that allows attorneys, prosecutors, plaintiffs, and defendants to file suits and affidavits online, get hearing dates, and view court decisions; current plans call for a future ability to allow plaintiffs and respondents to meet via teleconferencing.

Malaysia has a successful track record in using the Internet to deliver public services; indeed, e-Services was one of the initial flagship projects when e-government was introduced (Hussein et al., 2010) . In the early 1990s, the Public Service Network transformed post offices throughout the country into one-stop payment centers, a precursor of e-Services. The full-fledged e-Services initiative, begun in 2002 and also known as eKL, was implemented in phases following a three-month long pilot program in the urbanized Klang Valley. The initiative adopted the widely used "one government, many agencies" principle to integrate public services, including online delivery of drivers' licenses, court summons, and tax and utility bill payments. The Rilek services program offers Internet access to the public with touch screens at information kiosks, where they can pay fees, fines, and utility bills with a credit card. An experimental mobile e-government service, the MySMS initiative, used a single number, 15,888 (Thunibat et al., 2011) . The Agriculture Ministry sends short messaging service (SMS) notes to farmers to warn them of rising water levels and impending floods. The state also offered several telehealth programs, often aimed at rural areas, including: the Lifetime Health Plan (advice for healthy living); Mass Customized Personal Health Information & Education (health information tailored to people's demographic specifics); Continuous Medical Education (which provides health information to health care professionals); and Teleconsultation, which allows citizens to speak with professionals online. All of these are accessible at hospitals and 41 public health clinics. Other successful examples include its Road Transport Department (e-insurance, e-road tax, and e-license renewal), immigration (e-passport and e-visa), the Royal Malaysian Police (e-summons), and the Kuala Lumpur City Council (e-complaints) (Abdullah and Kaliannan, 2006) .

In 2001, the state began to issue the Government Multi-Purpose Card, known as MYKAD, the world's first multipurpose smart identity card (Yeow and Loo, 2010). It includes nine applications, consolidating personal identification, banking, driver's license, passport, health, and transit information. It can thus be used at stores, schools, buses, and hospitals. MYKAD reduced the processing time for passports from eight weeks to two days (Siddiquee, 2005) .

One of Malaysia's success stories concerns taxes (Dorasamy et al., 2010) . Integrated electronic tax preparation, filing, and payment were introduced in 2006 by the Inland Revenue Board (IRB, or in Malay, Lembaga Hasil Dalam Negeri) (Azmi and Bee, 2010). Security includes a 16-digit PIN number; when security loopholes were discovered, the IRB moved quickly to close them. Although the initial use fell below expectations, in 2009, a total of 1.25 million people filed taxes digitally. Surveys indicated that the most likely users were young, female members of the Chinese minority (Ambali, 2009) . In an effort to increase participation, the IRB added a new feature to the e-filing system, e-bayaran or e-payment, in which taxes can be paid through banks. The online system was shown to have lower error rates than paper submissions and has raised compliance levels.

Malaysia's e-government includes the interests of the powerful business community. Port authorities and the customs department are integrated through electronic data interchange to process applications for imports and exports. A major success is called e-Perolehan, a website (www.eperolehan.co.my) launched in 1999 at a cost of RM35 million ($12 million), in which registered companies can submit bids for government contracts, advertise their wares on the web, and receive government payments digitally. It has received significant amounts of scholarly attention (Kaliannan et al., 2007; Siddiquee, 2008; Sambasivan et al., 2010; Aman and Kasimin, 2011; Hui et al., 2011) , more than any other aspect of Malaysia's e-government. It comprises a novel and highly successful form of e-procurement aimed largely at small-and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and has lowered the state's operational and administrative costs. Given the size of the government's procurements-more than 23 billion ringgit in 2007 ($5.7 billion)-this is no small issue. More than 120,000 firms are registered. The system reduced the time between application for registration and approval of supplies from 36 days to 20 days (Siddiquee, 2005) . However, firms must purchase a smart card to use it, train employees, and periodically upgrade their software. Nonetheless, e-procurement of government contracts has steadily become the norm (Santhanamery and Ramayah, 2014), even if growth rates did not meet expectations.

There have been roadblocks on Malaysia's path to e-government adoption. For example, the culture's emphasis on egalitarianism, fatalism, and individualism at times impeded the implementation of relevant policies (Seng et al., 2010) . Public awareness of e-government remains low. Bureaucratic in-fighting was another obstacle, which diminished trust, teamwork, and knowledge sharing. While government websites in Malaysia are generally functional, they occasionally suffer from broken links and accessibility problems; these are compounded at the state level (Isa et al., 2011) . Lack of trust among its residents has slowed enthusiasm for e-government programs (Lean et al., 2009) . However, Malaysia resorted to the use of public-private partnerships to overcome these barriers (Kaliannan et al., 2010) , in which private firms invested in public projects but the state retained responsibility for the delivery of core services. One example is the aforementioned e-Perolehan procurement program. Finally, mobile e-government is hampered in part because many state web pages are not designed to accommodate them well (Thunibat et al., 2011) .

At the local level, Malaysian e-government has enjoyed considerably less success (Khadaroo et al., 2013) . Local governments face significantly greater obstacles than does the national one. Many are short of funding and the requisite IT skills, and some have outsourced to unreliable software vendors. Not all of the 144 local governments have websites, and many still rely on paper transactions. Some outsource the task to the Ministry of Local Government. Others have adopted more interactive features, such as e-complaints, e-compounds (for impounded vehicles), e-assessments, e-communities, e-forums, and e-taxes. Lack of collaboration among local governments inhibits sharing of information and best practices.

Given the wide discrepancies in standards of living between peninsular Malaysia and the two provinces on Borneo, Sabah, and Sarawak, it is no surprise that the country suffers from a significant digital divide (Genus and Nor, 2007) . The government's National Strategic Framework of Digital Divide lays out a comprehensive approach to promoting IT use in rural and disadvantaged areas, including rural telecenters and broadband diffusion. One of its most important e-government initiatives is e-Bario, named after a remote, isolated village in Sarawak. Led by university researchers, the state initiated Internet access in local schools and a publicly accessible telecenter; because electricity is unreliable, the system used diesel generators. Another is KedaiKom ("community building"), a collaborative program between Malaysia Communications, the Multimedia Commission, and ISPs. Launched in 2002 in Kedah, Melaka, Pahang, Perak, and Perlis, it provided 58 telekiosks (Ibrahim and Ainin, 2009). Finally, promoting the Internet in rural areas requires more content in Malay, rather than English.

Censorship exists in Malaysia to varying degrees. Unlicensed printing presses and pornography are strictly banned. Despite state promises not to censor the Internet, starting in 2014, the government began filtering politically sensitive websites, and at times has harassed bloggers and cyber-dissidents. News blogs must be registered with the Ministry of Information, and blogs that have reported allegations of corruption have been shut down. Some Facebook pages and Youtube videos have likewise been blocked.

To summarize, Malaysia has made significant strides in e-government, particularly at the national level. It is arguably the best example of e-government in the entire Muslim world. Most public services have moved online, with notable successes in taxes and procurement. As Mohamed et al. (2009) note through empirical surveys, most Malaysians are satisfied with their e-government's timeliness, accuracy, and content. The digital divide remains a pressing problem, and mobile e-government, or m-government, is still in its infancy. 4.7 Singapore: "any public services that can be delivered online must be digitized"

A cosmopolitan, multiethnic city-state of slightly more than four million people, Singapore is one of the world's premier e-government success stories. As one of the "new tigers" that followed the Japanese model of industrialization, succeeding in garment production and other low-wage industries, it moved steadily into high value-added services. It enjoyed rapid rates of economic growth for several decades, and today it is the second wealthiest country in Asia, a financial services and telecommunications hub for the Asia-Pacific region, and hosts the world's second-largest port.

Having a well-educated and informed public also paved the way for its e-government programs, among the best in Asia and the world. In 2016, Singapore's Internet penetration rate was 81%, third highest in Asia (following South Korea and Japan). Its 2015 e-government readiness score was 0.8474, slightly below South Korea's (0.9283) but ahead of Taiwan (0.82) and Japan (0.8019). Its e-participation rate was a near-perfect 0.9474, second highest in the world (next to South Korea). Waseda University (2009) ranked Singapore's e-government as the best in the world in 2009, although more recently South Korea has seized that honor. It has since received numerous international awards, such as Stockholm Challenges (2008, 2010) , the Commonwealth Association of Public Administration and Management Innovations awards (2006, 2008, and 2010) , and United Nations Public Service awards (2006, 2007, 2008, and 2010) (Ha, 2013) . The government is not modest about its successes: the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) claims to have built a "world-class e-government" that enables citizens to "be involved, be empowered, and be a pacesetter." Because it has implemented a highly successful e-government, Singapore has been the focus of significant scholarly attention (e.g., Siew and Leng, 2003; Chan et al., 2008; Baum et al., 2008) .

Singapore clearly moved to capitalize on the digital revolution as a means to improve its government at an early moment. Its e-government initiatives began as early as 1980, with the launch of the Civil Service Computerisation Programme and then, in 1981, of the National Computer Board. Its progress then advanced in several waves, including the National IT Plan (1986-91), the IT2000 Master Plan (1992-99), and Infocomm (or Singapore) 21, which began in 2000 with a series of forums and surveys; it proceeded to accelerate the development of government web pages and e-government in the hopes of creating an "intelligent island" (Ke and Wei, 2004). In the 1990s, the Singapore One (One Network for Everyone) project, launched in 1997, created the world's first nationwide broadband network, and it reaches 99% of the population. In 2000, it unveiled its E-government Action Plan, budgeting $932 million over the next three years to implement it (funds are approved through the Ministry of Finance). Since 2002, e-government initiatives have been coordinated by the IDA. The government initiated a Remaking Singapore project in 2002 that solicited citizen input as to how to improve competitiveness and the functioning of the state. In 2006, the iGAP 2010 initiative, funded with $2 billion, coordinated planning for the next five years. In 2011, it started the E-government Master Plan, with the explicit aim of providing "government-with-you" (Baum and Mahizhnan, 2014). The most recent initiative is eGov 2015. The system is highly centralized: all of the government's e-services follow identical security, electronic payment, and data exchange procedures. Today, more than 1700 government services can be delivered online (Ke and Wei, 2004; Ha, 2013); essentially, "any public services that can be delivered online must be digitized" (Ha and Coghill, 2006, p. 107) . The central government portal (www.ecitizen.gov.sg) offers access to a wide array of services. The state also invested heavily in security measures to protect online transactions from hacking, identity theft, and cyberterrorism. In 1998, in a bid to increase IT and Internet literacy, the government organized a five-day mass hands-on training event called Surf@Stadium.

Singapore's e-government system works well for several reasons. First, it possessed strong, proactive leadership with a clear vision of the need for e-government, with well-specified goals and sufficient financial resources. From the beginning, its designs were inclusive and citizen-centered (Ha, 2013). The stated objectives of e-government are CARE: Courtesy, Accessibility, Responsiveness, and Effectiveness (Ha and Coghill, 2006). Cultivating trust was central to its success (Srivastava and Teo, 2009). Engagement of users-state employees, firms, and the public-was essential (Pan and Chan, 2008) . Pan et al. (2006) note that the Singapore IDA invested heavily in training programs and cultivated considerable goodwill. The government's promotional campaign featured "Q-busting," i.e., the prevention of queues at government offices through e-government. As Sriramesh and Rivera-Sanchez (2006) point out, Singapore is also well educated and has a corporatist, communitarian culture. Also, the state was careful to identify potential stakeholders in designing and implementing it (Tan et al., 2005) , including public servants, corporations, academics, and labor unions. The state solicited input from a variety of interests to gain a holistic interorganizational perspective, helping to align stakeholders with the state's objectives. Managers were encouraged to facilitate collaborative learning, and to hold meetings where best practices could be exchanged. When implementing e-government, it held a prolonged public relations campaign, including IT literacy education and a series of online fairs. However, there are faults in this system too: Singapore lacks privacy laws for electronic transactions (Ha, 2013), although many public websites state privacy policies. Notably, the state rejected a proposed Freedom of Information Act.

Since 1999 a one-stop ecitizen portal (http://www.ecitizen.gov.sg), the world's first to be provided by a government (Netchaeva, 2002) , provides a single point of access, through which citizens can check traffic, download publications, register births and deaths, search for jobs, pay fees, fines and taxes, check retirement benefits, register to vote, and obtain health care advice. With more mobile phones than people in Singapore, access to the portal is effortless. As Sriramesh and Rivera-Sanchez (2006) report, it receives about nine million hits per month; 75% of Singaporeans have used it and 80% of them report satisfaction. Users can sign up for a personal password, Sing-Pass, to protect their credit card information. It has become the model of many such portals around the world.

Does e-government promote democracy in Singapore? Nominally a parliamentary democracy, it also has a long history of authoritarian control. E-government, however, has amplified transparency in government decision making and increased the public's trust. Nonetheless, the state can use digital technologies to retain tight control as noted by Netchaeva (2002, p. 472 

Singapore was the first country in the world which used the Internet to conduct a population census.

But at the same time the administrative structures demand registration of all citizens and keep the public under rigid control. If a citizen does not turn up at the polls, his or her name will be struck from the register and his or her right as a citizen to vote lost.

Singapore certainly makes it possible to use the Internet to provide citizen feedback: anyone can voice their views at www.feedback.gov.sg without being traced. However, Sriramesh and Rivera-Sanchez (2006) assert that Singaporeans tend to be apathetic and suffer from a cultural trait known as kiasu (conformity) that inhibits such participation. Moreover, they argue (p. 725) that "The government of Singapore does engage in e-consultation but as mentioned previously, it is not clear to what extent this feedback actually influences policymaking."

One of the stars of Singapore's e-government is its state-of-the-art Electronic Tax Filing system (Tan et al., 2005) , which it implemented in response to significant uncollected revenues in the 1980s. While it started as a telephone-based service in 1995, the Web soon allowed this system to move online. In 1998 e-filing began, allowing Singaporeans (even those overseas) to pay through the Internet. The government's investments in the requisite technology were recouped within five years. The digital system not only reduced paperwork, but necessitated fewer staff as well. Large corporations and government bureaus were encouraged to submit information about their employees to expedite the process. It includes a system that allows taxpayers to communicate with the tax authority and with one another, including questions and complaints; this feedback is often used in upgrading and improving the system. In 2008, 87% of potential tax returns were filed this way (Dorasamy et al., 2010) . One motivation for filing taxes electronically is that filers get immediate acknowledgment.

In other ways, too, Singapore's e-government was unique. It was among the first countries in the world to implement a national e-library, and an e-citizen center (http://www.ecitizen.gov.sg). The government launched a "Connected Homes" test bed for home networking and community services and a MySingapore website giving citizens access to a broad array of services. The e-litigation service reduces the complexity of legal filings and encourages court attendance; lawyers can also appear in court via videophones (Ha and Coghill, 2006) . The Singapore Immigration & Checkpoints Authority offers discounts to those who apply for visas and passports digitally. The Ministry of Manpower introduced iJOBS, an online job matching site. The Singapore Sports Council implemented iBook, an online service for booking for sports facilities. The IDA recently facilitated a pilot project for the distribution of new Indian films via satellite to secure servers in Indian movie theaters.

Singapore has been especially innovative in using social media, particularly Facebook, to engage citizens in dialogues (Soon and Soh, 2014) . For example, it deployed social media extensively to alert residents during the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome outbreak of 2004 (Pan et al., 2005 . The Immigration & Checkpoints Authority gives permissions for exit permits to go overseas by SMS, while other agencies send text messages to pay parking tickets and national service obligations (Trimi and Sheng, 2008) .

E-government has been highly useful to Singapore's business community. The state introduced electronic commerce plans as early as 1996 (Wong, 2003) . Under the e-Business Industry Development Scheme, it introduced subsidies to encourage firms to enhance their e-commerce capacities. Subsequently, the government passed the Cyber-Trader Act, the Electronic Transactions Act, and the Compute Misuse Act. Other laws protected entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, start-ups, and patent holders. In 1997, it established Tradenet, an electronic clearing house that seamlessly unites firms, the Customs Department, the Trade Development Board, and air and seaport authorities (Teo et al., 1997) . The active participation of the island's business community, which anticipated the benefits, was central to the success of these initiatives (Chan and Al-Hawamdeh, 2002; Tung and Rieck, 2005) . Because multiple stakeholders were included in the design and implementation of e-government initiatives, such measures enjoy widespread trust among different segments of the population (Lim et al., 2012) ; as with e-commerce, trust is central to the effective adoption of e-government, and trust, like all social constructions, varies greatly over time and space. The portal, gebiz.gov.sg, allows firms to conduct many functions online, including electronic registration, tax payment, submission of contracts, and license renewal, update, or termination. It has cut red tape considerably; the time needed to incorporate a company dropped from two days to two hours (Sriramesh and Rivera-Sanchez, 2006) . Similarly, the One-Stop Public Entertainment Licensing Center cut processing times "from 6 to 8 weeks to about 2 weeks" (Ha and Coghill, 2006, p. 113) . The government's website http://www.gebiz.gov.sg/ allows firms to conduct business with the state easily. Firms and entrepreneurs can apply for patents online through http://www.epatents.gov.sg/.

Empirical analysis confirms that the digital divide is an impediment to e-government in Singapore (Ke and Wei, 2006) . To alleviate this issue, Singapore provided 27 self-service Citizens Connect kiosks. The state partnered with private firms to implement the PC Reuse Scheme, which recycles personal computers to those in need. It also pumped S$25 million into a program to encourage late adopters to get online (Pan et al., 2006) . However, a linguistic divide persists: a former British colony, Singapore provides all of its e-government services only in English, a potential obstacle in a country where the majority of residents speak Mandarin, Tamil, or Malay.

In 2004, to address national security and infectious disease concerns, the Singaporean government launched the Risk Assessment and Horizon Scanning (RAHS) program, which collects and analyzes large datasets in the hope of predicting terrorist attacks, epidemics, and financial crises (Kim et al., 2014) . Its Experimentation Center (REC), which opened in 2007, focuses on new technological tools to support policy making for RAHS and enhance and maintain RAHS through systematic upgrades of the bigdata infrastructure. A notable REC application is exploration of possible scenarios involving importation of avian influenza into Singapore and assessment of the threat of outbreaks occurring throughout Southeast Asia. The government also launched the portal site data.gov.sg to provide access to government data gathered from more than 50 ministries and agencies.

While Singapore is a world leader in IT and e-government, it is also widely known for being authoritarian and censoring the Internet regularly (Rodan, 2000; Gomez, 2002) . Its primary vehicle in this regard is the Singapore Media Development Authority (MDA), which has regulated Internet content under the guise of monitoring a broadcasting service since 1996. All ISPs are automatically licensed by the Singapore Broadcasting Authority, which routes all Internet connections through government proxy servers. Licensees are required to comply with the 1996 Internet Code of Practice, which includes a definition of "prohibited material," i.e., content that it deems "objectionable on the grounds of public interest, public morality, public order, public security, national harmony, or is otherwise prohibited by applicable Singapore laws" (OpenNet Initiative, 2007, p. 3) . Moreover, "the government has at times taken unannounced strolls through several thousand personal computers with internet connections, subsequently explaining such actions as sweeping for viruses or pornography" (Kalathil and Boas, 2003, p. 78) . Self-censorship is also encouraged as a means to stifle political expression. The use of lawsuits under stringent defamation laws is also common, and can reach well beyond the island's perimeter. For example, Jiahoa Chen, a Singaporean student at the University of Illinois, was forced to shut down his caustic.soda blog under threat from the government-run Agency for Science, Technology, and Research. As a result of these measures, Singapore's government has achieved near-total control over its Internet environment with minimal loss of political legitimacy.

With 250 million people, Indonesia is the world's fourth-most populous country and the largest Muslim nation. A vast, diverse archipelago consisting of 17,500 islands, Indonesia is Southeast Asia's behemoth. Following the traumatic coup against Sukarno in 1965, the country was opened up to global economy in a wave of neoliberalism and military dictatorship. Recently it has inched toward democracy and enjoyed significant rates of growth, forming yet another "tiger." Long dependent on oil revenues, it has diversified its economy as foreign investment has fueled the growth of garment production and electronics. Nonetheless, corruption is a serious problem and deeply entrenched poverty persists.

Private initiatives to create an Internet in Indonesia date back to 1994, when the first ISP, IndoNet, began. Today, however, Indonesia lags behind many of its neighbors in e-government. Its e-government readiness score was 0.4949, well behind Malaysia and Singapore, and its Internet penetration rate was only 34.1%. Most of Indonesia's 88 million netizens live in large cities and gain access through cybercafes, which tend to be clustered in tourist and business districts. However, cell phone usage is ubiquitous, and mobile Internet services are available in large cities. Its telecommunications infrastructure includes the Dumai Malacca Cable that runs under the Malacca Straits to Malaysia and its home-grown Palapa satellite network. Broadband is available only in large cities. Its e-participation index was a relatively low 0.2105. The country's limited success is, in part, due to endemic corruption, lack of political will, and shortages of qualified personnel (Rose, 2004; Rahardjo et al., 2007) .

Early attempts to apply IT to the Indonesian state include the Archipelago-21 project in the 1990s, which was discarded during the financial crisis of 1997-98. E-government got a very late start in Indonesia, where it was introduced by Presidential Instruction No. 6 in 2001, which stressed the need for affordable IT services, strategies for their development (e.g., training), and offered guidelines to local governments for its adoption. This was followed by Instruction No. 3 in 2003, which emphasized the construction of the necessary technical and administrative infrastructure. A coordinating body consisted of government officials, academics, representatives of the business community, and members of social organizations. By the end of the year, hundreds of government agencies had opened their own websites, although maintenance and updating have been a longstanding problem. In 2004, the Department of Communication and Informatics followed up with guidelines for quality standards, project implementation, and a blueprint to implement them. In 2006, Presidential Decree Number 20 established the Council of National Information and Communication Technology (Detiknas). Subsequently e-government unrolled in several phases, including pilot projects and an e-government task force. Many of these efforts were developed in collaboration with the Indonesia Telecommunications Company (PT Telkom).

The national government's websites usually only offer cursory information, and only in a small number of cases have interactive capacities. Rahardjo et al. (2007) found that government web pages that received citizen feedback tended to improve considerably in terms of their functionality and appeal. The Indonesian Digital Library Network (http://idln.itb.ac.id), which began in 2001, is a collaborative effort of local universities, national government agencies, and foreign donors. One of the most popular websites is Lapor (Layanan Aspirasi dan Pengaduan Online Rakyat), initiated by President Susilo Bambang Yudhyono in 2011, which allows citizens to report instances of corruption or infrastructure problems via SMS (lapor.go.id) and receives 1000 reports per day (Lukman, 2013); a team then checks the complaint of wrongdoing for accuracy (at least in theory) and notifies the complainant of actions taken. More recently, President Joko Widodo repeatedly vowed to implement an e-government system that would strengthen monitoring, improve accountability, and reduce corruption. His administration did establish a one-stop integrated service to obtain investment permits and licensing, computerized school exams to prevent cheating, and e-blusukan, which enables the president to engage in contact with citizens via teleconferences. The e-Livestock program registers individual cows from birth to slaughter. As in many countries, Indonesia moved in 2008 toward e-procurement for government contracts (Sistem Pengadaan Secara Elektronik), a system overseen by the Government Good/ Service Procurement Policy Organization. The state also introduced electronic tax filing in 2014, although it has not enjoyed much popularity. It has experimented with the Sistanas system that would allow e-balloting. It created an Instanet with 18 institutional members to expedite information among agencies.

Very recently, i.e., since 2014, the government has experimented with more novel ideas, including a state-sponsored hackathon, Code for Vote, to test the mettle of e-elections software; an elections app to disseminate data; various smart cities initiatives; and an Open Data Club, consisting of information-sharing via WhatsApp (Huang et al., 2016 ; see their map of e-government initiatives in the country). The government used Twitter to alert citizens of the impending eruption of Mt. Sinabung in 2014 (Chatfield and Reddick, 2015) .

Following a long tradition of highly centralized political control, Indonesia moved decisively to grant provinces greater autonomy, starting in 1999, which made local e-government initiatives all the more significant (Rose, 2004) . To facilitate this process, the national state in 2003 published a handbook of e-government (http://www.kominfo.go.id). Siskom Dagri is the national government network that connects the government in Jakarta with district governments. However, local efforts have been highly uneven, as a result of local contingent conjunctures of administrative capacities (Nurdin et al., 2015) . By 2004, less than half of Indonesia's 385 regional governments (kabupatens, cities, and provinces) had their own websites; those that did were located mostly in Java. Few are interactive, and often lack contact information for local officials. None had dialogue rooms. Municipal websites hardly fare any better (Prahono, 2015) .

There are some bright spots in Indonesia's local e-government, however. Surabaya, the second-largest city, has initiated an e-procurement system, reducing its costs by roughly 25%. Jakarta introduced two location-based e-government apps: Qlue, which allow citizens to file geotagged complaints with the municipal government (and has been downloaded 80,000 times), and Crop, used by ground-level officials who respond to the closest complaint. Jakarta has also used social media to inform citizens; it opened Twitter and Facebook accounts in 2012. The Yogjakarta government started the Jogja Cyber Province Initiative to manage IT implementation in government offices. In a study of Yogyakarta, Tangerang, and Kutai Kartanegara, Nurmandi and Kim (2015) identified human capital as the central factor in the implementation of successful municipal e-procurement programs. The Takalar (Sulawesi) and east Kutai (Kalimantan) districts moved some services online in 2000, reducing the time needed to obtain permits and identification cards. Kutai Timur had the best of 400 local government websites in the country (Rose, 2004) , with a one-stop portal (http://www.kutaitimur.go.id.utaitimur.go.id) called SIMTAP (Information Management System of One-Stop Services), where 12 public services, including identity cards and building permits, may be obtained. Investment permits can be obtained in 36 min. Similarly, the new city of Gorontalo took admirable steps to enhance transparency with its web pages. All too often, however, these initiatives are underfunded and lack sufficient human resources and leadership. For example, only 19% of localities use geographic information systems.

The brightest spot in local e-government in Indonesia is the Regency of Sragen, in central Java, which has been particularly successful with its one-stop portal approach, Kantor Pelayanan Terpadu (KPT, One-Stop Services). The so-called Sragen Cyber-Regency developed a wireless network and web page that includes a public forum, news services, tourism information, statistical data, search engine, licensing service, teleconferencing ability, complaint center, and civil registry office. It issues 52 types of licenses online. It has conducted Indonesia's first, and only, Internet elections, for village chief. Its system has been imitated, with varying degrees of success, by the Regencies of Lebak, Katingan, Sika, Mataram, Balangan, Dumai, and Sika. In 2006, Sragen won an e-government award for achievement in 2006.

Indonesia's implementation of e-government has been slow and haphazard, and hampered by several obstacles. The telecommunications infrastructure is underdeveloped, and its regulatory framework could be much improved. The necessary initiatives rarely receive sufficient funding. The government has not invested much in human capital or technical skills. Many regional officials simply do not take it seriously (Wahid, 2004; Rose, 2004) , exhibiting what Anwaruddin (2012) calls a failure of e-leadership. There is little overall strategy, resulting in duplicated efforts. Local officials are often highly conservative and distrustful of e-government. Security problems persist. Corruption makes the allocation of budgetary expenditures inefficient.

Recognizing it needs assistance, the Indonesian government has reached out to Singapore and South Korea for assistance; the Korea-Indonesia E-Government Cooperation Center opened on March 2, 2016, and will run until the end of 2018. Indonesia also adopted Korea's electronic patent system, its national financial management system in 2009 ($43 million), and its public security management system in 2015 ($72 million).

The country's enormous digital divide is also a major obstacle in Indonesia's efforts to implement e-government (Hermana and Silfianti, 2011) , particularly the schism between Java and the outer islands. The geography of government websites mirrors that of the population: half are located in Java, another indication of how the real and virtual worlds are interpenetrated. To address the digital divide, the government established a series of information kiosks. Educational efforts can also mitigate the digital divide: Rye (2008) discusses two small Internet-based distance-learning master's degree initiatives in Indonesia, both offered by Universitas Terbuka (Open University Indonesia), which offered students on remote islands access to higher education services they would not have otherwise have had.

The government does engage in modest Internet censorship, albeit with a light touch. In 2008, it passed the Law on Information and Electronic Transactions, which enables certain forms of censorship, including pornography, anti-Islamic content, gambling, and incitement of hatred. Access to Youtube and Reddit sites has been blocked periodically. When a Facebook account called to have a cartoon contest portraying Mohammed in 2010, the government requested that the account be closed. Bloggers accused of defamation of public officials have been harassed.

To summarize, Indonesia lags behind its neighbors in implementing e-government. Although a few notable local examples exist, there has been little systematic and coherent strategy for using the Internet to serve citizens. The usual suspects-inadequate funding and lack of human capital-are accompanied by corruption and indifference. The digital divide persists, particularly in the low Internet adoption rates in the outer islands. expedite movements through airports and borders; e-MIPR (e-Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources); Islamic information kiosks; and e-billing and e-maintenance management programs. In 2008, Brunei founded the E-government National Centre, and in 2009, it launched a five-year E-government Strategic Plan, with the aims of modernizing the civil service and making the state more user-friendly. The "Internet for Schools" project achieved Internet connections in all of the country's public schools, including religious ones.

Another vast archipelago of 7100 islands, the Philippines, with its history of Spanish colonialism, Catholicism, and American occupation, occupies a unique cultural niche in East Asia. With more than 100 million people, the country is sizable, but poor, and has enjoyed little of the rapid economic growth found in most of Southeast Asia. Agriculture still accounts for a third of its economy, although it has seen some growth in garments and electronics production, as well as call centers. Literacy is a remarkably high 93%. A vast diasporic population is the source of significant remittances.

Its 2015 e-government readiness index was 0.513, roughly on a par with that of Indonesia, but its 2016 Internet penetration rate was 52%. However, mobile phones are widespread and text messaging is wildly popular. E-participation was evaluated at 0.2105, identical to Indonesia.

Efforts to use IT in the Filipino government began remarkably early, with the establishment in 1971 of a National Computer Center. Although the government identified e-government as a strategic priority, it committed few resources to the project. In 1994, the state established the National Information Technology Council, which initiated steps toward the adoption of computers. The enactment of RA 7925 in 1995, the Public Telecommunications Policy Act of the Philippines, was another milestone that liberalized that sector. In 1998, it launched IT21, a plan for the 21st century, as well as the Electronic Commerce Promotion Council. This was complemented by Administrative Order 232, which instructed local offices to begin digital networking with one another. The Central Visayas Information Sharing Network, established in 1998, began to offer news, statistics, business guides, and local updates very early, well before the Internet had become entrenched in Filipino society.

The origins of Filipino e-government may be said to lie with the Republic Act 8792 or the Electronic Commerce Law of 2000, which gave legal recognition to electronic documents, signatures and transactions. Similarly, the Government Information Systems Plan in the same year guided the computerization of public offices and the implementation of e-government measures. The Information Technology and Electronic Commerce Council was given wide latitude to encourage the growth of an information-based economy and society. However, the country lacks a single, coherent strategy in this regard, leaving different agencies to pursue e-government on their own. More recently, the ICT Roadmap (2006-10) laid out the government's strategy to deal with the digital divide there through a series of community e-centers. In 2011, the plan du jour was the Philippine Digital Strategy. In 2013, it unveiled its E-government Master Plan calling for a digitally empowered, transparent government. In June 2016, the Department of Science and Technology launched the Government Network (GovNet) to expedite this process.

The Filipino state has enjoyed several e-government successes. The Department of Management and the Budget established the Government Electronic Procurement System as the official channel for soliciting and approving bids on government projects (Lallana et al., 2002) , increasing transparency in the process and reducing corruption.

To address similar problems of corruption in the process of importing and customs declaration, the state adopted a single electronic form that calculates payments due, a cashless system that reduces opportunities for bribe-taking as face-to-face meetings between inspectors and cargo agents were eliminated; as a result, waiting times for cargo were reduced from eight days to four hours. The Department of Budget and Management's Bottom-up Budgeting interactive website allows for citizen input into the process. The state has also started distance-learning programs, although these are aimed primarily at basic education (Ramos et al., 2007) .

The Philippines has often been called the "text messaging capital of the world," with 100 million texts sent daily, generating a higher number per capita than any other country. Given the popularity of text messaging there, it would be odd if the government did not avail itself of the medium. Indeed, the country in some respects appears poised to skip e-government altogether and leapfrog directly into m-government, becoming something of a world leader in the process. Text messaging has long played a key role in Filipino cultural and political life: in 2001, President Estrada was deposed in an SMS-organized campaign he called a "coup de text," when just 15% of Filipinos had mobile phones. With the introduction of the TXTGMA service in 2001, Filipinos all over the world were able to bring their concerns directly to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Today, half of all government agencies use SMS to keep in contact with the public. The Civil Service Commission launched an SMS service called TextCSC that allows citizens to complain about corrupt workers and slow service delivery; it is the most widely used public SMS service in the country. The Bureau of Internal Revenue launched an electronic payment confirmation scheme using SMS messages on mobile phones to guard against "fixers" who issue fake receipts to taxpayers. Known as e-broadcasting, the system provides taxpayers with direct confirmation within 38 h that their payment has been received by authorized banks. The Department of the Interior has a centralized emergency and crime reporting service called Text 117. Citizens can voice their concerns and questions to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources through the DENR@YourService project. When the state floated a proposed tax on text messages, the public responded with a virtual NGO called TxtPower, which led a successful campaign to defeat it. Starting in 2002, citizens have been able to help enforce antipollution laws by reporting smoke-belching public buses and other vehicles via SMS or online (http://www.bantayusok.com) due to the Bantay Usok project of the Land Transportation Office; it receives about 6900 SMS messages per month. Oversees Filipino workers can seek assistance from the Department of Foreign Affairs via the SMS service TXTDFA, and the Center for Migrant Advocacy initiated an SOS SMS program for overseas workers facing emergencies. Starting in 2002, the National Police allowed citizens to report suspicious activities and crimes by criminals and police officers via SMS. The national JobHunt program sends SMS messages to applicants when a relevant position becomes open. The Bureau of Internal Revenue offers a raffle to selected texters. In other respects, however, the country has to play catch-up: for example, there is no system for m-payments.

Another success story from the Philippines concerns telemedicine. In 1998, the University of the Philippines established the National Telemedicine Center, which manages referrals from 40 doctors in remote areas around the country (Marcelo, 2009 ). Some of its major accomplishments include the Community Health Information Tracking System (CHITS), founded in 2004, a disease surveillance system used in 12 community health centers; the E-Learning for Health Project, which offers a series of short videos on issues such as poisons, strokes, tuberculosis, and influenza; the BuddyWorks Community Partnership, which established broadband connections in remote sites so that difficult medical cases could be referred to experts; and the SMS Telemedicine Project, which allows doctors and patients to communicate via mobile phone messages.

In 2002, the Filipino government began the Jumpstarting Electronic Governance in Local Government Units (e-LGU), to encourage them to develop web pages and develop a system of 700 community e-centers to provide Internet access. Set to run for three years, it was seen as a means of enhancing efficiency and generating revenues. At its end, in 2005, essentially all local governments had web pages, although many were not updated regularly and few offered interactive services. Siar's (2005) analysis showed that most were lacking substantial information, including relevant contact information, what services they offered, or online forms. Only a tiny handful attempted online management of property records or business permits and licenses. However, Bulacan Province was touted as the leading local government in this regard, and was rewarded with a Galing Pook award in 2002 for its efforts to promote digital inputs from citizens.

The digital divide in the Philippines remains severe, particularly between urban and rural areas. As blogger Suerte-Cortez (2016) notes, this has serious implications for e-government there:

In northern Luzon, people face a two-hour commute over rough roads just to check their e-mails. When they get to a local internet cafe, they are faced with slow and unreliable connections and unexpected power outages. E-governance seems far away when reliable connection happens once a month. ... Web access remains a challenge in remote areas of the Philippines, and a significantly large amount of the population is excluded from e-governance.

Cognizant of this problem, the Filipino government has responded as best it can, including the 700 community e-centers established under e-LGU noted earlier; privately operated, they are nonetheless cheaper than Internet cafes. The Pan Asian Networking program established four multipurpose telecenters on Mindanao. Virtually all public schools have Internet access via the Gearing up Internet Literacy and Access for Students (GILAS) program. Other measures include subsidies for rural Internet connections, Internet terminals in public libraries, the distribution of free (open source) software, and distance-learning programs in some rural villages. The country's heavy reliance on mobile phones may also play a role in fostering Internet growth.

In short, the Philippines presents a unique example of e-government. Mimicking the successes of other ASEAN countries in some respects, it is also unique to the extent to which it relies on SMS texting. Hampered by corruption and a frequently stagnant economy, the government has nonetheless successfully adopted several e-government programs, although there is still much progress to be made.

Given the enormous diversity among Southeast Asian countries, it is unsurprising that e-government varies considerably there as well. Examples range from barely developed (Myanmar, Laos) to mediocre (Thailand, Indonesia) to very good (Malaysia) to among the world's best (Singapore). Internet use is growing rapidly throughout the region. In general, the more open and democratic the government is, the more likely it is to use e-government, although the causality in this case may be bidirectional. These observations indicate that e-government is tailored to specific national and cultural contexts, and serve as a warning against simplistic "one-size-fits-all" interpretations.

Brunei: oil-rich sultanate takes steps

His Majesty Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah called for the establishment of e-Brunei, and allocated roughly $1 billion annually for its implementation. Planning for the project, however, did not get underway until 2003, when the e-government Program Executive Council was established. The slow start reflects the lack of clear objectives and the country's unfamiliarity with IT, leading the Sultan to express his disapproval at the tepid rate of adoption