For ten years now the words "justice" and "democracy" have been reformulated and reedited over and over again in dozens of projects intended to make the vivid dream of e-governance in Armenia a reality. But nothing much has changed as a result. New projects offer an opportunity to put into circulation huge amounts of money (in the form of grants or credits), giving renewed impetus to the notions of democracy and justice and creating the illusion of yet another important cause.

In the last ten years, various international organizations accredited to Armenia have supported and have often initiated and implemented diverse projects introducing information and communication technologies into the public administration system of Armenia.

"The amounts spent so far in Armenia on creating e-governance infrastructure would have been enough to develop several e-governments," said Armen Grigoryan, secretary of the Information Technologies Development Support Council.

And now the European Union is undertaking a pilot e-governance initiative aimed at developing an e-governance strategy and summarizing, integrating, and building upon the work that has been done so far in this field. The same circle again.

"They began talking about these projects in Armenia back in 1997. It's been almost ten years now. But the engine's just been idling all that time, since almost nothing has changed," said Hrach Bayadyan, chairman of the NGO Information Technologies Fund.

First attempt

A commission for the development of a "Unified State Information System" was set up in accordance with Government Decision # 152 of March 16, 1999, made up of representatives of ministries and government agencies, public organizations, and scientific institutions. The commission developed an action plan describing the scope of work and responsibilities of governmental institutions in relation to the creation of the System. However, when this fairly bulky document was presented to the I nformation Technologies Development Support Council for consideration in 2001, it received a negative review.

From 2000, there was indescribable enthusiasm surrounding the development of various e-governance projects. One proposal after another, each called Electronic Armenia and each worth between $10,000 and $50,000 - was placed on the government table. Each new proposal was followed by lengthy discussions and suggestions to draw on international experience. The necessity of creating new working groups and offices was discussed with ardor. Some projects were approved and others turned down for various reasons.

Second attempt

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Government of Armenia initiated and implemented a large-scale project called E-Governance System for Territorial Administration (2002-2004).

Thus, an electronic system for territorial administration was set up (www.region.am), a network of web servers connecting the Ministry of Territorial Administration with the provincial centers. Each marz (province) has its own website, where visitors can access information about the province and the local administration, read laws and the administrative decisions, or send letters to local officials. To implement the project, Internet Access Centers in the marzes were established and training courses for local residents organized. T he Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) provided US $525,000 and 300,000 Swiss Francs for the project.

But soon it became clear that not all the marzes were in earnest about the project. The decisions, instructions, and reports contained on the regional websites are selective at best. For example, the "Laws of Armenia" subsection of the "Decisions, Legal Acts" section of the Lori provincial website (www.lori.am) was last updated in 2004. The same section of the Kotayk website contains only the laws, government decisions, and programs adopted in 2004. The Vayots Dzor website contains only four government decisions and one report posted in 2005.

In 2005, following the intercession of the Minister of Territorial Administration, a new post of Coordinator of Information Technologies was created in the provincial administrations by decree of Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan. However, this hasn't yet translated into improved websites.

Experience shows that any e-governance initiative that does not truly involve citizens and employees of state agencies becomes something like an end in itself. What has passed absolutely unnoticed is that this more or less efficient system could have changed the relationship between officials and their constituents. It is highly improbable that any citizen of any province has thought to send a letter to an official over the Internet hoping to put something right.

The employees presently working in the administrative offices do not appear to be particularly interested in this new way of working, either. The social projects implemented with the assistance of international organizations are often beyond the realm of state policy and control, as can be seen on the provincial websites.

The Evaluation Report of UNDP Armenia ICT-for-Development Program published in April 2005 states: "Without a clear mid- to long-term National Information Society Policy (NISP) and attached to it a detailed short-term Action Plan the government's informal commitment is not sufficient for the sustainable advancement of Armenia technologically. In these less-than-encouraging circumstances any initiatives supported by various groups and organizations, including those from the international community, will suffer from the lack of vision and poor coordination, which will ultimately prevent from the fast replication of best practices and successful projects across different sectors and as a result form creating for economies of scale."

The Information Technologies Development Support Council has repeatedly discussed the issue of creating a new structure for supervising ongoing projects, but Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan has turned down the proposal to create another interagency institution. "At present we have two governmental departments - the Telecommunications Agency within the Ministry of Transport and Communications and the E-Armenia Foundation of the Armenian Development Agency. There is no point in creating a third one for this project," the prime minister said.

"The question then arises - why are these projects designed, who needs all this?" said Hrach Bayadyan. "There are models of systems, but neither citizens nor officials need them. This is a path imposed on us-the world is moving in this direction and taking us along. For the time being it should be something formal, which later on will carve its way both into people's minds and into real life. It is not the case that after the technologies are introduced, people will begin enthusiastically to implement them. Perhaps in few years this will indeed become a necessity. But it doesn't imply that we have to senselessly waste time, which is what has been done so far. We have to act in well-thought-out ways, in order to make people's lives better, so that our country has at least certain edges of comparison with the developed countries."

Third attempt

With a grant in the amount of 1.2 million Euros, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia is presently implementing a pilot project on e-governance within the framework of the European Union's IT development project. The formulations in all the projects are the same: sufficiency in technical equipment, training of employees, democracy, transparent governance, etc. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been issuing e- visas as a first step in the Virtual Consulate program since 2002. This service is available on-line on the Ministry's website (www.armeniaforeignministry.com). This and other projects aspire to become models on the path to realizing the E-Armenia dream.

This, of course, will not be our final attempt at creating an electronic Armenia. We can go on endlessly. In recent years, with financial assistance and credits from various organizations, many agencies have to some extent improved their working conditions - furnished themselves with new computers, and, in order to become more presentable, created websites which, however, are not updated, don't provide on-line services, have no feedback from citizens, solve no problems, or are simply empty. Nevertheless, we keep talking about e-governance and enthusiastically welcoming each new project.