Is Digital Government Strengthening or Weakening Society?

Governments are facing technical, organizational, political, financial, etc. limitations on their capacity to tackle major policy problems like pandemics, climate change, migration, etc. that endanger societal well-being, security, and development. Overcoming such limitations requires a collective response, where different members of the society – individuals and institutions – are working with government and each other to address the problem. The aim of this paper is to examine the digital transformation of government and whether the outcome – digital government – makes society stronger or weaker, thus facilitating or undermining such collective response. To this end, we examine six qualities of social development – inclusion, equality, justice, collectivism, order and democracy – which presence or absence make societies stronger or weaker, and collect the evidence from scientific literature of digital government impacting such qualities, leading to inclusive vs. exclusive societies, equal vs unequal societies, just vs. unjust societies, etc. The result of this research is a landscape of different approaches, experiences, and designs, through which digital government contributes to the presence or absence of these qualities. This result has both research and policy implications.