towards E-government

Master Thesis
Towards E-government: Iraqi diplomatic missions’ case study
2
Heidelberg University of Applied Sciences
Germany/Heidelberg
Faculty of Informatics
Master Thesis
TOWARDS E-GOVERNMENT: IRAQI DIPLOMATIC MISSIONS’
CASE STUDY
Submitted By
SAIF AL-SHOKER
Supervised by
Prof. Dr.Yass Mohammed
Prof. Dr. Gerd Moeckel
Company’s Supervisor
Dipl. - Ing.Thomas Brandtstaetter
February 2012

Master Thesis
4
Towards E-Government: Iraqi Diplomatic
Missions’ case study
By
SAIF AL-SHOKER
Matriculation no: m1000859
A thesis submitted as a pre-requisite for the
Degree of Master of Science
Thesis Advisory Committee
Prof.Dr. MohammedYass
Prof. Dr. Gerd Möckel
Heidelberg University
of Applied Science
Ludwig-Guttmann-Straße 6
69123 Heidelberg
Germany
Dipl-Ing. (BA)
Thomas Brandtstaetter
BÜROTEX
Synargos GmbH
Max-Eyth-Str. 21
72622 Nürtingen
Germany

Master Thesis
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Herewith I declare:
• That I have composed the chapters for the MasterThesis forWhich I am named
as the author independently;
• That I did not use any other sources and additives then the one’s specified;
• That I did not submit this work at any other examination procedure;
Heidelberg,
(Date)______________________________
(Signature)______________________
Affidavit

Master Thesis
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Table of Contents
Abstract ��13
Chapter One - General Introduction
1.1 Introduction  ��14
1.2 Research Problem and Aims  ��16
1.3 Thesis Outcome  ��16
1.4 Disposition of The Study ��17
Chapter Two - E-Government Literature Review
2.1 Introduction  ��19
2.2 The Concepts of State and Government ��20
2.3 Characteristics of E-Government: ��21
2.4 Definition of E-Government  ��21
2.5 What Are The Types of E-Government Delivery Services ��22
2.5.1 Government to Citizen Approach ��23
2.5.2 Government to Employee Government to Government Approach 23
2.6 How Is E-Government Beneficial To Public Administrators and Society ��24
2.6.1 E-Government Improves Efficiency ��24
2.6.2 E-Government Improves Services ��24
2.6.3 E-government Helps to Build Trust Between Government Citizens 25
2.7 Adoption Phases of E-Government  ��25
2.7.1 Chandler and Emanuel’s Model  ��25
2.7.2 Layne and Lee’s Model ��26
2.8 Descriptive Analysis of E-government in the Arab Region ��34
2.9 Barriers to E-Government Implementation in Arab Countries  ��35
2.10 Access Issues ��35
Chapter Three - Case Study: Iraqi Diplomatic Missions
3.1. Introduction  ��37
3.2 Characteristics of the Republic of Iraq  ��38
3.3 Iraqi Foreign Ministry  ��39
3.4 The Definition of Foreign Missions ��40
3.5 Basic Concept ��40

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Table of Contents
3.6 Stakeholders ��41
3.7 Functions of the Missions Abroad  ��42
3.8 Iraqi Diplomatic Missions and Citizens Abroad  ��43
3.9 Comparative Worldwide E-Government Experiences  ��45
3.9.1 Australia ��46
3.9.2 Bahrain ��48
3.10 Consular Web-Based Services Requirements  ��50
3.10.1 Organizational Requirements ��51
3.10.2 Change Management ��52
Chapter Four - Conceptualization
4.1.Introduction  ��53
4.2 Research Process ��54
4.3 Data Collection ��55
4.3.1 Literature Review ��55
4.3.2 The Questionnaire ��56
4.3.3 Interviews ��56
Chapter Five - Design
5.2 Architecture Prototype ��63
5.2.1 User Front-End Web Portal ��64
5.2.2 E-Visa ��66
5.2.3 Online Appointment System ��72
5.2.4 Online Passport System ��74
Chapter Six - Conclusion
6.2 Discussion ��79
6.3 Conclusion ��79
6.4 Thesis Outcomes ��80
Bibliography ��81
Appendix A - Questionnaire��84

Master Thesis
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Chapter One
Figure (1.1) - shows the thesis structure �� 18
Chapter Two
Figure (2.1) - Layne and Lee Model  �� 26
Figure (2.2) - Web measure index �� 27
Figure (2.3) - Illustration of e-government maturity around the world �� 28
Figure (2.4) - Illustration of e-government emerging stage �� 29
Figure (2.5) - Illustration of e-government enhanced stage �� 30
Figure (2.6) - Illustration of e-government interactive stage �� 31
Figure (2.7) - Illustration of e-government transactional stage �� 32
Figure (2.8) - Illustration of e-government connected stage �� 33
Chapter Three
Figure (3.1) - Iraq Neighboring countries �� 38
Figure (3.2) - Structure of the Iraqi Ministry of foreign affairs �� 39
Figure (3.3) - Illustration of the Australian e-government portal �� 46
Figure (3.4) - Illustration of the Australian Embassy in Germany and e-visa processing  48
Figure (3.5) - Shows the Bahraini e-visa website �� 49
Figure (3.6) - Illustration of the Bahraini Embassy website in London �� 50
Chapter Four
Figure (4.1) - Phases of the research process �� 55
Figure (4.2) - Website of the Iraqi Embassy in Stockholm (old version) �� 58
Figure (4.3) - The new website of the Iraqi Embassy in Oslo �� 58
Chapter Five
Figure (5.1) - Illustrates the proposed web-application architecture �� 63
Figure (5.2) - A proposed design of an Iraqi Diplomatic Mission website taking the Iraqi
Embassy in Berlin as a sample �� 64
Figure (5.3) - shows the basic view of Bonita soft GUI �� 66
Figure (5.4) - Shows the Process diagram of e-Visa application �� 67
Figure (5.5) - A proposed design showing visa selection �� 68
Figure (5.6) - A proposed design showing the user when he/she is prompted to enter
personal credentials. �� 69
Figure (5.7) - A proposed design showing generation of reference number �� 70
Figure (5.8) - Shows the Process diagram of online appointment system �� 72
Figure (5.9) - Shows the Process diagram of online passport system �� 75
List of Figures

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Chapter Two
Table (2.1) - E-government development in the Arab world  �� 34
Chapter Three
Table (3.1) - Iraqi’s National Profile sources �� 39
Table (3.2) - Consular functions summary �� 42
Table (3.3) - Estimated number of Iraqi citizens in various countries �� 45
Chapter Four
Table (4.1) - Illustrates the key findings of some of the old Iraqi Diplomatic missions’
websites�� 60
Table (4.2) - Illustrates the key findings of some of the current Iraqi Diplomatic missions’
websites as part of a recent e-government project partially deployed but not successfully
completed�� 61
List of Tables

Master Thesis
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ICT Information and communication technology
G2C Government to Citizen
G2G Government to Government
G2E Government to Employee
E-services Electronic services
MoFA Ministry of Foreign Affairs
E-Visa ElectronicVisa
GUI Graphical user interface
E-commerce Electronic Commerce
BPMN Business Process Model and Notation
List of Abbreviations

Master Thesis
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E-government represents a key instrument in empowering change, fostering
technological innovation in the public sector and government structure. A mean
to make a crucial change in society, culture by utilizing the best out of ICT to
enhance government functionality. E-government has caught the attention of
many governments around the world to undertake studies, conduct research
in the efforts to identify factors that may play a significant role in the progress
of e-government in terms of reducing administrative costs, providing long-term
benefits and increasing accountability and effective delivery of e-services to the
citizens. Therefore, e-government is identified as a “hot” topic of the day and
one of the major priorities in governments’ agenda across the world. However,
e-government is not easy to come across because it is not simply a software rather
than a framework that reflects government policy and the relationship between a
government and its citizens.This consequently,raises many important critical points
such as political, social, cultural and technological issues which must be taken into
account and treated carefully when adopting e-government.
This thesis investigates on how an e-government system can be adopted and applied
at a diplomatic mission to provide consular services taking Iraq initiative as a case
study by conducting interviews with Iraqi diplomats as well as carrying out a survey
intended for ordinary Iraqi citizens.
Based on the data collected which served as an input for the initial framework to
narrow down the study.The framework was used as a tool to pave the road ahead
for designing a web application and prototyping a model to define the internal
workflow process of some online services.This thesis has made a contribution to
the field of e-government in terms of providing consular services to Iraqi citizens
within the diplomatic missions abroad.
Abstract

CHAPTER I
1.1 Introduction
Throughout the 18th and the 19th centuries, the world
witnessed the industrial revolution which has created the
industrial society, whereas during the 21st century, the
humanity has progressed to the information revolution.
We are living in an era where the world is connected at
all levels due to the revolutionary changes in technology,
computers are being connected all over the world which
consequently, leads to the use of information technology
in almost every aspect of our daily activities reaching
from banking, trading, learning, teaching, entertainment
to government. As we know, one of the major goals and
plans being considered in governments’ policy nowadays
is to reduce the administrative size and costs on one
hand and to increase the productivity and functionality of
government body on the other hand. (Leon J. Osterweil,
Lynette I. Millett and Joan D.Winston, 2007).
General Introduction
e-government

Towards E-government: Iraqi diplomatic missions’ case study 15
E-government is considered to be a key success factor towards a modernizing
government. In this regard, governments are continuously facing new challenges
to increase their performance in providing citizens with better access to their
services.
The nature of government functioning has been going through a fast change due
to the impact of technology that made the delivery of services possible over the
internet. This has motivated different governments around the globe to conduct
research on the topic of e-government, which later has evolved to become a
recognized research field.
In recent years, many governments around the world have taken initiatives in
adopting the concept of e-government as a powerful tool to meet citizens’ needs
and moving public services towards higher transparency, accountability and
efficiency.Among the main reasons why many governments are starting including
e-government in their agenda are to gain trust, confidence and credibility from
their citizens. However this vision that e-government is promising in improving
the overall functionality of any government cannot be accomplished without
encountering several serious obstacles.The degree of complexity of implementing
and maintaining good provision of online services is high. Countries such as Iraq
facing many obstacles is the best example that can be applied for this research
thesis.
This research thesis contributes to the issue of the Iraqi diplomatic missions to
citizens’ relationship in providing Iraqi citizens living abroad with good consular
services by addressing the current situation of Information Technology and the
degree of awareness within the Iraqi community living abroad and Diplomatic
member staff.
In recent years, many electronic Government projects were launched in Iraq, like
computerizing all MoFA’s internal processes and creating an intranet. For instance,
in 2004,(UNDESA,2008), the Iraqi Ministry of Science andTechnology has launched
an initiative in conjunction with the Italian Ministry of Innovation and Technologies
in providing technical support to construct an intranet connecting different
Ministries and even recently (Iraqi Missions overseas),the Ministry of ForeignAffairs
has launched an e-government program to link all its diplomatic missions abroad
through a web portal but all projects have been largely unsuccessful, or even close
to having been achieved.
Chapter 1

Iraqi citizens should be able to obtain consular services or information in minutes or
hours as compared to the current situation which is in days,weeks or even months.
Diplomatic member staff should be able to deliver their work more efficiently and
this cannot be done without a proper organizational structure.
Before conducting this thesis, I started interviewing different Iraqi Diplomats
and Iraqi citizens abroad (who most of them at least went to an embassy once
before) and after gathering enough information, the result showed that the general
public considers consular affairs as the most important mission of the whole
foreign ministry. Furthermore, Iraqi diplomats may still be a bit confused about the
significance of consular affairs as part of the whole agenda of the MoFA,but indeed,
citizens do not share that sense of perspective.
Now days, citizens have more demand for their time, as distances to work have
increased, rate of dual-income families has increased too. Thus, citizens are less
flexible to visit any Diplomatic Mission during normal working hours.Citizens want
to have access to consular services at their convenience and this thesis discusses a
solution to overcome such obstacle.
1.2 Research Problem and Aims
Chapter 1
This thesis proposes a framework strategy to adopt and implement e-government
within the Diplomatic Missions. In addition, it presents a proposal for a sample web
design layout to replace the current one.Furthermore,it reviews the current issues
in providing good consular services to citizens and suggests a model presented
in three case studies: E-visa program (along with web illustrations to give the
reader clearer vision of the process), online appointment system program and an
online passport system using an evaluation framework based on questionnaire and
interviews results.
1.3 Thesis Outcome

The remaining chapters of this thesis are organized as follows:
Chapter two gives a brief description about the company profile in which the
author has conducted some research on the topic of e-government. Chapter three
explains some general concepts of government,state and e-government,in order to
prepare the reader to gain further insights about the topic.Then,it reviews different
definitions, perspectives and benefits of e-government. It also gives an overview of
the maturity levels of e-government, provided with some web illustrations. Finally,
it identifies some major issues that may prevent the achievement of e-government.
This is then, followed by short description about Iraq and its foreign policy in
chapter four.Furthermore,this chapter also presents an overview about Diplomatic
Missions as a general concept and some examples of worldwide e-government
implementation with some web illustrations related to the same topic.At last, this
chapter is concluded with a list of consular web-based requirements that contribute
in the successful delivery of services to citizens.
Chapter five provides the research plan on data collection methods and presents
the methods were used in this thesis. In addition, it shows how information was
collected from questionnaire and interviews to bring together all findings from
previous chapters to be served as an input to identify the problem and develop a
framework to propose a model to build a web application for the Iraqi diplomatic
mission in chapter six. Finally, chapter seven presents a conclusion for this thesis
with recommendations for future prospects.A simple framework is shown in figure
(1.1) to give the reader an illustration of the thesis structure.
1.4 Disposition of The Study
Chapter 1

Chapter 1
Figure (1.1) - shows the thesis structure

2.1 Introduction
A literature review will be conducted in this chapter, to
introduce the reader to the core of this thesis, starting
with the definitions and concepts of government,state and
e-government.Then,it is followed by discussing the models
of implementing e-government and the barriers to its
implementation. In addition, this chapter will introduce the
maturity level of e-government development presented
with some web illustrations to give the reader a clear idea
about the research topic as a basis for later chapters.
CHAPTER IILiterature Review
e-government

A state can be defined as an organized political community,residing in a territory and
possessing external and internal sovereignty which has internationally recognized
boundaries and recognition by other countries.The scope of a state is much more
beyond its structure and it consists of several elements which can be summarized
as follows (Rosenberg):
A defined territory: is a geographical area fixed by definite frontiers, under the
authority and jurisdiction of a government, in which the functions of a state take
place to exercise such sovereignty and no other state should have power over the
country’s territory.
Government: is the supreme authority by which a state is governed at a given time.
It has the role to administer and organize the organs of a state in the following
aspects: political, social, cultural, environmental protection, national defense, foreign
and internal affairs and enforcing of state policy (Duursma, 1996, pp. 110 - 119).
Permanent population: population is the collection of human beings living together
as a community.The population of a state represents all people who, in principle,
live in a territory on an ongoing basis.
Sovereignty:is the authority to govern or rule a group of people over a geographical
area.The definition of the “Sovereignty” is quite similar to the “Independence” and
they can interchangeably be used together (Chanhchom, 2010).
It’s important to keep in mind that state differs from government.As a matter of
fact, the nature of state is permanently while the nature of government serving
that state is temporarily and changes over time. Each successive government is
composed of a body of individuals whose role is to enforce laws and legislate new
ones. They are concerned with administering many areas of human activity such as
trade, education, medicine, war and etc (Duursma, 1996, pp. 110 - 119).
2.2 The Concepts of State and Government
Chapter 2

Itallstartedfewyearsago,whentheworldwitnessedtheexplosionincommunication
technology, which has influenced the society in a spectacular way, especially with
the emergence of the internet. Now that technology has become an integral part
of everyday life, it is seen to be as a solution to major problems for governments,
in fact, many government agencies around the world started to use ICT tools and
internet to support governance and to have a better relationship with citizens by
delivering more modern services and improving the quality and responsiveness of
these services to their citizens.
Only recently the public sector has come to realize the importance of ICT as a means
to provide high-quality and efficient public services and today, many government
agencies around the world are facing challenges to set up the prerequisites to
enable citizens to have a better and transparent form of access to their services.
A brief history of e-government shows that, in the 1990s, some governments took
some initiatives in adopting e-government solutions, ranging from simple web
presence and one-way communication to two-way communication with citizens.
Finally, this moved on with time to more integrated web presence like offering
the possibility of online payments, downloading or filling online applications, online
documentation and email communication (Leon J. Osterweil, Lynette I. Millett and
Joan D.Winston, 2007).
2.3 Characteristics of E-Government
Chapter 2
For one to fully realize the idea of E-Government one must first understand
what government stands for, as we stated before that the role of a government
is to administer and organize the organs and structures of a state and only when
the government starts to use the ICT in their day-to-day activities it moves to
e-government.
2.4 Definition of E-Government

E-government, however, is a term for which there are multiple definitions among
different governments and organizations.For instance,(Ndou,2004,p.3) emphasized
that the failure of some e-government adoptions is due to the narrow definition
given to it.
According to OECD (2003), e-government is the use of Information and
Communication Technology (ICT), and particularly the internet to achieve better
government. However this definition is quite general and doesn’t focus on a
specific aspect of how to achieve a better government, while the (World Bank)
defines E-government as the use of information technologies ( such as internet) by
government agencies to transform relations with citizens and other governmental
branches as such to provide better delivery of public services to citizens, improve
interactions with business and industry and come up with a more efficient
government management, consequently resulting in less corruption, increased
transparency and/or cost reduction. This definition stated above has focused on
the desired goals without an emphasis on the tools should be used to achieve such
results.
Chapter 2
E-government offers quite a lot of services to facilitate transactions between
government and other key stakeholders. It focuses on four main customers to
be served: citizens, government agencies, employees and businesses, however, our
main focus in this research will be mainly the interactions between government
and citizens, other government entities and employees and they are summarized
as follows:
• Government to Citizen Approach
• Government to Employee Government to Government Approach
2.5 What Are The Types of E-Government Delivery Services

This approach focuses on posting the information to citizens online through
web pages such as ordering of birth/death/marriage certificates, as well
as the possibility to enable the government and citizen to communicate
and interact with each other using electronic format. Early stages of
e-government web sites design were not organized properly, especially the
hyperlinks to other government services. This proved to be confusing to
citizens as they would spend time searching and going through a lot of
web pages till they reach the information they need. Learning lessons from
e-commerce sites,to adopt new approaches to bring citizen into satisfaction
by using citizen-centric approach and this includes organizing the content
around citizen needs and making the web site more structured to reduce
the number of clicks to reach the information (Gant, 2008, pp. 16 - 18).
This interaction improves the quality of citizens’ lives by providing good
government services and a good example of G2C can be found in Dubai’s
web portal (www.dubai.ae).
2.5.1 Government to Citizen Approach
Chapter 2
Government to employee approach aims to enhance the performance of
both government and its employee and this is done by coordinating the
internal operations and improving the business processes among them.While
this concept is very closely related to the Government to Government
approach, its main objective here is to increase the level of cooperation
between different government agencies; it provides the means to facilitate
the interconnection and communication between government offices at all
levels, in different locations by saving time and eliminating redundancies.
A good example to be considered is the communications between
diplomatic missions and their diplomats worldwide with foreign ministries
as an instrument to enhance diplomacy (Gant, 2008, pp. 16 - 18).
2.5.2 Government to Employee Government to
Government Approach

Technology has proved to be valuable in increasing social productivity and economic
growth. Embracing e-government will help government to provide better services
to citizens as well as increased efficiency within government agencies, leading to an
overall environment of more structured government.The benefits to agencies and
citizens are outlined below:
• E-governement improves efficiency.
• E-governement improves services.
• E-government can help to build trust between government and citizens.
2.6 How Is E-Government Beneficial To Public Administrators
and Society
Chapter 2
With the usage of ICTs, e-government can simplify and make processing
tasks and public administration transactions more efficient, resulting in
less errors and the saving of time and money. Internet-based applications
accessed online can bring significant improvement by enabling the share
of data within and between government agencies, leading to an increase in
their service processing and delivery capabilities as well as the exchange of
data with less time and fewer staff. As well as the provision of information
and make it available to citizens 24 hours a day,7 days a week (OECD,2003,
p. 2).
2.6.1 E-Government Improves Efficiency
Citizen satisfaction is considered to be a core element of e-government
strategy, successful services are built on user’s requirements and what they
need and this can be done by providing these services on the basis of
self-serve and make it almost effortless to find information, as the user
should not have to understand the complexity of government structures
and its inter-relationships.The internet can achieve this goal by making web
sites more user-friendly accompanied by a quick government response
and enabling governments to appear as a unified structure (Nations,
E-Government Survey 2012, 2012, pp. 112-113).
2.6.2 E-Government Improves Services

Building trust between government and citizens is considered to be
fundamental to good governance. E-government provides the means to
increaseparticipationofcitizensinpolicyprocess.Forinstance,e-government
can provide opportunities to citizens to express themselves,that their voice
can be heard, through web comment forums as well as to provide them
with the possibility to submit suggestions, ideas. Ultimately, this approach
in turn can help government to better understand citizens’ needs which
will consequently increase the accountability of the government itself and
prevent corruption (Blind, 2006).
2.6.3 E-government Can Help to Build Trust Between
Government and Citizens
Chapter 2
Several stages can be noticed in the implementation of e-government.This section
will give an overview of some existent models of different stages as proposed by
different authors.The process of establishing an e-government system passes through
different stages, until it reaches its final stage and regardless the different stages of
each proposed model, there are many similarities between these approaches. For
example, it starts from the immature to the mature where the latter provides full
integration of government information and services within different government
agencies at different levels. For example, it starts with simple information posted
on the web, then two-way communication facilities, transaction process at a later
stage until it reaches a stage where it seamlessly ties together different ministries.
The various models of the stages of e-government can be summarized below:
• Chandler and Emanuel’s Model
• Layne and Lee’s Model
2.7 Adoption Phases of E-Government
Chandler and Emanuel (Geoffrey K. Louise Y.) broke up e-government
implementation process into four stages:
1. Information stage: where it displays the availability of government
services on the web.
2. Interaction stage: where the interactions between government and
citizens are enhanced, represented in two way communication.
2.7.1 Chandler and Emanuel’s Model

3. Transaction stage: transactions are possible at this stage. For example a
citizen can submit a form online.
4. Integration stage: integration of services is fully realized across different
government entities.
Layne and Lee (Karen Layne Jungwoo Lee,2001) developed e-government
implementation to go through four stages. Layne and Lee study proposes a
‘stages of growth’ model in order to reach a fully functional e-government,
see figure (2.1).
• Cataloguing phase: in this phase, initial efforts are taken to make
government information and its services available to the public through
the creation of websites.
• Transaction phase: further efforts are considered to enable citizens to
interact with their government electronically.
• Vertical integration phase: This level and last level focuses on the
differentiation between government functions and government levels.
This phase takes into account the integration of different government
levels within the same functional areas.
• Horizontal integration phase: this last level, in contrast to the previous
phase, focuses on integrating different government systems across
different functions.
2.7.2 Layne and Lee’s Model
Figure (2.1) - Layne and Lee Model
(Karen Layne Jungwoo Lee, 2001)
Chapter 2

Based on the above two models presented and their similarities, there are some
differences.For instance,Layne and Lee (2001) divide integration phase into vertical
and horizontal phases, which in turn gives more focus on the level of integration of
data and services.This enables the citizens to access government services without
to worry about which agency is responsible for. This model also focuses on the
levels of organizational and technological aspects.
It can be noticed that Layne and Lee (2001) move to the transaction phase without
mentioning the interaction phase.On the other hand,Chandler and Emanuel’s model
mentions the interaction stage. In addition, the model gives little consideration to
the technical security aspect at the transaction stage.
Chapter 2
As countries move upwards in developing their e-government systems to become
more sophisticated in terms of content delivery and user satisfaction, they face a
lot of challenges.According to the United Nations, (DESA, 2008), see figure(2.2),
the progress towards a solid e-government system is classified into five stages
are Emerging, Enhanced, Interactive, Transactional and connected, based on the
functionalities, facilities and services available on the web. Figure (2.3) shows the
availability of e-government around the world and as it can be noticed that most
Arab countries still at early stages of e-government maturity.
Figure (2.2) - Web measure index

The stages are a method for measuring progress of e-government implementation.
They represent how a country is successful socially,economically and in its political
will. In this research, the five stages of e-government development are presented
with some web illustrations and are as follows:
1. Emerging Stage
2. Enhanced Stage
3. Interactive Stage
4. Transactional Stage
5. Connected Stage
Chapter 2
Figure (2.3) - Illustration of e-government maturity around the world

Figure (2.4) - Illustration of e-government emerging stage (D.C., 2004)
Chapter 2
1. Emerging Stage:
The first level of e-government is the Emerging stage. At this level, governments
start creating websites and provide basic information about the different types of
government agencies.These websites provide links to Ministries, regional and local
authorities and diplomatic missions abroad.
The content of such websites is static and provide information about the type of
services being offered, working hours, contact information and etc.

Figure (2.5) - Illustration of e-government enhanced stage (Stockholm, 2005)
Chapter 2
2. Enhanced Stage:
This is the second level of e-government strategy;it focuses on providing means for
individuals to communicate with government agencies and search for information
which is regularly updated.
At some point, a home page may act as a point of entry to other governmental
agencies and provide some features like downloading some useful documents for
greater interaction between citizen and agencies.

Figure (2.6) - Illustration of e-government interactive stage (Government S.,2012)
Chapter 2
3. Interactive Stage:
At this level governments start to create a national government website that acts
as a point of entry to a wide variety of services and information, users may look
up into the databases to retrieve specific information. At this moment, some
enhanced features begin to emerge like securing sites, user log-in and password
and downloading applications with the possibility to submit them online.

Figure (2.7) - Illustration of e-government transactional stage (Canada, 2011)
Chapter 2
4. Transactional Stage:
At this advanced level of e-government maturity,individuals can perform transactions
electronically like, for example, making processing payments, submitting application
forms, applying for visas and passports just to name a few. The outcome of this
e-government stage is to try to minimize the interaction with government staff and
automate these processes as best to improve the efficiency of the services offered.

Figure (2.8) - Illustration of e-government connected stage (Government S.L.,2009)
Chapter 2
5. Connected Stage:
This stage is considered to be the most sophisticated level of e-government
implementation. During this phase, governments transform themselves into a
connected entity using a fully integrated ICT and back office infrastructure that
responds to the needs of its citizens. Data is either exchanged vertically between
different levels of government or horizontally between different Ministries. In
addition, the integration takes place across all government sectors from local,
regional authorities and external institutions. Connected government can be
summarized as follows:
• Horizontal connection among different agencies
• Vertical connection among central and local agencies.
• Infrastructure connection.
• Connection between governments and citizens.
• Connection among stakeholders.

There are numerous surveys showing how governments are progressing in the
adoption of e-government in terms of the previous five stages discussed earlier.
According to the UN survey conducted in 2010 (UN2010), most of these countries
indicate that they fall within the enhanced and interactive stages. This survey
measures the significant differences between developed and developing countries
in terms of the quality of online services.
ProfessorWest (West, 2005) observes,“Most governments around the world have
gonenofurtherthanthebillboardorpartialservice-deliverystatesofe-Government.
They have made little progress at portal development, placing services online, or
incorporating interactive features onto their websites. Not only are they failing to
use technology to transform the public sector, their efforts mostly consist of no
meaningful change or small steps forward”.
2.8 Descriptive Analysis of E-government in the Arab Region
Chapter 2
Country
E-government development
index value
World e-government
development ranking
2010 2008 2010 2008
Bahrain 0.73 0.57 13 42
United Arab Emirates 0.53 0.63 49 32
Kuwait 0.52 0.52 50 57
Jordan 0.52 0.54 51 50
Saudi Arabia 0.51 0.49 58 70
Qatar 0.49 0.53 62 53
Tunisia 0.48 0.34 66 124
Egypt 0.45 0.47 86 79
Oman 0.45 0.46 82 84
Lebanon 0.43 0.48 93 74
Libya 0.37 0.35 114 120
Morocco 0.32 0.29 126 140
Algeria 0.31 0.35 131 121
Syria 0.31 0.36 133 119
Iraq 0.29 0.26 136 151
Sudan 0.25 0.21 154 161
Yemen 0.21 0.21 164 164

Table (2.1) - E-government development in the Arab world (UN2010)

Up to now this literature review has examined the basic principles of e-government
and its impact on a country’s development. In this section, focus is moved towards
the challenges that most Arab countries are facing in establishing e-government
system.
Like many other developed countries around the world, Arab countries which
represent 5% of the world population, are putting efforts in implementing
e-government. Such efforts may help them to support accountability and
transparency,and at some phases to be competitive with other developed countries.
One of the most common complaints that Arab citizens are now suffering is the
quantity and complexity of government formalities and paperwork (UNDP, 2001).
So the first step towards a successful implementation of e-government is to make
plans to simplify the organizational and administrative aspects as a whole.
Many technical and non-technical issues emerge as e-government becomes broader
in scope and its complexity increases,such issues have to be closely monitored and
controlled, as they are considered to be crucial to the successful implementation
of an effective e-government.
According to Heeks (Dada), most developing countries fail to implement
e-government and the main reason to such failure is the presence of a gap between
the current reality and the plans to implement a future e-government system.This
is due to the inconsistency in the physical, economic and social aspects.
2.9 Barriers to E-Government Implementation in Arab Countries
Chapter 2
Many users feel that using websites to carry on transactions with e-government
agencies (such as, name, ID number, credit card details and personal information)
are not safe.They feel that websites are not enough secured as their information
may be manipulated or misused by other third parties or hackers. This lack of
security has created less willingness to go for online services.
In order to overcome security challenges, governments must provide the means
to protect their websites as well as associated data - repositories (archives) and to
provide a secure access point to citizens to gain citizens trust, this can be achieved
partially through public awareness by using TV, campaigns, seminars, etc.
2.10 Access Issues

In today’s world, when it comes to secure critical data, there is a significant and
increasing demand for information security based on the concept of applying
cryptographic services and consequently using cryptographic keys. So it all
comes to securing the keys so the overall system can be secured and assured.
Some critical keys for instance must be securely generated and imported at a
corresponding crypto node.This cannot be done without the proper handling of
the key management so the outcome can be reduced.
Taking into consideration what have been mentioned, so the establishment of
cryptographic infrastructures will demand more than the conventional system
integration which requires ultimately, a profound system-planning and process
integration.1
Chapter 2
1
Source: In Personal communication with Brandtstaetter,T. (2011). Cyber Crime.

CHAPTER III
3.1 Introduction
Now days many governments around the globe are
considering more and more to develop and to find the
best strategies to efficiently deliver e-government services
to citizens, in order to support and speed up the process
of modernization of public sector.
In the previous chapter,I gave an overview of e-government
in general, its benefits as well as various issues that affect
the implementation of e-government such as the economic,
cultural, political and social impacts, which are different in
each country; therefore there is no standard model to be
applied in all countries.
However, utilizing and learning the lessons from other
e-government initiatives is indispensable to avoid
future problems that might prevent the adoption of
e-government. Therefore, this chapter illustrates brief
information about Iraq, some statistics about displaced
Iraqis around the world, its diplomatic missions abroad
which is the main focus of this research, as well as a brief
description of the services offered.
Case Study: Iraqi Diplomatic Missions
e-government

Iraq is a country situated in westernAsia,confined geographically from the northeast
by Zagros Mountains, the Syrian Desert from the west and the Arabian Desert
from the south.Iraq neighboring countries are Syria,Turkey,Iran,Jordan,Kuwait and
Saudi Arabia see figure (3.1). It occupies 438,317 square kilometers.According to
the Iraqi Central Organization for Statistics,the total population reached 30 million
in 2009 and a growth rate of 2.6%. (UNdata).
3.2 Characteristics of the Republic of Iraq
Chapter 3
Poppulation
Master Th
F
esis T
igure (10) -
 Tota
 Annu
 Popu
Towards E-g
- Iraq Neigh
l population
ual growth 2
ulation aged
governmen
He
hboring cou
n 30 Million
2.6%
0 – 14 yea
t: Iraqi diplo
eidelberg U
ntries
rs 40.7%
omatic miss
niversity of
sions’ ca
Applied
Figure (3.1) - Iraq Neighboring countries (Geology, 2007)

The ministry of foreign affairs of the republic of Iraq is in charge of the Iraqi’s
foreign policy and diplomacy. It is also in charge of all diplomatic missions abroad.
As of now, Iraq has a diplomatic representation in almost 35 countries around
the world to provide Iraqi citizens with the necessary information and consular
services. Figure (4.2) illustrates the various departments within the Ministry.
3.3 Iraqi Foreign Ministry
Chapter 3
Figure (3.2) - Structure of the Iraqi Ministry of foreign affairs (MoFA, Ministry Structure)
Table (3.1) - Iraqi’s National Profile sources (UNdata)
Population
 Total population 30 Million
 Annual growth 2.6%
 Population aged 0 – 14 years 40.7%
Area  438,317 square kilometers
Currency  Iraqi Dinar (IQD)
Economy
 Natural resources: petroleum, natural gas, Phosphates,
sulfur
 Nominal GDP (2010): $82.2 Billion
Official language
 Arabic
 Kurdish

Diplomatic Missions abroad are government agencies that are composed of a
group of people (Diplomats) from one state operating in another state. Embassies
and consulates which are government representations in a foreign country operate
under the government sector of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.A state can have
only one embassy in another state to represent it. Instead, a country can have
multiple consulates to represent the latter in another country. It can be noticed
that consulates and embassies are different, an embassy is considered to be larger
in representation, generally situated in a country’s capital.While a consulate is just
a small version of an Embassy located in bigger cities but not in the capital city
(Wikipedia).
3.4 The Definition of Foreign Missions
Chapter 3
As has been mentioned, Embassies play a significant role in foreign policy as they
represent their government in another country. Embassies main task is to inform
its government about all the events in the host country. In addition, embassies
help in preparing treaties and exchange messages between its government and the
host government.While consulates major task is to promote trade and establish
commercial links between the government it represents and the host government
in which it resides. Given the difference roles addressed to both embassies and
consulates to represent their government, they both provide their own citizens
living in the host country with public services which will be of our interest in this
research (Borders, 2004).
Consular services provided by a diplomatic mission are at the forefront as they
are considered as point of contact for citizens overseas.They didn’t receive that
much of attention by e-government strategy and they only started to be adopted
by different countries in the last few years to take part of the e-government plan.
Development of consular affairs needs to be understood as it contributes in
strengthening the relationship between the government and its citizens abroad.
(Borders, 2004)
3.5 Basic Concept

The continuous growth of citizens implies the ministries of foreign affairs (MFAs)
these days to find the best way possible to assist them anywhere around the world,
as foreign ministries are trying to avoid criticism by the public, they are starting to
appreciate the market value of consular affairs and putting all the efforts to upgrade
the quality of these services as a mean to improve the government image among
the public (Maaike H. and Jan M.).
Chapter 3
1. National citizens: individuals living in the host country are considered the main
stakeholder in a diplomatic mission residing in that host country as it has a
direct impact on increasing the quality and efficiency of consular services.
2. Foreign nationals: foreigners wishing to stay in the sending country that may
require a prior visa, have also an impact on the improvement of the consular
services.
3. Diplomatic mission staff: employees of the diplomatic mission can contribute
directly and indirectly towards a successful and efficient provision of consular
services.
4. Institutions of the host country: the exchange of messages between the
authorities of the host country and the diplomatic mission as well as the
embassies and consulates of other countries
3.6 Stakeholders

3.7 Functions of the Missions Abroad
The receiving state has the duty to protect the interests of
the sending state and its citizens, within the limits granted by
international low.
To issue passports ( including diplomatic, service and ordinary
passports) and travel documents to nationals of the sending state
on one hand and issuing visas or documents to foreign individuals
wishing to visit the sending state
Giving appropriate assistance to nationals of the sending state.
Engaging in notary services such as authentication, legalization
and civil registrar services, provided that such services do not
contradict with the laws and regulations of the receiving state.
To transmit judicial documents to be used as evidence for the
courts of the sending state
Table (3.2) - Consular functions summary
1
2
3
4
5
According to the Vienna convention on Consular Relations (Nations, Vienna
Convention 1963), consular functions can be summarized in the table below:
Chapter 3

Chapter 3
As discussed earlier in this chapter, foreign missions are considered to be a point
of contact where citizens can get assistance,consular services and further guidance
in case of emergency and so on. Iraqi diplomatic missions are of no difference, they
provide various consular services (MoFA,MoFA consular services) and they can be
summarized as follows:
1. Issuance of passport:issuing a new passport in case of previous expired passport
or passport loss
2. Issuance of birth certificate: it is issued when an Iraqi child is born abroad, the
family’s newborn should present the birth certificate issued by the competent
authorities in the country in which the birth took place, and the Iraqi mission
then issues the Iraqi birth certificate in accordance with the foreign birth
certificate.
3. Marriage and divorce registration: foreign countries have their own rules and
regulations of marriage and divorce. Iraqi missions abroad provide their citizens
to register a marriage or divorce in the records of the civil affairs department
in accordance with Iraqi personal status law.
4. Issuance of the civil status ID issued in case of renewal or lost.
5. Issuance of the civil status ID: issued in case of renewal or lost.
6. Iraqi nationality certificate: Iraqi missions provide their citizens with the
possibility of:
• Issuing an Iraqi nationality certificate.
• Discarding the Iraqi nationality on citizen request.
• Reclaiming Iraqi citizenship
7. Issuance of criminal record certificate.
8. Issuance of life certificate
3.8 Iraqi Diplomatic Missions and Citizens Abroad

9. Pass document: in case of lost passport and a citizen wishes to return to Iraq.
10. Issuance of public and private authorizations.
11. Ratifications.
12. Issuance of certificate of origin.
13. Issuance of entry visa to Iraq for foreign nationals.
All these services are part of the functions offered by the Iraqi missions abroad,
it should be pointed out that Iraqi missions face some considerably significant
challenges one of them is the surge in appointments that can take rather long as
well as most of these consular services mentioned previously take considerably
along time to be processed, it takes sometimes up to few months to receive a
passport or an ID.This has created a lot of frustration among the Iraqi nationals to
have to wait up few months to get their documents processed and delivered.
These challenges are arising more and more among the various Iraqi missions
abroad, due to problems in the appointment system and inefficient document
issuing process.
According to some Iraqi diplomats, appointments are taken up weeks in advance,
till they are made available, which is the main reason for the backlog.Another issue
is arising which contributes directly to the backlog,is the significant increase in Iraqi
nationals abroad.The dramatic increase of Iraqi nationals between 1990 and 2011
went far beyond the Iraqi missions’ capacity to meet their citizens’ needs.
Chapter 3

Country Estimated Number of Citizens
Syria 1,200,001
Jordan 750,0001
Egypt 100,0001
Iran 202,1002
Lebanon 40,0001
Turkey 10,0001
Gulf States 200,0001
Germany 150.0003
Sweden 70,0003
Norway 24,5054
United Kingdom 250,0005
Denmark 12,6002
U.S. 90,0006
Netherlands 50,0005
Australia 11,1001
Table (3.3) shows an estimated number of Iraqi citizens living in some countries
around the world, both legally and undocumented and it is continuously rising.
Chapter 3
Table (3.3) - Estimated number of Iraqi citizens in various countries
Many countries around the world have taken major steps in the adoption of
E-government systems. It is not limited to advanced nations but also in developing
countries which are applying best practice solutions to build efficient systems.
Many countries have been successful in implementing e-government solutions in
their relevant Ministries and foreign missions. In this regard, strategies and policies
applied by some successful countries like Australia and Bahrain are assessed.The
ultimate goal is to identify factors and lessons that may serve in the implementation
of e-government system.
• Australia
• Bahrain
3.9 Comparative Worldwide E-Government Experiences
1
Source retrieved from UNHCR Statistics on Displaced Iraqis around the world as of April 2007. Check www.unhcr.org for updates.
2
Source retrieved from UNHCR on Iraqi Refugee and Asylum-seeker statistics as of March 2003. Check
www.unhcr.org for updates.
3
Source retrieved from a survey conducted by the European Council on Refugees and Exiles as of April 2004. Check www.ecre.org
for updates.
4
Source retrieved from Statistics Norway as of January 2009. Check www.ssb.no for updates.
5
Source retrieved from the NewYork Times, published on Wednesday. January 19. 2005.
6
Source retrieved from the US Census in 2000 by the Population Reference Bureau. Check www.prb.org for updates.

Australia was one of the first countries which took major steps in developing
and implementing an efficient e-government. One of its successful projects
was the E-visa (Gov, 2003) (http://www.immi.gov.au/e_visa/) program
launched in December 2000, by enabling people from different countries
around the world to lodge visa applications directly through the website.
3.9.1 Australia
Chapter 3
Figure (3.3) - Illustration of the Australian e-government portal (Government A.)
As it can be seen from figure (3.3) above, the e-Visa website is rich of
different functionalities, enabling applicants to submit their applications
online without the need to use paper-based application or to be present
at the Embassy. In addition, it allows them to know about the status of
their submitted applications;with some features like printing a copy of their
application, being notified of any missing documents needed to be upload
or approval notification via email. Helpdesk is provided either by phone or
email to further assist applicants. Finally, this program has brought a lot of
benefits as follows:

1. Apply for visa anytime, anywhere 24 hours a day- 7 days a week.
2. Making the application process more simplified.
3. Time to process applications was significantly reduced to as little
as about 20 minutes.
4. The requirement of sending the passport via post across the
border was removed.
5. Paper work was significantly reduced
In realizing such compact program, the project also had to face some
obstacles like:
1. Changing the whole paper-work process to electronic process,
required legislative change.
2. It took more than the expected time to investigate the best
technologies available to achieve the task.
3. Dealing with visas meant to meet an acceptable technical level of
encryption while maintaining at the same time a high speed of
connection.
Figure (3.4), illustrates the current website of the Australian Embassy
in Berlin. It provides audio and visual content, properly marked up, not
dependent only on colors, very well structured with good navigation
mechanism and provides clear information with easy guidelines for users as
well as a lot of options regarding times, services in a very handful way.
Chapter 3

Figure (3.4) - Illustration of theAustralian Embassy in Germany and e-visa processing
(Embassy)
Chapter 3
The Bahraini Government started the project e-Visa and was first
implemented in October 2005 (Bahrain, UN - Bahrain eVisa System, 2005)
as the first of its kind in the Middle East and one of the best in the world. It
is an online e-Visa system application service destined for the payment and
processing of visas.The system is connected in the backend with the General
Directorate Nationality, passports and residence database to monitor and
provide clearance for each processed application on individual basis.
In addition to that, the system is based on workflow-driven mechanism;
the system also provides various types of visas allowing more and more
groups of people to benefit from this system: foreign nationals resident in
Bahrain who intend to have multiple re-entry visas; more opportunities
for applicants seeking to work within companies residing in Bahrain and
visitors. See figure (3.5).
3.9.2 Bahrain

Figure (3.5) - Shows the Bahraini e-visa website (Bahrain, Bahrain eVisas)
Chapter 3
In addition to this service, the Bahraini Diplomatic missions around the
world provide a lot of good consular services in a very structured, simple
and handful way. As in the figure (3.6), which shows the website of the
Embassy of the Bahrain in London, it provides either national citizens or
travelers wishing to visit the country with good consular services like:
passport services; legalization; visas; and traveler guide, all handled and
processed electronically through the website and via post.
The website also gives an insight about the country like its foreign policy,
governmentstructure,economyandtourismjusttonameafew.Thisfeatureis
useful for companies seeking to invest,individuals wishing to travel,students
seeking education and valuable information for other governmental entities
for mutual cooperation
The website is connected to the main e-Visa website so individuals can
apply directly without the need to wait, provided with instructions and
guidelines on how to successfully complete an application.

Figure (3.6) - Illustration of the Bahraini Embassy website in London (London)
Chapter 3
To successfully and efficiently deliver consular services to citizens, there are basic
but important requirements that must be fulfilled.These requirements are different
and vary from a country to country. Countries like Iraq, which is still lagging far
behind its developed counterparts in e-government,especially in providing efficient
consular services to citizens abroad. Such countries must make more efforts to
meet these requirements, which are considered a key success factor to improve
the diplomatic missions’ internal workflow process and consequently resulting in a
higher level of citizen satisfaction.The requirements are as follows:
• Organizational Requirements
• Change Management
3.10 Consular Web-Based Services Requirements

Online consular services are not just a technical aspect; providing them
requires change management. There are several requirements at the
organizational level which affect the overall provision of such services and
they are illustrated as follows:
1. Organizational Structure
In every diplomatic mission, it is essential to consider the organizational
structure, its objectives and its managerial divisions, based on a form of
organizational hierarchy, this is necessary when applying e-government
concept. In addition, modern technology must be able to best fulfill the
needs of the organizational aspects, as it will lead to enhance and improve
government performance in meeting the needs of its citizens.
2. Work Procedures
In order to apply modern technologies and utilize them for better delivery
of consular services to citizens, the internal workflow process inside the
organization must be highly qualified and efficient.Both simple and complex
procedures within the organization are considered important as they
represent the stages of services from process to delivery.This approach is
of mutual benefit as for citizens to have more satisfaction with the available
services and for diplomatic missions as well to help them deliver services
more easily and with less expense for the state,it also facilitates their internal
work process. There are some focal points that need to be considered
as they represent the first steps towards the successful implementation
of e-government within the diplomatic missions’ framework and they are
detailed as follows:
• Reforming of administrative work process is the first step towards
providing online consular services. This means the re-engineering of
procedures and processes like changing the forms, reports and records
in a way that it fits in the broad usage of modern technologies.
• Clear scope and definition of the transactions so they can be automated
or at least monitored automatically.
3.10.1 Organizational Requirements
Chapter 3

• For fast and efficient delivery of service, documents and requirements
requested from the citizen should be reduced as much as possible.
• Providing guidelines and instructions for citizens before lodging an
application in websites.
• Keep the organizational work process and delivery of services updated
with the latest state of technology and innovation.
3. Centralization and Decentralization
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is no other than a global organization
of a country that works for the interests of its citizens abroad through
its diplomatic missions. So it can be described as a huge network of
organizations (represented by a central organization which is the Ministry
and its representatives abroad) and its level of interaction and coordination
is affected by the degree of centralization or decentralization which requires
the following:
• Enabling transparency means that roles, tasks and responsibilities must
be defined for both at the central and local level.
• Defining how information is transmitted between the Ministry and its
diplomatic missions abroad.
• Define certain priorities and technologies within this network to
guarantee high quality of performance. In addition, set some monitoring
mechanisms to maintain it.
Chapter 3
Shifting the services provided by diplomatic missions from its traditional
way to make them available online using e-government requires great
efforts and patience. So, Change Management addresses these internal and
external workflow processes and adapts them to the new environment.
Within the context of e-government, Change Management takes care of
how diplomatic staff members make the transition from traditional paper-
work to a more sophisticated system-aided process. This is achieved by
providing staff members with the required up-to-date technical education,
system support, possible training and documentation for computer usage.
3.10.2 Change Management

4.1 Introduction
So far I have used exploratory research as we have seen in
the literature review chapter to enrich the reader with the
basic concepts of e-government.According to Yin (1994),
the research design is “the logical sequence that connects
the empirical data to a study’s initial research questions
and, ultimately, to its conclusion”. The following sections
outline the research process,chosen data collection,design
and implementation.The main purpose of this chapter is to
outline the research strategies that will be used by the
researcher for the thesis.
CHAPTER IVConceptualization
e-government

When research problem has been identified, the research objectives and questions
started, it is necessary to indicate how the research objective would be achieved
(Walliman, 2001).
In light of this,the first step towards the accomplishment of this thesis is to identify
the research problem and get reliable information.I have done this by going through
scientific published articles and other sources mainly available on the internet.I have
also studied different e-government initiatives adopted and implemented in different
countries,the challenges they had to encounter.In addition,I have analyzed different
cases of e-government success and failure, the gap between design requirements
and reality. Furthermore, I made a comparative study of different governmental
websites, i.e. advantages and disadvantages (mainly diplomatic missions’ websites)
and their online services provided to the public.
In the second part of the thesis, I have collected enough information regarding
e-government in Iraq and the current status of the Iraqi diplomatic missions’
websites which are presented in this thesis through statistics.The first step to take
when creating a research, according to (Yin 1994), is to make an evaluation of the
research strategy.
Generally speaking, there are five types of research strategies a researcher can
follow when conducting social science research: through experiments, surveys,
archival analysis,history and case studies.For the purpose of this thesis,a survey was
performed on people to understand their needs, as well as some interviews were
made with some diplomatic employees to understand and expand my knowledge
about the internal work process within the diplomatic missions.These interviews
and questionnaires were the main data collection strategies I have used in order to
draw the steps towards the design and implementation of a prototype. Figure (5.1),
the phases of the research process are presented.
4.2 Research Process
Chapter 4

Chapter 4
Figure (4.1) - Phases of the research process. (created by the author)
Throughout this thesis, different data collection strategies were studied to find the
most efficient strategy that best suits and fulfills the needs of the research problem.
As the choice of a specific data collection method is seldom easy and many factors
have to be considered depending on the nature of the phenomenon in question.
For this thesis I used different data collection methods to gather the information
and they are summarized as follows:
• Literature review
• The questionnaire
• Interviews
4.3 Data Collection
A continuous literature review was conducted by the author throughout the
whole project.The main issues addressed were the following focal points:
1. Definition and basic concept of e-government
2. Barriers to e-government implementation
3. Successful stories of e-government projects adopted by different
countries
4.3.1 Literature Review

At beginning, the information gathered through different sources was
used to establish a theoretical research proposal outlining the research
goals and questions. At a later stage and side by side to the case study, a
focus search was carried on e-government initiatives adopted by different
countries around the world, the challenges they faced and their outcomes.
The information collected through the literature review phase was utilized
to refine the project scope and reshape the research questions. In addition,
it was of great benefit to build the questionnaire draft and prepare the
interview questions.
Chapter 4
I developed questionnaire template (see appendixA) based on the research
questions in mind using clear language and meeting research objectives.The
questionnaire was distributed in printed papers among Iraqi citizens who
were present at both Iraqi embassy in Berlin and at the Iraqi consulate in
Frankfurt.
SimpleArabic was used to ensure no misconception or misinterpretation in
understanding the questionnaire questions.
4.3.2 The Questionnaire
Factors affecting the provision of information and consular services on
Iraqi’s diplomatic missions’ websites based on interviews with diplomatic
employees:
Since foreign missions are complex by nature, especially their internal
work process, so providing government information requires a lot of
dedication and effort in order to maintain a diplomatic mission’s website
content. They usually contain a lot of information and this information
is in continuous change. Many studies have shown that the provision of
information and services on the web can be subjected to some factors
such as lack of management support and planning.Iraqi foreign missions like
other diplomatic missions around the world are of no exception in facing
challenges to provide good information and good consular services.
4.3.3 Interviews

In order to address these challenges, the author conducted an interview
with some webmasters and diplomats of the Iraqi foreign ministry to
investigate in depth the reasons behind the lack of information and services
provided through the websites.
As a result of the interview, the following focal points seem to affect the
provision of information and services on the Iraqi foreign missions.
1. The existence of a gap between e-government initiatives and an action
to implement it.
2. The provision of information has low priority for diplomatic missions’
management.
3. Head of missions share different points of interests and lack of central
support management.
4. Information may be ambiguous.
5. Website outsourcing.
6. Website evaluation.
1. The existence of a gap between e-government initiatives
and an action to implement it
Many initiatives took place over the past few years to implement
e-government in Iraq, but they ended up with failure and no success.
Recalling the e-government strategy known as “Government Intranet
project” in 2008 to link different Iraqi ministries to insure voice, video and
data sharing, the project was promising but then it was never implemented.
Also recently, the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs started a new strategy to
create a web portal connecting all the diplomatic missions.The goal was to
replace all previous diplomatic missions’ websites with new enhanced ones.
But the project was partially implemented and its success was just at the
information level and of no benefits, figures (4.2) and (4.3) illustrates the
outcome of the partially implemented e-government strategy adopted by
the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs as it lacks a lot of features and services.
Chapter 4

Chapter 4
Figure (4.3) - The new website of the Iraqi Embassy in Oslo (Oslo). It can be
noticed that even with the launch of the e-government project, it still covers
basic features at the information level with no e-visa system or online filling
forms. In addition, lack of information, updates and other important features
when it is compared to other foreign missions of other countries
Figure (4.2) - Website of the Iraqi Embassy in Stockholm (old version) which is
still the official website for the Embassy with its basic features at the information
level (Stockholm, 2005).

2. The provision of information has low priority for diplomatic
missions’ management
The study suggests that the information and services provided through
websites of different Iraqi foreign missions vary significantly from an embassy
to another.This is due to the lack of appreciation by top management of the
importance of these services and information to citizens.This shows that
the internal management gives low priority to citizens’ needs of information
and services in its agenda. Such implications could be caused by the lack of
IT professionals and lack of motivation to drive them to design enhanced
websites with good public services and accurate information.
3. Head of missions share different points of interests and
lack of central support management
Provision of information is influenced by head of missions’ interests. Study
showed different perceptions with respect to head of missions’ interests.
Some of them were highly motivated that e-government strategy will
provide citizens with good public services, whereas others were not. It
is also due to the fact that the ministry gives no proper directions to its
foreign missions to address the importance of e-government to citizens.
4. Information may be ambiguous
The interview conducted shows that due to the lack of formality within the
departments of the Iraqi Ministry of foreign affairs, it is occasionally to face
some problems with the source of information. In fact, the formalization
documents that explain the internal process sometimes are not updated
when new regulations come into action. This is because when there is
a change in the regulations, they are sent to the departments through
circulation forms from top management. Causing uncertainty to rely on
these documents, consequently, affecting the information provided by
diplomatic missions’ websites.
Chapter 4

5. Website outsourcing
A telephone interview was made with IT department of the Iraqi Ministry of
foreign affairs and it revealed that one of the factors influencing the provision
of services and accurate information was the lack of communication between
the Ministry’s IT staff and the Company’s staff in charge of developing the
websites.The interview showed as well lack of websites maintenance.
6. Website evaluation
Web accessibility evaluation to government is undertaken in order to enable
assessment and comparison of websites in accordance with predefined
criteria.In this regard,the author conducted a web evaluation of the current
Iraqi Diplomatic Missions’ websites abroad in terms of local language,forms,
news and updates, general content and online services. Findings of this
assessment have revealed that there is a lack in accessibility features and
standardization. Table (4.1) below summarizes the key evaluation findings
of the old Iraqi diplomatic missions’ websites, which was conducted by the
author.
Chapter 4
Missions abroad
Local
language
Downloadable
Forms
News
and
updates
General
Information
Possibility of
online
services
Feedback
or
comment
Iraqi Embassy
Athens
No Low — Very low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Brussels
No Low Low Low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Bern
No Low — Low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Berlin
Yes Low Fair Low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Helsinki
Iraqi Consulate
Frankfurt
Iraqi Embassy
London
Yes Low — Very low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Madrid
No Low — Low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Paris
Iraqi Embassy
Rome
No Low Fair Low — —
Iraqi Embassy
Stockholm
No Low Fair Fair — —

Table (4.1) - Illustrates the key findings of some of the old Iraqi Diplomatic
missions’ websites. (created by the author)

Chapter 5
Missions abroad
Local
language
Downloadable
Forms
News
and
updates
General
Information
Possibility
of online
services
User
friendly
Iraqi Embassy
Washington
Yes Fair Fair Fair — Fair
Iraqi Embassy
London
Yes Fair Low Fair — Low
Iraqi Embassy
Stockholm
no Low Low Low —
Very
low
Iraqi Embassy
Paris
Yes Low — Low —
Very
low
Iraqi Embassy
Tokyo
Yes Low Low Low —
Very
low
Iraqi Consulate
Sidney
no Low Low Low —
Very
low
Iraqi Embassy
Beijing
Yes Low Low Very low —
Very
low

Table (4.2) - Illustrates the key findings of some of the current Iraqi Diplomatic
missions’ websites as part of a recent e-government project partially deployed
but not successfully completed. (creted by the author)
In addition, the author also conducted an extensive research to evaluate
the current e-government project in designing websites for all the existent
Iraqi Diplomatic missions abroad and after evaluation, the outcome can be
summarized as in the table (4.2) below:

5.1 Introduction
In this chapter I will discuss and propose a design as a
prototype of the front-end web application showing the
presentation and process phases of the e-government
system within the Iraqi Embassy. This chapter will also
include the technology used within the system back-end
and its whole functionality together. To be filled later with
the list and in detail about the BPMN the example will be
highlighted out of the previous list
CHAPTER VDesignAnd Implementation Of Iraqi
DiplomaticMission’sWebApplication
And System’s Functionalities
e-government

Now comes the design phase of the web-application that will provide functionalities
to support diplomatic missions in daily work like the possibility of online visa
processing, document processing for national citizens, appointment system and
communication as well as payment processing just to name few. Initially, the web-
application will consist of the front-end in the form of a website portal made open
and accessible to the public through a web browser.The website is rich in facilities
and allows users to obtain different consular services 24/7 and from anywhere.The
services are then processed in the back-end via a secured connection. Figure (5.1)
below, shows an overview of the web-application architecture.
• User front-end web portal
• E-Visa
• Online appointment system
• Online passport system
5.2 Architecture Prototype
Chapter 5
Figure (5.1) - Illustrates the proposed web-application architecture (created by the author)

As I already mentioned previously,the website will be open and accessible to
users online and they can access it from anywhere at their convenience. In
this case I designed a website for the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin for illustration
purposes, see figure (5.2). To assist website’s highly intuitive and user
friendly organization, each service provided in the website is supported
with instructions and a step-by-step guidance as the user proceeds to the
next step until the service is fully obtained.
5.2.1 User Front-End Web Portal
Chapter 5
Figure (5.2) - a proposed design implemented by the author of an Iraqi Diplomatic
Mission website taking the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin as a sample (created by the
author)

In addition to the different consular services provided within the website
which I will discuss in detail in later sections, it also supports the following
standard features:
1. Support of local language.
2. Support of site search bar.
3. Support of map directions.
4. It provides Ticker for news and updates.
5. It provides external links to other governmental organizations.
6. It provides external links to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other
Diplomatic missions;it also provides external links to diplomatic missions
of other countries present locally within the same country.
7. Provides information about Iraq, its foreign policy, its economy, bilateral
relations within the local country, Global issues at a glance and links to
high profile companies for business purposes.
8. It provides a section for inquiries.
9. It provides a directory for the education system and external links to
Universities.
10. It provides information about the Diplomatic mission, press, contacts,
jobs, opening hours and general information.
As I already came across earlier that Iraqi diplomatic missions abroad
provides national citizens with different services, all these services are
processed using the conventional paper-work, so in thesis I will provide a
prototype to come up with a better system to provide consular services to
citizens efficiently.
Chapter 5

In this section, I will try to explain the whole process with the help of
BPMN2.0 and how to obtain aVisa online by the user and how it is going
to be processed and implemented in the back-end with the help of the
business process Modeling. I will follow BPMN2.0 standards to model and
define the processes that later will result in a prototype for the E-visa
system. As we know there are many tools available in the market, so for
my convenience I will be using during the design phase an open-source
BPM and workflow software called Bonita Studio to model and show the
business processes within the E-Visa system.
Figure (5.3) below, shows an overview of how Bonita Studio looks like,
with it’s easy to use GUI toolkit which provides many facilities that help to
design workflows in accordance with BPMN2.0 standards.
5.2.2 E-Visa
Chapter 5
Figure (5.3) - shows the basic view of Bonita soft GUI (Soft)

Chapter 5
Figure (5.4) - Shows the Process diagram of e-Visa application implemented by the
author. (Soft)
Figure (5.4) below shows the various processes that constitute the E-Visa
system using the Bonita Execution Engine, each process defined can be run
separately or within the whole system for testing and running purposes to
be later deployed.
The GUI toolkit provides an easy understanding and handling of processes
using the design elements which follow the standards of (BPMN2.0). The
proposed E-Visa process is designed to meet the needs of foreign nationals
wishing to visit Iraq, the system will provide acceptance of different types of
e-visas (single entry, multiple entry, transit, etc.)

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