Perhaps governance was easier in the past when the world was small villages scattered across the globe, each village busy with its internal affairs and only communicating with others when needed, in the days when an incident that occurred in China needed dozens of days to reach America in the nineteenth century, and when only the elite were the ones who read newspapers and books, and few were the ones who followed the radio, and a limited number were the ones who participated in public affairs in the twentieth century.
But with the beginning of the twenty-first century, and after the whole world became a small village, and the winds of globalization invaded all facilities until they swept every home and every person, where no home is without television, satellite channels and the Internet, and no person is left without an email and an account on social networking sites... Rather, communication has become possible via laptops, wireless networks and last but not least via smartphones.
The government's mission has become planning to achieve development, respond to global changes, and communicate and influence (i.e. mutual influence) with the actors, but it is a role that is no longer limited to it in light of the increasing role of the media, civil society, and transnational and transnational influences. This mission must be redefined and planned in consideration of these factors to achieve the strategic goals of society and the nation. Consequently, the definition of government will be reformulated to move from the previous narrow concept limited to ministers and the country's leadership, referred to in English as (Government), to the broader concept that includes a government apparatus that is continuous and consistent with civil society activities, social influencers, and popular and local elements to formulate a system of governance, referred to in English as (Governance). This concept is central to all the following paragraphs, wherever the words government or rule are mentioned, they refer to it.
Active citizenship, in its meaning that goes beyond the passive meaning limited to residing in the state, working within it, and participating in political life limited to elections, has a meaning that goes beyond it to broader horizons that include the philosophy that citizens must work to reform and improve society through economic participation, volunteer work, work in public affairs, and any other activities that would improve the lives of all citizens.
In societies where the philosophy of active citizenship prevails, the efforts of the government, active political parties, free media, civil society institutions, and private sector institutions combine in a steady, balanced, and continuous manner to improve the lives of society as a whole and the lives of individuals through participation in expressing opinions, positive influence, and working for the collective interest and self-benefit under the umbrella of the rule of law, transparency, and accountability.
The concepts of good governance constitute a clear framework for implementing governance that seeks to balance various influences to achieve an appropriate standard of living for individuals and society as a whole, based on basic principles for effective implementation that include participation, rule of law, majority orientation, transparency, accountability, responsiveness, effectiveness and efficiency, equality and inclusiveness. These principles constitute a regulator for practicing effective and good citizenship, which together aim to advance community life towards collective goals, and improve the lives of individuals to achieve their own projects under the rule of law and respect for the community. The trend of governments towards change towards implementing effective, good and regular citizenship within the frameworks of good governance is a healthy approach that stems from the core needs of the nation in achieving its development goals and facing its external challenges with high immunity shared by the various societal carriers that guarantee equality directed by the majority under the rule of law, in effective and efficient solidarity, achieving a response to these challenges and goals in light of high transparency and a high sense of responsibility placed under accountability.
In the face of these challenges in this open world, a new approach is needed that differs from the traditional approaches that dominated the approach of governments in previous periods, an approach at all levels within government work, at the level of communication with the public and influential parties, and at the level of benefiting from the experiences of work teams and experts in reading reality, anticipating the future, and developing solutions, in light of indicators of facts that help understand problems and the effects of implemented solutions.
This approach must benefit from the information technology revolution, the globalization of the media, and the cognitive interconnection represented by the Internet and social media, and the penetration of communications in all aspects of life and their access to smartphones and tablets. This must be accompanied by a strategic renaissance of the government to amend the government approach according to the new approach at the following levels:
Influencing the masses and social sectors is no longer limited to the government and its affiliated agencies. It is known that the media, civil society institutions, and last but not least, social media groups have a wide and significant influence on emerging social and political changes and movements.
There will be no tools that help absorb this new influential reality that are not based on a technical policy built on information and communication technologies, as such tools provide great benefits that include the effective use of information and communication technologies to achieve diplomatic and governmental goals, collecting, classifying and integrating digital information and knowledge to benefit from them in governance, and achieving communication between diplomats and rulers with their people, listening to them and dialogue with them.
Technical policy with its previous points falls within the following broad classification categories:
Knowledge management: To harness administrative and governmental knowledge so that it is retained, shared and used optimally to pursue and pursue national interests at home and abroad.
Public diplomacy: To maintain communication with audiences once they move online and to harness new means of communication to listen to audiences, target important ones with key messages and influence key influencers online and in the public sphere.
Information management: To help gather the overwhelming flow of information and use this to better inform policymakers and help predict and respond to emerging social and political movements.
Consular communications and response: To create personal channels of communication with citizens traveling abroad, with flexible communications in crisis situations.
Disaster response: To harness the power of connecting technologies in disaster response situations.
Freedom of communication: To create technology to keep the Internet and communications space open and free. This has related objectives to promote freedom of speech, democracy and inspire promising creative ideas.
External resources: Create digital mechanisms to benefit from external and non-governmental expertise and harness it to advance and develop national goals.
Political and governmental planning: To allow for effective international oversight, coordination and political planning across government, in response to the internationalization of bureaucracy.
