On April 19, the 25th meeting of the Central Committee for comprehensively deepening reform deliberated and adopted the guiding opinions on strengthening the construction of digital government. What is digital government? Why is it urgent to strengthen the construction of digital government? How to enhance the effectiveness of digital government? The reporter interviewed Huang Huang, vice president of the school of government and management and professor of the Department of public policy of Peking University, and Meng Tianguang, vice president of the school of Social Sciences and head of the Department of political science of Tsinghua University. Digitalization is not only changing the world, but also redefining the world. Digital government is an important part of this redefinition Reporter: what is digital government? What is the difference between E-government and e-government? Huang Huang: in theory, the so-called digital government is to uphold the concept of "people-centered", realize the connection, empowerment, coordination and reconstruction of government agencies and organizations through the use of digital technology and data value, so as to improve the governance ability of the market, society and ourselves. From the tide of human historical development, the fourth industrial revolution represented by digital technology is rapidly changing the basic operation logic of government, market and society, which has a far-reaching impact on the organizational form, functional boundary, governance ability and governance technology of the government. At present, the transformation of digital government has become a global wave. Its rapid development, wide coverage of countries and many fields are noteworthy in the history of human social governance transformation. Since the middle and late 1990s, China's e-government has gone through the stages of information release, one-way service, two-way interaction, online transaction processing and so on. Compared with e-government, digital government is based on promoting governance modernization in its core objectives, follows the data paradigm in its top-level design, brings "data governance" into the scope of issues in its policies, increasingly tends to be a platform model in its business architecture, and is upgrading to intelligence on the basis of technology. Meng Tianguang: digital government is an important part of Digital China strategy. The Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee proposed to strengthen the construction of digital society and digital government, and improve the digital and intelligent level of public services and social governance. The 14th five year plan and the long-term goal outline for 2035 propose to "improve the construction level of digital government", widely apply digital technology to government management services, promote government governance process reengineering and model optimization, and constantly improve the scientificity of decision-making and service efficiency. Innovative experiences such as "one run at most" in Zhejiang Province, the "digital government" reform in Guangdong Province, and the "five complete government services" in Guizhou Province, as well as innovative applications such as e-driver's license, e-Social security, e-medical record, blockchain invoice, face brushing for medical treatment, paying after seeing a doctor, and 24-hour online digital civil servants, have not only shortened the working time of the masses and improved the administrative efficiency of the government, Moreover, it has improved the satisfaction of the people - these are realized on the basis of government digital transformation such as data integration and flat decision-making. Reporter: at present, why is it urgent to strengthen the construction of digital government? Huang Huang: in human history, from agricultural society to industrial society, from slash and burn farming to sound, light, chemical and electric power, every scientific and technological revolution will bring changes in the system and governance mode. Since human society started the information revolution, digital technology has accelerated the release of social productivity and promoted the great development and prosperity of economy and society. Digitization is not only changing the world, but also redefining the world. Digital government is not a simple superposition of information technology and government governance, but the most important part of this "redefinition". The simultaneous superposition of digital revolution and governance transformation not only deepens the urgency of government digital transformation, but also provides many possibilities for the exploration of national governance. Meng Tianguang: in the face of the changeable, rapid change and complexity brought by the rapid integration of IOT network due to the urban population exceeding the rural population, the wireless network users exceeding the wired network users, and the human network giving way to the Internet of things, the uncertainty brought by the increasing "intersection" between urbanization and ubiquitous digital technology, and the people's ability to know armed by digital technology With the rapid improvement of evaluation ability and active participation ability and the growing demand for public services, the construction of digital government is urgent. Only by realizing the benign interaction between the government and digital technology, accelerating the improvement of national governance, and the contents of Digital China including digital economy, smart society, smart city, smart transportation, smart hospital and smart education, can we effectively promote high-quality development. Build a digital service system that is accessible, intelligent, convenient, fair and inclusive, and enhance the people's sense of access, happiness and security Reporter: how will the digital reform help the transformation of government functions? Meng Tianguang: the digital transformation of the government not only promotes the embedding of digital technology into the government to promote the reconstruction of governance structure, business process and service mode, but also constructs new government social relations and government market relations to support the construction of digital society and the development of digital economy. Technology affects the organizational structure, and then affects the management effect. Some scholars believe that digital technology is turning the series business process between departments into a parallel business process "around public needs". Digital technology not only reshapes inter departmental business processes horizontally, but also compresses the organizational level vertically, making government governance "flat" and "flexible". For example, the essence of Zhejiang's "run once at most" reform is to force the government to reform itself based on the people's feeling of working with the government. The reform took place in the digital age, deeply using digital technology, Reengineering Government processes and innovating service methods. The reform abandoned the perspective of "government centrism", practiced the development thought of "people-centered", and realized the transformation of the subject from the government to the people. The reform originated within the government, directly promoted the construction of digital government in the new era, further extended to economic, social and other fields, and promoted the comprehensive digital transformation of provincial governance. In recent years, the Chinese government has attached great importance to the construction of digital government and has become the "big society test ground" for the construction of global digital government. The practice of government management reform based on digital technology, such as "Guangdong Provincial affairs", "zheliban", "yukuai ban", "second batch and second ban", is taking the algorithm as the core to open up the "last mile" of government public services. Digitization is not an end in itself. The ultimate goal is to improve people's sense of gain, happiness and security. Reporter: according to the requirements of the meeting of the central deep reform commission, build a ubiquitous, intelligent, convenient, fair and inclusive digital service system. How do you understand this? Huang Huang: ubiquitous and accessible. It is about the technology of digital government, which should be fully covered; Smart and convenient, which is about the efficiency of digital government, should be convenient, fast and intelligent; Fairness and inclusiveness is about the value of digital government, so that people can enjoy the achievements brought by advanced technology. Generally speaking, the focus on digital government includes at least the following aspects: first, breadth, that is, the service scope based on open network; The second is depth, that is, the service content deepened based on intelligent means; The third is thickness, that is, service resources based on large-scale data accumulation; Fourth, speed, that is, service efficiency based on computing power; The fifth is temperature, that is, based on the digital platform, to provide capacity support for timely response and practical solutions to people's livelihood issues of concern to the people. With the application of big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence and other technologies, digital government plays an important role, and the interworking and sharing of government service data plays a significant role Reporter: socialism with Chinese characteristics has entered a new era. What new progress has been made in the construction of digital government? In recent years, with the integration of new generation digital technologies such as big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence, the construction of digital government in China has made steady progress, and the service efficiency of digital government has been significantly improved. The efficiency of integrated government services and supervision has been greatly improved. New service management models such as "one network through all", "one run at most", "one network unified management" and "one network coordination" have been widely popularized, the digital business environment has been continuously optimized, and the level of Online government services has leapt to the world's leading level. According to the 2020 UN e-government survey report, China's e-government development index ranked 45th in the world. By the end of 2020, the proportion of provincial administrative licensing matters accepted online and "run at most once" has reached 82.13%, the average commitment time limit of more than half of the administrative licensing matters in China has been reduced by more than 40%, and people's affairs have become more convenient and efficient. Meng Tianguang: digital government plays an important role in epidemic prevention and control. Relevant departments actively applied big data, artificial intelligence and other means to help study and judge the epidemic trend, identify risk personnel, allocate anti epidemic materials and detect virus genes, quickly cut off the infection chain, effectively control the spread of the epidemic and strongly support the resumption of work and production. E-government has played an important role in coordinating epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development. To lay the foundation for the "one code" communication between the national government and civil aviation authorities, and promote the "one code" communication between the national government and regional health departments. At the same time, the "epidemic prevention health information code" service was launched to gather and support the sharing of 623 million "Health Code" data across the country, serving 600 million people in total. The exchange and sharing of government service data plays an important role in epidemic prevention. The general office of the State Council has launched a large number of high-frequency services for the whole country with the cooperation and coordination of various regions and departments, ensuring that the national government services do not close for 24 hours during the epidemic period. Many cities have also given brilliant answers to the construction of digital government. In the future, a greater breakthrough will be in the "general office", so that the masses can solve urgent and difficult problems with their fingertips Reporter: to enhance the effectiveness of digital government, why must we seize the "bull nose" of data sharing? Huang Huang: the core issue of digital government construction is how to realize data sharing across regions, levels, departments and fields, so as to make business collaboration possible, and make online government services "run once at most", "Zero run", and even "second approval" and "invisible approval". However, cross organizational data sharing faces many institutional, organizational and personal constraints. In some places, relevant departments have developed their own information systems and data centers, resulting in decentralized, incoherent and static government data resources