The rating of Russia's regions by their readiness for e-government

The paper summarizes the results of the development, calculation and analysis of the composite index of e-government readiness of the Russian regions. The approach used in the construction of the index is based on a conceptual framework for e-readiness assessment, with 34 indicators reflecting the accessibility of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) for the government bodies, households and organizations of a region, the level of web-presence of the government bodies, the utilization of e-government services by the enterprises, as well as the level of human capital development. The index was calculated basing on the data provided by the Federal State Statistics Service as well as results of the evaluation of the regional government bodies' official websites conducted in November 2006 and based on the UN methodology for assessing the countries' e-readiness. The top positions in e-government readiness index of the regions are occupied by Moscow and St. Petersburg, natural resource-oriented regions with high revenues of their households, as well as the regions where the government bodies are implementing targeted policy concerned with the utilization of ICT in public administration at the state, regional and municipal levels Among the regional government bodies' official websites, the Republic of Chuvashia's website rates fist. It is shown that digital inequality, both vertical and horizontal, from the standpoint of ICT accessibility and the utilization of e-government technologies is typical for the Russian government bodies. The vertical inequality is characterized by significant differences in ICT availability and utilization between the three levels of public administration (state, regional and municipal) while the horizontal inequality is reflected in significant interregional variations (sometimes differing by an order of magnitude). The local self-government bodies have the greatest problems with the availability of hardware, network technologies and the implementation of e-government concept. By the beginning of 2006, only 4.6% of the local self-government bodies had their own official websites, there were only 28 PCs per 100 employees to compare with 60 PCs per 100 employees at the federal level, even with the territorial divisions and representative offices taken into account. The problem common for all government levels in Russia consists in the almost complete lack of e-delivery of public services, which distinguishes our country from the most industrialized countries where e-services are regarded as a key area in the implementation of e-government concept.