Paper short abstract:

My contribution will be a discourse analysis of speeches at the 2020 GovTech Summit. Addressing public governance as a presumably profitable enterprise, I will analyse the speakers' consideration (or absence of) the notions of responsibility and accountability to states and citizens.

Paper long abstract:

Early innovation in computer technology hails from the government and had always been importantly related to transformations in modes of governing. Hicks (2017) and Agar (2003) show that shifting responsibility for policy decisions to scientists, engineers and other technical specialists is not a novelty. What is new is GovTech or Government Technology, which Filer characterises as both a policy domain and an industry (Filer, 2019, p.17). GovTech proponents explicitly consider public administration, or governing, a profitable enterprise; it is supposedly a win-win situation for different stakeholders, from citizens, governments to start-ups and investors.

My contribution to this panel will inquire into GovTech, a subset of the industries that governments turn to for outsourcing their political functions. I will present a discourse analysis of speeches at the 2020 GovTech Summit, delving into the speakers' consideration (or absence of) the notions of responsibility and accountability to states and citizens. I will focus on the United Kingdom, coupling my analysis of the present with a historical consideration of (a)political decisions that led to the current situation.

Agar, J. (2003). The government machine: a revolutionary history of the computer. Cambridge and London: The MIT Press.

Filer, T. (2019). Thinking about GovTech: a brief guide for policymakers. [online] Bennett Institute for Public Policy. Available at: https://www.bennettinstitute.cam.ac.uk/media/uploads/files/Thinking_about_Govtech_Jan_2019_online.pdf [Accessed: 22 January 2021].

Hicks, M. (2017). Programmed Inequality: How Britain Discarded Women Technologists and Lost Its Edge in Computing. Cambridge and London: MIT Press.