Research on the Influence of Digital Technology on Urban Governance (3) Qian Cheng
In recent years, China’s digital technologies such as big data, blockchain and artificial intelligence have developed rapidly. Some digital technologies have penetrated into urban life, and their application scenarios have been continuously expanded, which has become an important support for the high-quality development of urban public services. Digital technology has the advantages of fast iteration speed, high intelligence level, wide application range, low marginal cost and easy scale promotion, which accelerates the mode transformation and optimization and upgrading of urban public services in China.
New Practice of Digital Technology Empowering Urban Public Services in China
Digital technology enables the continuous development of urban public services, and vivid practices of digital technology changing urban public services have appeared in various places. Taking employment public services, basic education, public health and pension public services as examples, some innovations and explorations have achieved remarkable results, which have improved the sense of acquisition and happiness of urban residents.
Platform economy and sharing economy, especially the "online job hunting" and "online office" under the epidemic in recent years, have profoundly changed China’s employment model and brought earth-shaking changes to the employment public service. For example, digital technology has broken down the barriers between supply and demand, effectively improving the quality of matching between supply and demand. Big data and artificial intelligence help employers accurately meet the needs of employees. By covering information such as job seekers’ age, gender and job search needs, public employment service agencies can provide personalized and accurate services. Digital technology has also directly driven hundreds of millions of jobs. In recent years, the scale of employment in China’s digital economy has been expanding, and new employment forms are becoming an important channel for workers’ employment. Digital technology also promotes employment equity, and enables the disadvantaged groups in cities to share job-seeking information through lower marginal information cost. At present, digital technology has been widely used in public employment services, which greatly improves the level of government affairs of public employment service institutions.
Some cities in China, especially mega-cities, have unbalanced basic education resources and unequal educational opportunities, which has become one of the problems that the masses have reflected and appealed more. "Internet+Education" has expanded the coverage of high-quality educational resources, enabled them to be spread more openly and equally, created conditions for solving the imbalance of educational resources such as "difficulties in choosing schools" and "housing fever in school districts", and technically promoted educational equity. Through information technology, the majority of primary and secondary school students can have access to subject knowledge from all over the country and even around the world without leaving home, which lowers the learning threshold.
The practice of global response to epidemic shows that digital technology has become an important support to deal with public health events and carry out public health services. New materials, new biomedicine, new medical equipment and "Internet+medical care" have changed the public health service model, and big data, detection technology and vaccine research and development have become important means to deal with the public health crisis. Digital technology has reduced medical costs to a certain extent, enabling more low-income groups to afford newer drugs and treatment services. At the personal level, the concept of health management is changed through digitalization, and personal vital signs such as heart rate, blood sugar, blood pressure and lifestyle information such as exercise and sleep are monitored, analyzed and stored based on electronic medical records, electronic health records and wearable devices (such as smart watches, sleep monitors and applications). At the group level, medical needs are determined through the acquisition of public health information, public health monitoring is carried out, the focus of health work is guided, and public health events such as epidemics and infectious diseases are dealt with through information collection. Digital technology empowers grassroots public health services, and innovates a new governance model to promote the joint development of health, medical insurance and community services, which provides a new path for improving the efficiency of urban grassroots public health services.
Aging is a global challenge, and digital technology has created conditions for actively responding to aging. Big data, Internet and satellite communication technologies have improved the city’s ability to cope with aging, and created higher quality public services for the elderly residents in cities. Digital technology has also promoted the development of the old-age care industry. Old-age robots and intelligent nursing homes are constantly meeting the new needs of the elderly. In recent years, digital technology has served all kinds of public service scenarios for the aged, providing global, convenient and intelligent aged care services for the urban elderly and improving their quality of life.
Main problems of digital technology support in urban public service
The development of digital technology is also facing some new challenges and problems, and there are some potential risks in the impact on urban public services. Some cities have also encountered some outstanding difficulties and bottlenecks in exploring digital public services.
First, digital technology is in the hands of a few leading enterprises and platforms, and "one dominant company" and "winner takes all" are not conducive to consolidating the foundation of urban public services. Technology monopoly is a common form of monopoly in the market. While some leading enterprises increase R&D investment and promote technological progress, they also constantly form market monopoly by virtue of digital technology and scale effect, which is not conducive to technology diffusion and also increases the cost of technology application in urban public services. The private sector’s digital patent technology serves the public interest, which needs the government’s decision-making departments to weigh between commercial interests and public interests, which is not conducive to the accelerated popularization and application of digital technology in urban public services.
Second, digital technology faces problems such as data security, data abuse and data leakage risk while supporting urban public services. These new data resources are not within the scope of traditional supervision, and it is difficult to effectively supervise them by current laws. While improving the efficiency of urban public services, they will reveal citizens’ private information and even government confidential information, resulting in public information security risks. In the face of increasing digital resources, the government needs to continuously increase regulatory costs and increase financial expenditure on digital infrastructure. At the same time, government departments may face problems such as out-of-control network public opinion management, disorderly expansion of platforms and AI ethics, and put forward new and higher requirements for government public services.
Third, digital technology has achieved some results in solving the technical problems of urban public services, but it still has limitations in solving the long-standing institutional and root problems. Many urban public services, such as urban infrastructure renewal, medical and educational resource allocation, floating population service, ecological environment management, social organization cultivation, etc., are facing deep-seated interest relationship adjustment, and some of them involve the basic institutional arrangement of urban governance. These development problems need to be broken through the continuous acceleration of reform, and the role of digital technology in urban governance is still limited.
Fourth, the uneven development of digital technology has aggravated the "digital divide" in some fields and the gap in urban public services. Some people think that the difference caused by the digital divide is becoming the "fourth big difference" in China after the "three big differences" between urban and rural areas, between workers and peasants and between brain and body. Because digital technology has not widely covered all urban residents, some elderly people, children, migrant workers, disabled people and people with urban difficulties have not been able to share the digital dividend in time, the digitalization of urban public services can not only narrow the gap between groups, but also expand the gap to some extent. During the epidemic period, for example, the elderly have many difficulties in using digital technologies such as mobile phones, computers, and apps, which have affected medical treatment, travel, and old-age care, and also restricted the elderly groups from enjoying basic public services.
Fifth, the low integration of digital as an important factor of production affects the efficiency of digital technology. As the main body of urban public services, the government is not only the user of service data, but also the producer of digital resources. Various government departments have mastered a large number of digital resources, which creates conditions for urban managers to provide public services. However, the digital resources held by the government are often scattered in various departments, and the digital resources are "isolated" and "fragmented". Due to the lack of a unified digital management department or the limited authority of big data and other departments, the concentration of data in serving public services is not high, and it is difficult to maximize the effectiveness of digital public services without effective integration.
Sixth, under the trend of digital economy, the digital transformation of urban public service subjects and the construction of digital capabilities need to be accelerated. For civil servants, employees of enterprises and institutions and practitioners of social organizations who have been working in the traditional public service mode for a long time, digital technology is usually a new method and tool, which needs to be changed from thinking mode, working path and
The actual operational level has accelerated the transformation.
policy advice
First, improve the organizational leadership system and ensure the investment in digital technology. It is suggested to further define the functions of government departments, improve the digital management institutions of urban governments, optimize the functions and responsibilities of urban big data bureaus (centers), improve the data integration and service functions of data management institutions, and clarify the scope and rules of digital supervision. Further increase the general public budget for updating and transforming the digital infrastructure of urban public services, and ensure the funds for the digital construction of urban infrastructure. We will promote the intelligent upgrading of infrastructure in an orderly manner and steadily build an intelligent and efficient converged infrastructure.
The second is to improve urban digital governance capabilities and strengthen digital service capabilities and standardization. Strengthen the digital technology training of public servants and improve the digital service ability of urban public servants. Promote the standardization of public services with digital technology standardization, clarify the digital technical specifications in public service objects, service contents and service standards, and improve the digital standard specifications in key areas of people’s livelihood.
The third is to cultivate public service subjects in multi-center cities and promote the integrated development of digital products and services. Accelerate the development of smart city government and social capital cooperation (PPP). Actively guide leading enterprises and social organizations in digital technology to participate in urban public services. Accelerate the transformation of new technologies from commercial products to public products. Accelerate the integration of digital technology and people’s livelihood security, and focus on research and development of digital public service products for the masses’ "urgent difficulties and worries".
The fourth is to strengthen the digital planning of urban public services and regularly evaluate the empowerment effect of digital technology. Learn from the experience of urban governance in developed countries, integrate digital technology into urban development planning, and build a digital friendly city. In Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou and Shenzhen and other cities with good digital economy development foundation, we will carry out digital public service pilot projects and build a number of benchmark cities for digital public services. Timely track and evaluate the implementation effect of digital transformation of public services, and dynamically optimize the digital evaluation system of urban public services.
The fifth is to strengthen the information barrier-free construction and enhance the digital social service ability for special groups. Narrow the gap between urban centers and suburban public services, improve citizens’ digital literacy and participation awareness, and provide more and fairer basic public services for more migrant workers and new citizens. Increase the education, training and publicity of digital technology, especially for the elderly, floating population and people in difficulty, and continuously narrow the "digital divide."
(Author: Institute of Public Administration and Human Resources, the State Council Development Research Center)
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