CITIZEN EMPOWERMENT REFORMS AND

The foundations for governance in an information age are developing through theWorldWide Web as it becomes the principal electronic public gateway into government organizations. Governmental openness is now important to a variety of strategies for governmental reform. TheWeb (a)makes governmentmore efficient; (b) facilitates the functioning of new network-like arrangements between public organizations, the private sector, and citizens; and (c) em-powers citizens to play a stronger role in interactingwith government.Wedescribe the concept of organizational openness and summarize a methodology to measure it on a worldwide ba-sis.Data from1997 through 2000 are presented, showing rapid diffusion of theWeb and varia-tion in levels of openness, even across countries with similar levels of economic and political development. Bureaucracies adopt Web technologies as a function not of traditional diffusion processes, but of emergent institutional isomorphism. Short-term prospects for responsive government improve, but so do unrealistic expectations affecting government legitimacy