Information Technology Reference
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makers and academics.Administrative data is also
often supplemented by other national data sets and
specialized data collections, which are ultimately
managed and analyzed using ICTs. For example,
the use of computers to analyze data on periods
of unemployment directly led to the develop-
ment of the previously-mentioned Job Seekers
Classification Index and the associated policy to
differentiate employment services according to
client profiles.
Finally, ICTs
shape
social policies. While it is
not widely recognized, the advent and widespread
deployment of ICTs in government can shape the
nature of social and public policies (Henman,
2006a; Henman, 2009). In terms of the govern-
mentality framework, this use of ICTs is a clear
example of the way in which “technologies of
government” give rise to new “political rationali-
ties”. The analysis of statistics is one area in which
this occurs. The analysis of statistics can give rise
to new knowledge and insights about the client
population. For example, it provides the basis for
breaking up the client population into different
segments according to different levels of need or
risk, which is then manifested in social policy and
service delivery responses. The use of the JSCI
illustrates how this occurs. Statistics are analyzed
to reveal different patterns of unemployment as-
sociated with different personal characteristics.
This leads policy makers to consider differentiat-
ing policy responses that better matches services
to the predicted levels of need of unemployed
persons. Such policies are viewed as providing a
more effective and personalized response to social
problems (such as long-term unemployment), but
they also individualize our understanding of the
causes of these problems. By linking periods of
unemployment to personal characteristics, the
social elements that contribute to unemployment
(such as racial discrimination, poor economic
environment) can often get overlooked.
The increasingly
networked
nature of advanced
ICTs has also contributed to a recasting of social
policy (and public administration). Networked
ICTs support the exchange of data between gov-
ernment agencies and beyond. As a consequence,
social policies are increasingly being made in one
policy domain that requires the input of client data
from another policy domain. With the assistance
of networked data interchange, benefits or services
provided in one domain can be made conditional
on client circumstances in another domain. In
Centrelink an example of this is the Maternity
Immunisation Allowance, a universal payment
to parents of children who are fully immunized
at 18 months of age. This policy initiative relies
on data from the Australian Health Insurance
Commission, and in particular, the Australian
Childhood Immunisation Register, a database
of childhood immunization activity. Indeed, the
impetus for the creation of the Register was to
support the introduction of the Maternity Im-
munisation Allowance and similar conditional
payments to general medical practitioners. Other
conditional policies implemented by Centrelink
include making a parent's income support pay-
ments conditional on their child not truanting
from school, or the absence of child abuse in the
household, although the extent to which these
policies are reliant on networked ICTs is unclear.
While such conditional policies result from politi-
cal objectives, the rapid emergence and growth
of such policies can not be easily disentangled
from the networked information infrastructure
that makes such policies readily feasible. As with
targeted policy, such conditional policies also
involve an individualization of social problems.
By making receipt of benefits conditional on a
person's behavior or activity in another domain,
such conditional policies place the sole burden
on the individual to resolve the social problem
(such as childhood immunization and school
truancy).
The use of ICTs in implementing social and
public policy raises questions about the emerging
nature of the contemporary forms of government
and citizenship. In particular, the increasing auto-
mation of social policy has led some to argue that
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