Technology,transparency,and collaboration/integration: Analysis of digital government problems from public communication perspective during the COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the implementation of digital government in handling the Covid-19 Pandemic in Indonesia from a public communication perspective. The three units of analysis that build this article are technology, transparency, and collaboration & integration. A systems approach is used to analyze data collected through searching government policy documents, various relevant webinars, as well as online media reporting data that captures the dynamics of digital governance problems during the year the pandemic lasted. This article finds that the problem of digital government in handling the COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia is a complex in terms of technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration. From a public communication and system perspective, the findings of this article in all aspects show a portrait of a digital government system in Indonesia that is not yet robust and adaptive enough.

1. Introduction

In many countries considered to have successfully handled pandemics, such as Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, New Zealand, and China, digital government – defined as the use of information and communication technology (ICT) in government to positively transform the relationship between government and society (Veit & Huntgeburth, 2014) – has played a significant role (see, for example, Nam, 2020; Yen, 2020; Goggin, 2020; Whitelaw et al., 2020). According to an OECD report (2020),“Governments that had invested in sound digital government, policy levers, and skills, were better prepared to leverage digital technologies and data to provide rapid and effective responses to the COVID-19 outbreak.” However, there have also been several anomalies when countries with mature digital government systems, such as the United Kingdom and the United States, have had difficulties with their pandemic management efforts during a specific period (Yamey & Wenham, 2020). How, then, can countries such as Indonesia – with its immature digital government systems (Sabani, 2021; Deden, et al., 2017) and fragile public health systems (Mahendradhata et al., 2017) – expect to fare?

This article focus on the implementation and problems of digital government in Indonesia at the central and local levels, as well as the issues these governments have faced in their efforts to deal with the COVID-19 Pandemic. Like many other countries worldwide, Indonesia has used various digital technologies in its pandemic management efforts (Budd et al., 2020; Freeguard, Shepheard, & Davies, 2020). It was chosen as a case in this study’s exploration and analysis of digital government during a public health crisis for two reasons: the country’s particular social, political, and economic conditions, and the situation of the country’s digital landscape, digital government, and public health systems.

Indonesia’s digital government system, formally known as the Electronic-Based Digital Government System (SPBE), faces severe issues in matters of technology infrastructure, data, regulations, and human resources (Rose, 2004; Rahardjo, Mirchandani, & Joshi, 2007; Hermana et al., 2012; Prahono, 2015; Choi et al., 2016; Aritonang, 2017). Exacerbating this situation, Indonesia’s public health system is in poor condition, with its shortcomings becoming even more glaring since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic (Mahendradhata et al., 2017; Pratiwi et al., 2020; Mahendradhata et al., 2021). Throughout the pandemic, mitigation efforts have been stymied by diverse issues that range from community non-compliance with health protocols to poor-quality and even problematic government policies (Pratiwi et al., 2020; Sutarsa, Wirawan, & Astuti, 2020; Irwandy, 2021).

Around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgency of implementing and expanding digital government systems; this holds for Indonesia as well (UN-DESA, 2020; Roseth, Reyes, & Amézaga, 2021). As public mobility and offline activities have been limited to curb the spread of the virus, there has been an increased demand for public services to be facilitated by digital technology. Moreover, as explained by UN-DESA (2020), the COVID-19 pandemic has forced governments and societies to turn to digital technology as a short-term response to the crisis, use digital technology to navigate the mid-term socio-economic repercussions of the pandemic, and instigate long-term efforts to reinvent existing policies and tools. However, digital technology is not always viewed positively in handling the pandemic because of the consequences of its use (Rowe, Ngwenyama, & Richet, 2020; Madianou, 2020; Hantrais et al., 2021). According to Gkeredakis, Lifshitz-Assaf, & Barrett (2021) the shifts in digital technology use to cope with the COVID-19 crisis are fast-paced, dramatic and not well understood.

This article uses a public communication perspective to analyze the implementation and problems of digital government within an Indonesian context. In so doing, it elucidates the main principles of digital government and highlights the vital position of public communication during pandemics and other public health crises. It also underscores the importance of reaching beyond technology to understand digital government, which is ultimately not only a question of technology but also one of communication between the government and the public. Several prior studies of digital government emphasize this by accentuating the value of communication between the government and the public, as facilitated by digital technology (OECD, 2014; Veit & Huntgeburth, 2014). Ultimately, as many experts have argued (see, for example, Barry, 2009; Gutmann & Lev, 2020, Choi et al., 2015, Fung et al., 2015), public communication is an important determinant of governments’ success or failure in their pandemic mitigation efforts.

2. Literature review

2.1 Digital government and public communication perspective

The concept of digital government is often linked, exchanged, and equated with other ideas such as e-government, smart government, and internet government (Robertson & Vatrapu, 2010; Garcia, Dawes, & Pardo, 2018; Jansen et al., 2018; Lips, 2020). One popular explanation is “the use of digital technologies, as an integrated part of governments’ modernization strategies, to create public value” (OECD, 2014). Another definition of digital government is the use of ICT in government to positively transform the relationship between it and society (Veit & Huntgeburth, 2014). Robertson and Vatrapu (2010) explain that digital government encompasses the use of ICT to enable citizens, politicians, government agencies, and other organizations to work with each other and to carry out activities that support civic life.

According to Koh (2020), there are five essential attributes that determine effective digital government strategies: sensing, sense-making, communicating, collaborating, and decision-making. No consensus yet exists regarding the best means of measuring the quality of digital government (Gil-Garcia & Flores-Zúñiga, 2020). Some have argued that the core of digital government lies in the context of the communication between the government and the public, as mediated by technology. In other words, public communication can offer a significant tool for analyzing the implementation of digital government, including during crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic. This article uses such an approach to understand various digital government problems in the context of handling the COVID-19 crisis. Digital government in this study is interpreted as government activities facilitated by different types or forms of digital technology with the primary objective of creating communication and relationship between the public and the government. The public, in this case, is placed in a broad definition, including various stakeholders.

Although the government’s communication with the public is a core concept of digital government, as previously mentioned, research on this topic has not adequately used the public communication perspective. According to Lips (2020) so far there are nine theoretical and analytical perspectives on digital government: technology, data and information, revolutionary change vs. evolutionary change, private sector, transformational, institutional, networked governance, surveillance state perspective, and good governance perspective. Existing studies of digital government are more likely to use such approaches as public management, information technology, public administration, information science, economics, political science, strategic communication, and public relations (Garcia, Dawes, & Pardo, 2018; Criado & Gil-Garcia, 2019; Asgarkhani, 2005). Whereas a public communication perspective can provide a strong understanding of the digital government’s problems in today’s information society, including the development of massive, fast, and disruptive digital technologies and the threat of socio-political problems and multidimensional crises that may be more frequent and more complex in the future.

The public communication perspective in this article is understood in the context of System Theory; such a system approach is not only uncommon in digital government research but also somewhat unfamiliar in social research. Within modern society’s poly-centeredness, communication lies at the core of an interconnected (encompassing) social system. Modern society comprises much communication and only communication (Luhmann, 1992; 1997). Although each subsystem has internal codes, it only pretends to be a complete system; ultimately, public zones represent the interests of many social systems. In classical juridical discourse, “public” is defined as being accessible to everyone, and thus control over access is unacceptable. In this sense, print products and mass media programs are public because there is no control over who can access them. Dirk Baecker defines the public as a reflection of internal systems (social subsystems) with many diverse interests; it must, ultimately, involve all interactions and organizations (Luhmann, 2000). It thus follows that public communication requires open access, both in matters of technology and transparency, to the information it conveys.

In public communication, the issue of transparency is strongly related to the logic that communication for the public must represent the public. Precisely because the “public” always involves another, one inaccessible to all systems, it is necessary to represent it in the form of construction of reality in which all subsystems can have a part, without any obligation to do so in a certain way. Public representation in public communication, thus, must simultaneously ensure transparency and non-transparency as events continue to occur. It must encompass particular thematic knowledge, in the form of objects that are concreted in each event, and uncertainty in the issue of who will react to them and in what way (Luhmann, 1982).

2.2 Digital government during public health crises

The relationship between the government and the public is highly complex in today’s digital society, and this complexity has increased significantly during the current pandemic. Where previously the concept of digital government had been formulated and implemented in a more ’normal’ situation, the COVID-19 pandemic and its tremendous impact has and will affect the nature and practice of this concept. Studies of digital government in times of crisis, thus, are a necessary practical and conceptual precursor to developing ideal and adaptive concepts. Scholars have considered digital government in public health crises such as the SARS, MERS, H1N1, and Ebola outbreaks, but they are few; examples include Pan, Pan, and Devadoss (2005), Leidner, Pan, and Pan (2009), Ibrahim and Seifi (2014), Wong et al. (2015), Crook et al. (2016). The context of the COVID-19 Pandemic brings something different in understanding digital technology as well as digital government in crisis.

The digital government, proceed during a crisis like a pandemic, generally uses various forms of available digital technology. One of the most common is the use of websites that not only provides the public with the information they require but also allow them to act as agents in disseminating crucial knowledge (Ibrahim & Seifi, 2014). According to Crook et al. (2016), providing the public with accurate information and updates may provide an effective way to curtail the spread of myths, misinformation, and public fear. Apart from websites, governments in a number of countries use social media for specific purposes, for example provide general information dan tried to reduce fear during crisis (Wong et al., 2015). In the last decade (2010–2020), the use of social media platforms and mobile applications in digital government activities, including crisis management, has become more expansive (Liu & Kim, 2011; Kavanaugh, 2012; Wong et al., 2015; Tursunbayeva, Franco, & Pagliari, 2017; Gao & Lee, 2017; Sandoval-Almazan & Valle-Cruz, 2021; Padeiro, Bueno-Larraz, & Freitas, 2021). Nevertheless, Gkeredakis, Lifshitz-Assaf, and Barrett (2021) underscored the digital technologies used to overcome crises are new and have not been understood theoretically.

Contrary to the optimistic view of the role of technology and digital government in handling the pandemic, Rowe, Ngwenyama, and Richet (2020) argue that the government’s choice to prioritize a digital-first solution failed, alienating stakeholders from the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic and leading to a lack of concrete knowledge of this crisis. A similar perspective was expressed by Madianou (2020), which states that the use of digital technology in response to the COVID-19 pandemic may amplify social inequality and cause what is referred to as second-level disasters (refer to man-made disasters in which the consequences are more pronounced for socially and economically disadvantaged people). Ultimately, as the pandemic accelerated the adaptation of digital technology, it brought some unintended consequences, particularly broad-reaching restrictions on personal freedoms and increased public surveillance (Hantrais et al., 2021).

There are several articles relevant to digital government and the use of digital technology in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, including by Mora et al. (2021), Gerli et al. (2021), Arakpogun et al. (2020), Kummitha (2020), Hantrais et al. (2021), Agostino et al. (2021), Uwizeyimana (2022), Tan et al. (2022), and many others. In general, these studies show differences in viewing the role of digital technology in handling the COVID-19 pandemic based on the approach and the empirical facts that emerge. According to Agostino et al. (2021), COVID-19 has driven digital transformation in public service delivery. Meanwhile, Hantrais et al. (2021) revealed that the pandemic provided a fertile ground for cybercrime, while digital disinformation and influencing risked becoming normalised and domesticated. This article chooses a public communication approach in interpreting the problems of digital government in the COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia to enrich the existing literature landscape, both regarding the COVID-19 Pandemic itself and the wider public health crisis.

2.3 The quality of digital government

Several methods have been offered to ascertain the quality of digital government in general. The OECD, for example, uses twelve principles and six dimensions as assessment indicators, including digital by design, government as a platform, data-driven public sector, open by default, user-driven, and proactiveness. Meanwhile, the WASEDA International Digital Government Rankings Report used digital infrastructure, management optimization, e-participation, and cyber security as indicators. In the context of more specialized issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, Nam (2020) analyzed the South Korean government’s efforts to utilize digital technology for crisis management based on three principles: openness, transparency, and collaboration.

This article adopts several points from the methods of the OECD, WASEDA, and Nam (2020) while making adjustments to suit its specific data needs. This article also used a participatory perspective, which Tolbert and Mossberger (2006) describe as focusing on accountability, transparency, and responsiveness, in understanding the concept of digital government. Therefore, three main aspects or themes are used to analyze Indonesia’s implementation of digital government to manage the COVID-19 pandemic: technology, transparency, and integration/collaboration. Technology is understood as involving the form of technology (software and hardware), user capabilities, and purpose/value of use. Transparency refers to the openness and willingness of the government to convey various information to the public in order to carry out government activities, public services, and for the wider public interest. The third aspect, collaboration and integration, refers to the relationship between actors within the large government ecosystem. This aspect also includes understanding a combination of data from various sources for one purpose or goal. The following research questions are directly related to these three aspects:

Q1: How has the government used various forms of digital technology for public communication purposes in handling the COVID-19 pandemic? Q2: How does the government provide the public with data/information regarding the COVID-19 pandemic? To what extent is the government operating transparently? Q3: To what extent is collaboration between government agencies/agencies at various levels and government, as well as other stakeholders, taking place in the context of handling the pandemic?

3. Methodology

This research uses a qualitative approach to analyze empirical data regarding the use of various digital technologies by Indonesia’s central and regional governments in handling the COVID-19 pandemic during its first year (January 2020–March 2021). Data collection was conducted by reviewing available information and policy documents, which were accessed through official (central and regional) government websites, mainstream mass media (online versions), public discussions (webinars), as well as some initial studies and research reports. Digital government activities for pandemic management were tracked through the websites created by the central and local governments(see Table 2). Specific local governments were selected based on the number of COVID-19 cases reported within their territory. Central and local government policies were collected and analyzed, including presidential regulations, ministerial regulations, and regent/mayor/governor regulations. These documents were collected from several websites, specifically those developed by the central and regional governments for pandemic management. This document analysis was used to support the three main units of analysis. In other words, the researchers explored the contents of the regulations relevant to digital technology, transparency, and collaboration or integration.

Other data were collected through online public discussions (webinars) on relevant topics. This procedure is used to obtain views or perspectives from several speakers in the webinar, for example, regional heads and public health experts who are directly or indirectly involved in handling the pandemic in Indonesia. These webinars were found on YouTube through a search for several keywords: pandemic, COVID-19, government, digital, local government, digital technology, and digital transformation (See Appendix). The transcript of this webinar is compiled and used to find data or facts relevant to the three units of analysis.

Several media sources, including (but not limited to) Kompas, Republika, CNN Indonesia, Tempo, Kumparan, Detik, and Tirto, were consulted for further data. Media sources were selected as they are perceived as trusted sources of information by Indonesians and have large user/audiences. Data from these media outlets were collected by browsing their official websites using keywords (and combinations thereof) such as digital government, local government, pandemic, COVID-19, technology, transparency, and information disclosure, data integration. Collected data covered the first year of the pandemic in Indonesia, from March 2020 to March 2021.

Fifty news items were taken for thematic analysis (See Appendix), which enabled the researchers to explain the three aspects of digital government – technology, transparency, and integration – within the context of pandemic management in Indonesia. Data from media was manually read to find and identify emerging themes that relate to the three aspects that are the unit of analysis of this article. However, this is not done to show how the media constructs this issue, yet what problems regarding technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration in digital government during the pandemic are captured by the media as foremost observers of society.

The data collected from the several procedures above were then analyzed using three processes described by Huberman and Miles (2005): data reduction, presentation, and conclusion. Data reduction is made to simplify and make the data collected from the several procedures above suitable for research needs. This is done with guidance from research questions (Q1-Q3) that have been prepared with three aspects of analysis: technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration. Furthermore, data presentation is carried out to provide more structured and more accessible analysis materials. The final stage concludes by interpreting the data, connecting the data with the existing literature landscape, and elaborating on the theoretical and practical implications of the phenomenon under study.

4. Results

Before explaining the research findings, this section will briefly describe an overview of Indonesia’s government system and the digital landscape’s situation with its main problems related to the digital divide. The Indonesian government system is a division of authority between the central and local governments (provinces, cities, and districts). Administratively, Indonesia is a complex country consisting of 34 provinces and approximately 500 regencies/cities. The government in Indonesia is run in context decentralizing on a large scale and has introduced concurrent arrangements that distribute responsibilities between the national and subnational governments (Lele, 2021).

Meanwhile, digital government in Indonesia cannot be separated from the digital divide issue regarding material aspects to skills (Onitsuka, Hidayat, & Huang, 2018; Puspitasari & Ishii, 2016; Harsono, 2022). A large number of internet users, reaching 170 million users in 2020 (APJII, 2020), unfortunately, is not accompanied by a consistent network quality between regions, especially Java and outside Java (Wilantika et al, 2018; ). Related to digital abilities, gaps also occur, which can be seen in the digital skills of young people, which are more prominent than the older generation and other vulnerable population groups (Puspitasari & Ishii, 2016).

The findings in the article are described based on three units of analysis that were built namely technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration:

4.1 Technology

In Indonesia, the central and regional governments first responded to the spread of COVID-19 by providing the public with website-based information platforms. By March 2020, three government websites were providing information about the virus and its spread, namely the websites of the Ministry of Health (infeksiemerging.kemkes.go.id), the Jakarta Provincial Government (corona.jakarta.go.id), and the West Java Provincial Government (pikobar.jabarprov.go.id). During this period, the Ministry of Health was still the leading actor. Over time, following the establishment of the COVID-19 Task Force, a new website (https://COVID19.go.id/) was established by the central government as a center of pandemic-related information. After the virus spread throughout Indonesia, almost all of the country’s local governments (provinces, regencies, cities) created similar websites. However, not all of these websites used the same templates and features.

The central/national government (through its ministries and institutions) also developed several mobile applications for pandemic management, including Peduli Lindungi, 10 Rumah Aman, Bersatu Lawan COVID, Mobile COVID Track, Desa Melawan COVID-19, and SIRANAP RS. Some local governments also created their own apps. Jakarta, for example, created an application called Jakarta Kini (JAKI), one of the features of which was Jakarta Tanggap COVID-19 (Jakarta Responds to COVID-19), which provided users with services such as social assistance, data monitoring, contact tracing, JakCLM (self-assessment), and isolation/monitoring. The Central Java Provincial Government, meanwhile, created the Jogo Tonggo app for its pandemic management needs.

The central and regional governments also used popular social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, for communication and information purposes. Almost all government institutions at the central and regional levels have at least one official account on these social media platforms. In addition, the social media accounts of some regional heads (governors, regents, and mayors) were active in disseminating information about the pandemic.

The following table shows the types of digital media used by the central and local governments in Indonesia in their pandemic management measures:

No	Government	Website	Mobile app	Social media	Details
1	Central/ National Government	v	v	v	The central government developed several applications (Peduli Lindungi, 10 Rumah Aman, SiLacak, Bersatu Lawan COVID-19, Etc). In practice, the main application has been Peduli Lindungi. The President’s social media accounts and several high-ranking officials, such as ministers, are also active in conveying information about the pandemic, including official social media accounts of state institutions.
2	DKI Jakarta Province	v	v	v	The DKI Jakarta government has developed the JAKI. This application was then developed and integrated several functions of information and pandemic handling in it. The governor’s social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) is active in disseminating information about the pandemic
3	West Java Province	v	v	v	The governor’s social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) is active in disseminating information about the pandemic. The Governor of West Java has the most social media followers compared to other regional heads.
4	Central Java Province	v	v	v	The Central Java government developed a particular application during the pandemic, namely Jogo Tonggo. The governor’s social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) is active in disseminating information about the pandemic.
5	East Java Province	v	v	v	The governor’s social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) is active in disseminating information about the pandemic.
6	D.I. Yogyakarta Province	v	v	v	Jogja Pass is a platform that can be used to carry out COVID-19 self-screening as well as a digital identity for people in DIY to enter tourist attractions.
7	South Sulawesi Province	v	v	v	In this province, there is a particular application developed during the pandemic for teaching and learning purposes, namely Baruga Sikola. The information presented on the pandemic website is generally the same as in many other areas, namely general data and information on the spread of the virus.
8	Bali Province	v	v	v	The Bali Provincial Government uses the Bali Media Center application as a pandemic information platform.

The implementation of digital government has faced the problem of uneven network infrastructure and internet speed in the country. There is significant infrastructure inequality between Java, the center of Indonesia’s government and economy, and other islands such as Sumatra and Papua. As the pandemic progressed and all circles required access to online technology, this gap became increasingly clear. According to Ganjar Pranowo (Governor of Central Java Province), the technological disparity in Central Java is caused by human resource and infrastructure factors (Webinar, March 3, 2021). Meanwhile, Anies Baswedan (Governor of DKI Jakarta Province) said that the capital region’s development of its pandemic-mitigation website was supported by the qualified human resources and network infrastructure available therein, which was the best in Indonesia (Webinar, March 3, 2021). Unfortunately, hundreds of other local governments in Indonesia do not have such resources. Further exacerbating this issue, budgetary factors limited local governments’ pandemic mitigation efforts, including their endeavors to prepare network infrastructure and develop digital platforms.

In general, two types of digital government technology developed during the pandemic, distinguished by their use or goal. First was the technology developed in response to the pandemic’s effect on public services. As offline activities were restricted, governments were required to provide and develop digital platforms for public service and communication purposes. Likewise, government officials working from home needed to improve their knowledge of digital technologies, both new and existing. At the same time, members of the public – especially digital immigrants (Groups identified as users of digital and internet technology born before this technology developed rapidly or refer to generation X and older) – needed to adapt to new public service models that were almost entirely facilitated by technology.

Second were technologies developed specifically for handling pandemic-related needs, i.e., information websites, dashboards, and mobile applications for contact tracing. Several institutions and local governments (for example, the DKI Jakarta and South Sulawesi governments) integrated new functions into existing platforms. Meanwhile, other agencies and local governments created new technologies or platforms. For example, the East Java government developed a new app called Jogo Tonggo, the Yogyakarta municipal government created the Jogja Pass app, and the central government developed the Peduli Lindungi app. As for websites, almost all institutions (especially local governments) created new websites specifically to manage the pandemic.

4.2 Protracted transparency issues

Between January and February 2020, before the first case of COVID-19 was identified in Indonesia, data about the virus was still limited. As COVID-19 became increasingly widespread, more and more sources of information became available, ranging from websites created by governments (central and local) to mass media coverage and social media posts. However, not all of this available was valid, particularly on social media. Dis/misinformation created an “infodemic”, which compounded the existing health crisis. The World Health Organization paid special attention to this infodemic problem, which directly impacted its pandemic management efforts. Beginning in January 2020, the Government of Indonesia – through the Ministry of Communications and Information (KOMINFO) – began to monitor and limit the spread of fake news/hoaxes related to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

In March 2020, public discourses became heated after President Joko Widodo announced that the government had not disclosed all available data to the public for several reasons, one of which was to prevent public panic (See Appendix). After several protests, the government said that all data and information regarding the pandemic would be made open and accessible. Through the COVID-19 Task Force, the government stated that various data and information would be made widely accessible through diverse channels. Ultimately, through December 2020, the Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI) – a major professional organization – was still urging the government to improve access (Supriatin, 2020).

The dual problems of accuracy and transparency have been noted in many countries, including Indonesia (Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, 2021). Initially, the Indonesian government attempted to convey data through a daily televised broadcast. Over time, these routine press conferences ceased, with real-time information on cases and developments being made available online (https://COVID19.go.id/). However, civil society movements, media actors, and some researchers continued to show that the central and regional governments were less than transparent with data that should have been widely accessible to the public and relevant parties. Doubts were generally related to information on test results, tracing, and death rates, which were not fully shared with the public (COVID-19 Report, 2020).

Further calls for transparency were related to data regarding the national and local budgets for pandemic management (Winanti et al., 2021; Sulistyo, 2020). This was exacerbated by cases of corruption, where central/local government actors embezzled funds from social assistance programs (Aditya & Nugraheny, 2020). Further questions were related to vaccination, which is a crucial issue during health crises. Doubts regarding the government’s transparency in vaccination efforts emerged within the public domain even before the vaccination program began. Researchers, public health experts, journalists, civil society groups, and the broader public raised doubts about the vaccines, their mechanisms, and their side effects (Aditya, 2020). In response, the government assured the public that the vaccination process would be run transparently using an integrated data system.

Our analysis of media data related to the issue of transparency shows that this is crucial and became a serious problem in handling the pandemic in Indonesia. For example, Kompas report on January 19 highlighted some Ministers Affected by COVID-19, but only three announced it to the public. Things like this certainly impact how the public sees the government and how they put their trust in the government’s efforts during a crisis. In addition, a CNN Indonesia report in early January 2021 highlighted the issue of transparency related to vaccination. The problem of data transparency in Indonesia has been going on since the beginning of the pandemic, even for at least a year after this crisis occurred.

We also found that Governments’ failure to disclose information at various levels encouraged the public to take the initiative in collecting and providing access to pandemic-related data. Several movements and platforms appeared, including Kawal COVID-19, Lapor COVID-19, Pandemic Talks, Urun Daya COVID-19, Warga Bantu Warga, and Sonjo. Most took advantage of digital platforms to support their activities. Kawal COVID-19 and Lapor COVID-19, for example, routinely conveyed data and information about the pandemic through their websites and social media. In contrast, Pandemic Talks chose to use Instagram to share numerous news stories related to the pandemic. Meanwhile, the Sonjo movement (based in Yogyakarta) was a WhatsApp group-based volunteer movement that focused primarily on coordinating volunteers to help vulnerable and at-risk communities affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. A full description of these initiatives is available in the appendix.

These various public initiative movements can be understood as being driven by two factors. First, the public was aware of the need to jointly find solutions to complex problems and considered the Indonesian government to have been less than optimal in offering quick solutions. Community elements tried to help the government and society simultaneously by exchanging information, ideas, and solutions through their platforms. Second, technological literacy was improving, and thus the public was able to create diverse digital platforms to respond to community needs. Fresh ideas were easily realized. Several of the platforms mentioned above shared several characteristics: economic and social platforms. Such movements are important in digital government, as they evidence the community’s contributions to reducing the impact of the COVID 19 pandemic. These existing platforms provided more fluid spaces for public communication than those created by the government.

4.3 The lack of integration and collaboration

Data integration has been a vital problem in Indonesia during the current pandemic as well as before the crisis. The lack of synchronicity contributed significantly to Indonesia’s difficulty using digital technology to handle the pandemic. Previously, the government had launched the One Data (Satu Data) Program. However, by the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, this program had yet to operate optimally due to several factors, including technology, human resources, and government policies (Bayu, 2020).

The COVID-19 pandemic clearly showed problems in the integration of and collaboration between the central and local governments (Ramadhan, 2020; Lele, 2021). At the central government level, there were still hurdles to communication and coordination between institutions (e.g., ministries) despite a cross-institutional framework being available through the COVID-19 Task Force. This is evident, for example, in institutions’ development of mobile applications with similar or even overlapping designations/functions. Another example of the government’s lack of synergy is determining the status of regional quarantine or lockdown. Some local governments have taken the initiative to lock down or limit activities before the central government decides. However, there are also cases when the central government recommends implementing restrictions, but the local government does not do so.

If we look at several regulations issued by the central and regional governments since the beginning of the Pandemic, efforts for collaboration between sectors and levels of government have been attempted. The establishment of the Task Force for the Acceleration of Handling COVID-19 through Presidential Decree No. 7 of 2020, for example, has involved various institutions in the central and regional governments. Some regional heads have also issued policies that mandate collaboration in handling the Pandemic, not only between government units but also in the community, for example, Central Java Governor Instruction No. 1 of 2020. However, coordination and collaboration encountered a number of obstacles both in technical and regulatory aspects itself. Collaboration at the community level, which is informal, seems to work better.

This lack of synchrony was also related to crucial issues: general pandemic data, patient data, and death tolls. Such data discrepancies were evident throughout the first year of the Pandemic. In December 2020, for example, there was a gap of more than 3,000 deaths between national and local mortality data (CNN Indonesia, 2020). Likewise, the number of active cases in Semarang City submitted by the Central Government differed from the data available on the local government’s dashboard (Syambudi, 2020). The unsynchronized data between the central and regional governments was also acknowledged by the Deputy Minister of Health, Dante Saksono Harbuwono (See Appendix). Meanwhile, according to the Spokesperson for the Task Force for the Acceleration of Handling COVID-19, Wiku Adisasmito, some local governments are late in sending data to the system that has been prepared by the central government, and also the interoperability of the system is not working properly. Epidemiologist Dicky Budiman described the difference in data as occurring because the government had not fully adhered to the guidelines issued by WHO and used different definitions, for example, regarding suspected and probable cases (Pandamsari, 2020).

5. Analysis

This article finds that the problem of digital government in handling the COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia is a complex in terms of technology, transparency, and collaboration/integration. The non-optimality of digital government has negative implications for the quality of handling a pandemic, at least within a year this crisis has been going on. In terms of technology, the main problem seen is the gap between the quantity of technology developed by the government (central and regional) and the quality of its implementation. The digital technologies developed and used in response to the crisis are numerous and varied but fragmented. Relate to transparency, the government’s choice (especially the central government) to confine information for the public from the early phase of the crisis has negatively impacted public trust and the efforts to handle the pandemic in general for a year. Meanwhile, the third aspect shows the lack of data integration and the weak collaboration between levels of government (central and regional governments), as well as between the government and the public. The three aspects above (technology, transparency, and integration/collaboration) represent the complexity of the problems with digital government that, though present in normal situations, are amplified during crises.

The use of various types of digital technology during the pandemic, such as websites, mobile applications, and social media, is in line with the findings of several previous studies on other pandemic cases (Ibrahin & Seifi, 2014, Crook et al., 2016) although this time it shows a much broader scale. Digital technology comes in large quantity and variety but is seen as a reactive response rather than a proactive and strategic one. Digital technology itself is not a panacea because it is data and information that is transparent and inclusive that should be a ’vaccine’ to overcome the infodemic problems that have arisen with this pandemic. The debate over the positive and negative roles of digital technology, when viewed from a systems perspective, will show a portrait detached from binary oppositions like this. The technology developed and used is a system response to the complexity that arises. What can be seen from the data in this article is that the quality of this technology’s response is not optimal enough because the principles of public communication are not attached to it. Existing technologies, for example, operated in a code of (government) reputation instead of transparency and integration.

Previous research has shown that a lack of transparency can lead to some problems related to public confidence, and this, in turn, can lead to speculation about hidden practices (Faura, 2020). The results of this study show almost the same thing when the government at the beginning of the pandemic chose to limit information and caused confusion in the public sphere about what was going on, raising suspicion and doubt about the government’s efforts. According to Crook et al. (2016), providing the public with accurate information and updates may provide an effective way to curtail the spread of myths, misinformation, and public fear. Unfortunately, the choice of the Indonesian government at the beginning of the Pandemic, even a year after it started, what was captured through this article was show otherwise.

The findings of this article also show other facts that arise when the government is not transparent, then presents not only public demands but also initiatives to collectively and independently provide pandemic data and information by the public with utilizing digital technology. The non-transparency of the government in the perspective of public communication will be a significant obstacle in resolving the crisis, especially regarding aspects of communication or relations between the government and the public, as well as relations between the government itself at various levels.

In the aspect of integration and collaboration, certain conditions have made it difficult to realize a digital government for handling the Pandemic. According to Pardo, Nam, and Burke (2010), governmental and non-governmental organizations must share and integrate information despite their traditional organizational boundaries. According Mora et al (2021) more consistent collaborative efforts are required to improve the public response to large-scale infection, and cross-sector collaboration is also indispensable to ensure that misinformation and unjustified censorship do not prevent the public from receiving reliable data on public health crises. However, the central government, local governments, non-governmental organizations, business people, researchers, academics, and communities – seemed to be walking their own paths, often in opposite directions. In system perspective, they work with different codes and there isn’t enough interpenetration space. Data integration is actually technologically possible, but the conditions of the pandemic have actually shown the structural weaknesses that have existed so far in the digital government system in Indonesia. Integration of patient data, for example, is not available even for policy makers let alone the public to react to. In fact, integrated data can provide options for compiling government regulations and programs, as well as individual and community decision making during crisis.

From a public communication and system perspective, the findings of this article in all aspects show a portrait of a digital government system in Indonesia that is not yet robust and adaptive enough. The complexity caused by the COVID-19 Pandemic opens up even broader weaknesses of this system, which it can resolve through its internal mechanisms. This may be possible by reviewing the main code of the system to “connect government with the public” and the system’s structure in need of differentiation. This pandemic can open a fast track for digital government systems to evolve, both in technological and substantive aspects. Unfortunately, a review of technology, transparency, and collaboration & integration, as described in the previous section, shows the opposite. On the one hand, the inability of the digital government system in Indonesia is due to the complexity of the genuinely new and unusual Pandemic and the system’s internal conditions, which so far has had a differentiation structure that focuses more on the technological dimension. The digital divide, which before the Pandemic had become a complexity that the system had not been able to reduce, has become more complicated.

This article offers a public communication perspective, especially in a systems approach to understanding the implementation of digital government in a crisis. Gkeredakis, Lifshitz-Assaf, and Barrett (2021) underscored the digital technologies used to overcome crises are new and have not been understood theoretically. They offer to explore digital technologies’ varied uses and impact during crises by viewing crises as opportunities, disruptions, and exposures (Gkeredakis, Lifshitz-Assaf, and Barrett, 2021). The dynamics of digital government in the COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia analyzed in this article places crises as complexities that arise in external systems that must be reduced based on specific system codes. By placing this crisis as a complexity, the efforts mentioned in the introductory section to encourage explanations beyond technology will be more likely to be carried out in cases of digital government and broader use of technology in crises.

In a practical context, this article provides a perspective not only for the government but also for the public to view the Pandemic issue and the use of digital technology to deal with it more realistically and comprehensively. The digital government being developed cannot only be oriented towards the internal needs of the authorities, for example, about reputation. Still, it must be placed in the common interest of overcoming social problems due to the pandemic. Digital technology in its various forms is a tool for reducing the complexity of a pandemic that can work optimally when principles such as inclusiveness, transparency, and collaboration are embedded in it.

6. Conclusion

This article shows that the digital government system in Indonesia is not sufficiently capable of creating adaptive responses to the needs of handling a pandemic for at least the first year of the crisis. This inability includes technology, transparency, collaboration & integration issues that are interrelated. Digital technology used in government activities and handling the pandemic cannot be placed in a technical isolation space separate from the dimensions of transparency, integration, and collaboration. What is seen from the condition of the digital government system in Indonesia can reflect conditions in other countries that are facing the same crisis even at the global level. However, specific contexts and backgrounds may show different details of the problem that occurred.

This article departs from research over a certain period, namely, during a year the pandemic took place in Indonesia. After March 2021, the development of the pandemic shows a different dynamic, with the intensification of vaccinations and the emergence of new virus variants such as Delta, which triggers a severe transmission wave. Extending observations on the implementation of digital government needs to be done to complement the findings of this article. Observing the system’s evolution in different phases of the crisis will provide a complete view, as stated by Gkeredakis, Lifshitz-Assaf, and Barrett (2021), that future research must examine the long-term consequences of crises. In addition, further research on public or civil society initiatives to create data and information transparency, comparative cases from several countries, more detailed digital divide investigations, as well as a deeper review of the construction of a pandemic in the public sphere by the mass media and its relationship with trust are research alternatives in the future to work on.

Regardless of the time constraints and the aspects reviewed in this article, the findings and analysis using the systems approach can contribute to constructing an understanding of the puzzle of this multidimensional crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic, as predicted by several experts, may not end anytime soon, and this demands a continuous academic and practical response.