Authors' Presentation

Left to Right: Maria Alexandra Cunha, Solon Lemos Pinto, Peter T. Knight, and Ali Chahin

The seed from which this book grew  germinated in December of 2002, when two of the authors, Ali Chahin and Peter Knight, began to write a document with three parts: a diagnosis of the Brazilian federal e-government through 2002, a set of principles which they believed should guide the future evolution of Brazil's e-government, and specific recommendations on priorities for the Government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in this field. The document, 45 pages long, was completed on 7 January 2003, and then distributed to the authorities of the new federal government.

In February of 2003, Ali Chahin proposed developing the initial document into a book to fill a noticeable gap in the literature on e-government in Brazil. The idea was quickly accepted by Peter Knight. Then began an intensive effort which culminated in the present book. We added two more organizing authors with great practical experience in e-government at the federal and state level, Solon Lemos Pinto and Maria Alexandra Cunha, without whom the book would not have the weight which we believe it does, nor the quality and number of collaborators whom they helped recruit.

It was a snowballing process, with catalytic events like the III Rio Telecom conference (29-30 April in Rio de Janeiro), the Second Workshop on Digital Inclusion and the Third e-Gov Forum  (27-30 May in Brasília), the Congress on Public Informatics – CONIP 2003 (11-13 June in São Paulo), and the Information Society Week (12-13 June in Rio de Janeiro).  At each of these events we were encouraged by the quality of the presentations and found more collaborators interested in participating in this collective effort to take stock of and analyze knowledge about e-democracy and e-government in Brazil. The Information Society Week in Rio de Janeiro not only brought us more collaborators, but also the idea that this book could serve as a demonstration of Brazilian accomplishments at the World Summit on the Information Society to be held in December 2003 in Geneva.

This book is more than a collection of articles or chapters. It has a two-part structure. The first, containing three chapters, was written by the organizing authors and grew directly from the document of January 2003, in that it provides the background, analyzes international experiences in e-government, proposes principles which we believe should guide the future evolution of e-government in Brazil, and recommends priorities for this evolution. The second part has seven chapters grouping 29 separate segments contributed by 42 collaborators (including two of the organizing authors). They analyze experiences and concepts which we believe can be useful not only in Brazil, but elsewhere in Latin America and the world. The introduction and conclusion of the book were written by the organizing authors. At the end of the book are bibliographical references cited in the body of the book, a webliography of metadata on e-government, a glossary of acronyms and technical terms, information about the organizing authors and the collaborators who contributed the segments in the second part, and a detailed index.

In the great majority of cases, the segments contributed by collaborators follow a common format for analyzing brazilian experiences. These chapter segments deal with the background, objectives, implementation, results, and generalizable lessons of the experiences they analyze. This common structure is the first of three ways in which we sought to create an integrated book. The second was the use of text boxes in the first part to call attention to the chapter segments in the second part of the book. The third was by including in chapters of the second part both eferences to  the principles of e-government we advocate and to other matters treated in the first part as well as relevant matters discussed in other chapters of the second part. In the electronic version of the book, these references will be internal electronic links (hypertext); in addition, all the URLs cited in the book including iin bibliographichal references will be live links, allowing the reader to make a voyage of discovery in Brazilian and global cyberspace.

The intensive creative process for this book in the months of May-August 2003 combined the exchange of thousands of e-mails and preliminary versions of the book and its chapters between the organizing authors and with collaborators, the use of a website, and face-to-face meetings of the authors in Rio de Janeiro. The experience of Peter Knight was essential in organizing the process and interacting with the collaborators.

We believe we have created more than a book. We have created a virtual team of people with diverse skills, ideologies, political affiliations, nationalities and professions who share a single objective n– the use of telematics to promote economic, social and political development in Brazil and to share their knowledge with other regions and countries. Our virtual community was strengthened by face-to-face meetings that, in truth, began in May of 2000 at the Second Global Forum: Conference on the State and Democratic Governance in the 21st Century held 29-31 May 2000 in Brasília, with the participation of representatives of a large number of countries, at the Third Global Forum – Fostering Democracy and Development through e-Government held in Naples, Italy 15-17 March 2001, and then in countless bilateral and multilateral meetings in recent years. Many of us have become personal friends and not just professional colleagues.

We wish to thank all the collaborators who joined us on a tumultuous and at times frenetic odessy in  order to meet an extremely tight timetable -- our objective was to deliver the book to our publisher, Pearson Education do Brasil, by August 1. It took us almost 3 weeks more, but we believe the short delay was necessary so that we could produce a book we are proud of. There are also countless friends and companions who contributed ideas, inspiration, data, and support.

We owe special thanks to our spouses and families, who put up with an almost excluding effort which we made to write and finish the book. finally we want to thank the professiional assistance of Roberta Stabile and Zaida Knight for editing and collaborating in the revision of texts and translations.

Ali Chahin, Maria Alexandra Cunha, Peter Knight and Solon Lemos Pinto

Campinas, Curitiba, Deer Isle (Maine, EUA) e Rio de Janeiro 20 August 2003