No. 77 (2019): Changing the way governments operate

What does the future look like, what will the media be like in the next 50 years, what will be the responsibilities of public administration in 2060, the future cannot be predicted, However, if data were collected, scenarios were generated and then presented to a group of experts, at least some notions could be validated, which would allow public administrations to prepare for better management of these uncertain futures. These prospective tools are part of a series of processes that if implemented today could have a positive impact on the future.

Cycles of change and disruption have led us to a reality that is marked by technological advancement; the media, the workforce, social relations, commerce, entertainment, tax collection, health and public transportation systems all have technological components, life is not understood without technology.

This has led to the emergence of new needs, especially because the social fabric is increasingly complex, fragmented and plural. Even so, public administration has been slow to solve new and old emergencies, and this lack of response has led to a crisis of expectations, where societies are clear that they find immediate solutions to their new needs and demand change -or rupture-.

Therefore, public administrations must be able to manage the expectations and uncertainty of individuals in order to generate capacities for intersectoral, interinstitutional and interacting understanding and therefore build collaborative solutions, proposing a constructive solution to complex challenges and dynamic problems.

The gaps, not only economic, but also age and technological, blur and accentuate the particular urgencies that public administration must address and the State alone cannot, and should not, attempt to fill all these needs, but ensure that systems minimize the impact of change in an effective and efficient manner.

The urgency is collaboration, in a landscape in continuous transformation, where the public interests of private companies and individuals must be coordinated and generate significant impacts in the management of expectations; public-private partnerships are one of the necessary characteristics to foresee futures and generate responses.

It is in this scenario that the collection, processing, management and transformation of data into inputs with real value through Data Science, is a toolbox to transform social and economic environments, this because the management, transfer and applicability of knowledge should function as an early warning, proposing measures that instead of generating chaos, propose the tranquility of a responsible response in a space of uncertainty.

Megadata or Big Data; structured or unstructured data that produce trends about the users of a website must function as a compass, which signals some steps or trends that can be of help to generate solutions.

All this requires the public administration to set its sights on this trend and is that the generation of data globally is at an unprecedented point, according to the World Bank (2016), per day more than 803 million twits are shared, 186 million photos on Instagram, 152 million Skype calls and 36 million purchases are made by Amazon and these data, do not even include China, one of the countries with the largest flow of information and electronic market, largest in the world.

Data science should be understood as a tool capable of producing relevant, quality and timely evidence to support and guide decision making in governmental, business or institutional processes. Its use has been focused on the diagnosis of problems, situational analysis and scenario generation; consequently, the application of this data would improve the work of governments and public administrations, through the generation of effective solutions to problems of health, transportation, education, housing, among others, as well as the creation of scenarios that predict future situations or trends in order to manage uncertainties in a more effective way.

The application of Data Science in government management as a State policy is a necessity in the current context, based on the construction of scenarios, the use of Big Data, the consolidation of open government processes and the application of the large number of technological tools for the public function, in addition to making decisions based on data that facilitate and encourage intelligent and evidence-based decision making.

In a reality that is undergoing more and more accelerated changes, the advance of technology represents every day greater challenges for public administrations, for this reason it is necessary to reflect on its importance and propose it as a tool for progress. This situation requires the public administration to generate a new concept of its role and accept that it must also function as a developer, precursor and even regulator of this type of technology and be willing to take on the challenge, especially because this is not a simple process and the limits -if there are any- for governmental action are blurred.