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How will the existence of one billion personal “Internet of Things” devices in 2021 affect Arab societies? What economic impact will 26.7 billion dollars of online monthly spending in the Arab region have? In 2021 how will 100% mobile penetration and 80% social media penetration rates in the Arab region transform the way people do business and interact with governments? These are some of the growth figures projected in this report based on the analysis of a decade of data related to information and communication technologies growth in the Arab region, as well as a current regional survey examining online usage trends, perceptions, and concerns around a new breed of digital transformations in the Arab region.

Around the world, trust in government is at an all-time low. Limited accountability, lack of transparency and low quality of public services are coupled with unprecedented levels of access to information, informed citizens, empowered civil society structures and rising citizens expectations; all just a few of the reasons why the public sector globally is in the crosshair.The Arab World is burdened by varying degrees of these challenges on regional and country levels. Most importantly, the public sector in a majority of Arab countries continues to suffer from mounting deficiencies in terms of quality, efficiency and accessibility of government services. Meanwhile, the ever-growing connectivity in the Arab world has paved the way for the emergence of varying forms of networked societies where individuals and groups are firmly connected - and empowered by a medium of free-flowing information, ideas and knowledge. This increased connectivity has reached a critical mass of the population in the Arab region, both in terms of expanding physical communication channels such as computing devices, smart phones and other internet-enabled ‘things’, as well as informational channels in the form of affordable internet subscriptions and an arsenal of social media accounts. With internet users in the Arab region finally reaching the global average in 2014 for the first time ever - a developmental milestone for the region - suddenly this critical mass has gained access to massive volumes of data and information on every facet of life in their region and beyond. Coupled with wide scale political instability in many Arab counties, this new found ‘awareness’ is increasingly leading to rising expectations of government services by citizens. These new realities empowered large number of individuals and groups in the region to proactively utilize technological and informational means to voice opinions, make suggestions, give feedback as well as proactively innovate. These new transformations promise to enable individuals and organizations in the region to co-design, co-produce and deliver better or new public services, overcoming many shortcomings in the Arab public sector and filling the gaps left by the state. These socio-technological transformations have flattened informational hierarchies, changed trust models both in society and between citizens and government, re-defined many leadership characteristics, altered power structures and transformed the landscape of public service and policy making cycles significantly. Many governments in the Arab region realize today that they need to proactively engage citizens and partner with civil society structures as well as with businesses, to find innovative ways for delivering public services that are inclusive, citizen-centric, responsive, timely and cost-effective.With regards to service delivery, the unintended side-effects of the ‘new public management’ era and the documented limitations in the ‘electronic government’ era provide invaluable lessons for policy makers in the ongoing ‘open government’ and ‘social media’ era. With around 82 million Arab users today at 22 percent penetration rates regionally, social media is already providing the medium for overcoming many of the monumental barriers for re-inventing public service in the Arab world. With around 41 percent Internet penetration and above 110 percent mobile penetration in the region, we are also witnessing a new wave of convergence, with online social media tools merging with smart phone messaging applications. For example, the largest social media platform; Facebook has recently merged with Whatsapp, one of the widest used smart phone messaging platform. This meant that Facebook now has access to new datasets for 500 million users, majority of whom are already using Facebook. By the 2nd quarter of 2014, these users were exchanging 64 billion messages using their smartphones each day worldwide, up from 54 billion a day four months earlier. As with every new technological step forward, these changes are already opening a new era of opportunities for businesses and new channels for government engagement with citizens. Social media platforms are aggressively seeking better smart phone integration, as this is bringing new opportunities to develop location-based services, provide better customer experiences with merged identities and develop an ‘always on’ experience regardless of the technological channels the customers are using. In a region where mobile penetration is well above 100 percent, many governments have started taking advantage of such opportunities to provide innovative public services for citizens through a combination of smart phones and social media applications. However, universal connectivity, critical mass of users, big data analysis tools coupled with ubiquitous penetration of smarter devices also give way to new risks, where misuse of personal data and information by governments, businesses and individuals becomes easier and more feasible than ever. These are some of the policy implications fixed at the radar screen of every single government globally. As was the case in the early days of e-government development, adapting to these disruptive technological changes will eventually reach equilibrium where a regional and local ‘right fit’ will be achieved. While we are still in a beginning of an era where technology is empowering citizens and allowing for real collaboration models with government entities, the Arab region is witnessing increased examples where the ‘business case’ for using social media for co-design, co-production and co-delivery of public services is taking place. The UAE government, for example, has initiated a first-of-its-kind social media brainstorming campaign with society to try to solve public service problems related to health and education, and engage with the public to come up with innovative ideas to re-design and co-deliver many of these services. This was coupled with several local and regional awards initiated by the government to reward innovation in public service delivery through smart devices and social media to “harness the positive potential of social media for the good of the Arab world”.How sustainable is this ‘partnership’ going to be? What boundaries will be set by the different sides for their role in this partnership? What are the policy implications for this new collaborative governance structure? How will different governments react and adapt? These are some of the questions that will clarify with time, while these new channels are institutionalized. However, what seems to be clear is that, until more formal citizen engagement channels emerge in Arab societies, social media will continue to play a significant role in enabling better citizen engagement, government responsiveness, increased accountability and wider forms of collaboration for enhancing delivery of public service in the Arab world.

On an island located hundred kilometers off the shores of the capital city of Abu Dhabi, a UAE government retreat took place for all members of the Cabinet who gathered for two consecutive days in informal settings at the turn of the year. The ‘retreat’, held on ‘Sir Bani Yas’, the country’s largest natural reserve, discussed the outcomes of the ‘UAE Brainstorming Session’, a first-ever nation-wide technology-led citizen engagement initiative in the country.The organizers’ objectives were highly ambitious in terms of process and expected outcomes: engage citizens through technological means to transform the country’s education and healthcare sectors. These two vital sectors have traditionally faced chronic challenges compared to the county’s strong performance globally in other developmental indicators. Given the wide diversity of the UAE society, an innovative solution was required first to identify the type and scope of the challenges faced by different segments in the society, and then come up with proper solutions on the micro and macro levels. The government has had few choices given that many reform initiatives launched, new authorities introduced and massive investments pumped in the two sectors over the past decade with only small incremental improvement in both sectors. It was clear for the government that to take vast leaps in terms of quality of services in the two sectors, people in the UAE, including all segments of the community, had to be brought into the picture, engaged and empowered to take part in the policy making and service re-design and improvement cycles. Traditionally, the UAE experienced an informal participatory process of the ‘majlis’ (Arabic for council) where citizens interacted with rulers and community leaders to highlight problems and concerns in their communities in direct physical gatherings open to the public. However, until recently, there has never been a formal or even informal process in the UAE where the public was able to communicate directly and systematically en mass with the government – let alone take part directly in government services design or delivery.The proposed concept was adopted at the highest levels in the government as the country’s first technology-based citizen engagement platform. The “UAE brainstorming session” initiative highly utilized the country’s solid information and communication technologies (ICT) infrastructure as well as the society’s strong social acceptance of ICTs, especially social media networks, in order to crowdsource solutions and ideas to enhance the quality of public services in both sectors. Eventually, thousands of people from all walks of life proactively and voluntarily took part by proposing more than 82,000 new ideas and innovative solutions using various social media channels. Many challenges in the country’s public health and education sectors were identified and targeted, effectively leading to new initiatives taking place on the ground.Focusing on the utilization of social media in the process of citizen engagement in public service co-design and co-production, this case study documents the UAE brainstorming session process, highlights an innovative technology-based approach in citizen-government interactions and extracts lessons from local and regional contexts.

Since the spark of the popular movements across the Arab world, the critical debate about Arab youth’s political empowerment and the innovative uses of social media has been ongoing in policy and academic circles. Meanwhile, the Arab world continues to witness exponential growth in social media usage, merging online and offline identities among a significant percentage of young Arabs; this continues to play a critical role in shaping new dynamics in Arab societies. Almost two years later, many more questions beyond the impact on political empowerment of Arabs are increasingly being asked by policy makers and business leaders; the most critical of which is: Can this same phenomena also play a similar role in the economic empowerment of the most active group in society, the Arab youth? This paper is intended to provoke thought leadership discussions in private and public sector decisions making circles in 8 surveyed countries. Key findings of this survey provide evidence confirming that changes in the sense of empowerment is taking place within large segments in Arab societies.