Too few politicians really know about the details of digitization
(Photo: dpa)
When politicians meet these days to discuss the future of the country, one word is on everyone’s lips: digitization. It is the buzzword of the hour with which the leaders of tomorrow present themselves as visionaries with foresight.
It is often paired with other melodious promises such as “digital sovereignty”. If the whole thing gets out of hand, there are also metaphors: Germany should become the world champion in digitization, they say.
The fact that digitization is constantly portrayed as sexy is dangerous, because it makes it degenerate into a buzzword. Everyone wants to promote it, but hardly any of the political decision-makers understand what that actually means.
In truth, digitization is hard work and requires know-how in areas that hardly any politician wants to deal with voluntarily: statistics, mathematics and computer science.
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Politicians are running out of time. 575 administrative services are to be digitized by the end of 2022, at least that is what the Online Access Act (OZG) promises. So far this has been achieved across the board: 16. Germany is left behind wherever you can be: in broadband expansion, digitization of administration or digital education.
No idea of details
This is mainly due to the fact that those who control this process have little idea of the details. For the most part, lawyers and politicians (sometimes in personal union) decide on complex technical IT issues. The assumption behind it: You will be able to read in somehow.
It has been brilliantly proven in recent years that this does not work. Functioning digitization requires people who seriously deal with topics that no longer sound sexy: interface management, data processing, programming languages or algorithms.
According to estimates by the European School of Management and Technology, it would take over 46,000 IT specialists to really keep the promise of the OZG in German administration.
The future federal government must either register for evening courses in applied computer science or ensure that the administration becomes more attractive for IT staff.
This includes different salary structures and project-related positions, but also a different work culture with flat hierarchies. Because the current situation requires a lot more than just nice catchphrases.
More: How the economy wants to help the future federal government with digitization