Estonia, one of the leading eGovernment countries in Europe, has adopted an eState Charter. It took the Dutch eCitizen Charter as an example. Estonia’s National Audit Office uses this charter to evaluate performance of government institutions.
The eCitizen Charter (BurgerServiceCode) is a quality standard for eGovernment written from the citizen’s perspective. It consists of 10 quality requirements for digital contacts, both in the field of information exchange, service delivery and policy participation. The charter has been adopted as a quality standard on all levels of Dutch government and is also used as the basis for ongoing measurement of citizen satisfaction. Moreover it is the criterion for the annual eParticipation Awards.
The eCitizen Charter is the Winner of the European eDemocracy Award 2007 (Global eDemocracy Forum, Paris, October 2007) and Finalist of the European e-Government Awards 2007 (Ministerial e-Government Conference, Lisbon, September 2007). Moreover it has received the EU Good Practice Label 2007.
The eCitizen Charter has been translated in 22 languages. Implemention of the charter is recommended by UN, OECD, Council of Europe and UK Cabinet Office. How to implement the charter is explained in the eCC-Workbook