I’m sure many will still remember the images of President Mattarella as he downloads (and prints) his digital certificate. Many have learned thanks to that video that they have the opportunity to request and obtain a certificate online without having to go to the counter.
I am equally sure, however, that many would struggle to answer a simple question: is the right to digital certificates a right of all citizens or is it a simple faculty (which can therefore be eliminated from one day to the next)? And what are the other digital rights that are recognized to us?
Few know they are digital citizens and what it means to be. For the Council of the European Union, “digital citizenship is a set of values, skills, attitudes, knowledge and critical understanding that citizens need in the digital age. A digital citizen knows how to use technologies and is able to interact with them in a competent and positive way“.
Being digital citizens means having a much wider set of knowledge and skills than the mere ability of to use smartphones and tablets and to be able to surf the Internet. Digital citizens, for example, must be able to analyze, compare and critically evaluate the credibility and reliability of the sources of data, information and digital content (to avoid being conditioned by disinformation and fake news). Digital citizens must also be able to participate in public debate in an informed manner, as well as know the privacy policies of the sites and digital services they use.
What differentiates citizens from subjects, however, is the ownership of rights, which must be known in order to be enforced. And many digital rights are already there. For example, for years there have been rules that give individuals and businesses the right to a digital relationship (simpler and more serene) with all public offices. It is the right to use tools such as Spid and digital signature, to submit online applications, to receive notifications and communications online, to pay any fine or tax in a digital way.
These digital rights are set out in the Digital Citizenship Card, a set of rules found within the digital administration code (Cad), the legislative decree n. 82 of 2005. These regulations have the objective of broadening the sphere of rights of individuals and businesses and of making the concept of citizenship more current, precisely by making it digital.
For years, therefore, everyone (at least on paper) has been entitled to a digital relationship with the administration with a view to simplification, cost reduction and quality of life improvement. However, too often, administrations do not guarantee the effective implementation of the new rights.
One of the causes of the ineffectiveness of digital citizenship is that only a very few are aware of these rights and know that they can contact the administrative judge or the Ombudsman established at the Agency for Digital Italy in the event that they are denied.
Some numbers prove it. In one of the countries with the highest level of litigation (and therefore litigation), so far there has only been a judgment on digital rights (which condemned a Region for the non-use of the Pec in relations with citizens) and a few hundred reports to the digital Ombudsman (since almost everyone is unaware of its existence, you can find out more here).
Law no. 92 of 2019 (on the introduction of school teaching of Civic Education) provides that education for digital citizenship is part of a teaching made compulsory since kindergarten. And for those who have already finished school? For them “Mi manda Italian Tech” is born, the initiative to provide a multimedia guide to digital rights, simple and accessible to all: every week we will deepen one of the digital citizenship rights with a short video and an in-depth sheet with basic information and links to learn more.
The knowledge and the awareness of these tools are essential to improve the rules, if needed, and to ensure the implementation of the digital transformation of the PA, one of the most ambitious objectives of the NRP, the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. Informed citizens can push administrations to accelerate that modernization process that (as shown by the data recently published by the European Commission) he is still very late.
The claiming their rights of digital citizenship is not confrontation with administrations, but collaboration in the care of the public interest and the improvement of the quality of public services and of our democracy.
In one of the most beautiful speeches on the role of citizens, John F. Kennedy said so: “I have absolute confidence in the response and loyalty of our citizens provided they are fully informed. Not only could I not stifle the voices of dissent among your readers, I wish them. This administration wants to be transparent in its mistakes, because, as an essay said, A mistake does not become gross until you refuse to correct it. We want to take full responsibility for our mistakes and we hope you will indicate them when we fail to do so. Without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed, just as no republic can survive.”
Here’s why too the most backward administrations on the innovation front they need digital citizens.
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