The Importance of E-government in Western Asia For the sake of modernity, it may help to remind ourselves that the

United Nations uses the less Anglocentric word group Western Asia` to convey the common term Middle East as we know it. In what ways has E-government affected political transactions in this region? Do barriers to internet access affect full permeation of broadband, technology education, general education and literacy, and specifically female literacy? Do increases of internet permeation have numerous rewards for aspects of e-government, such as electronic court filing systems, legal data bases, alternative dispute resolution services, parliamentary communications, and communication through websites for advocacy groups online, which may or may not have certain policy biases due to certain political venture capital. in what ways do e-government initiatives from the United States affect policy decisions or communication styles in the Middle East? Key USA DARPA E-Government Influences include: 1. Open Gov a.Web Video Archives of State Department Briefings now recently live-streaming b.White House Press Conferences, c.C-Span Archives of Congressional Meetings d. e-briefings 2. Special State Department Policy Events in Video Archive 3. Share-ability of web platforms for easy tweeting, or facebooking, or google liking of policy intitiatives 4. E-government Youtube channels 5. Web Based Policy Groups 6. Web Based Political Organizing and Fundraising strategies 7. Sockpuppet configurations which advocate for Political Effects What role is Al-Jazeera and other media creating in digital cultures towards democracy and egovernement? How does the large ever increasing body of televised and audio recorded University and Policy Group and Think Tank web-based study materials on line relational to foreign policy and international relations alter the way people perceive the infinity of information, and the development of greater e-government capacity in Western Asia. Are there religious restrictions on such media? How can internet also help with basic language skills? How do emails and skype affect diplomacy?

are cables written to be strategically leaked? or does the leaking of information ever have bad effects? Is the leaking of information designed to pose a political regime challenge to the great Firewall of China? Do social medias program the human mind towards democratic government? Are young people coordinating resources over facebook, twitter, and the blogosphere? Do certain religious groups restrict internet access for religious reasons? What is the role of Islamic political bloggers? With more web permeation than ever what is the ideological saturation point in achieving PNAC change change through IDI, and NRI overseas? Is there a point of super-saturation in which e-government e-diplomacy reaches a limit to idea propagation? Will greater equality of access for schooling and education for women cause dramatic changes in global female literacy and government participation? In what ways can those areas be expedited for maximizing the CEDAW agenda. What aspects of e-government can have greater propagation for the elimination of violence to women, through greater access to legal infrastructure, legal websites, legal education, and legal services, and e-filing, and domestic restraining orders for women who are victims of gender Based Violence? Can Transparency Initiatives cause a change of heart for regimes which have more closed and restrictive ideas about the internet? Do restrictions on hate speech in European Internet stall the development of NeoNazi ideology, or is there more that can be done in alleviating the economic strain underpinning the rise of racist neofascism? Can internet provide valuable historical service for the archiving of primary source material for the documenting of war, and human rights crimes, such as the genital mutilation of Armenian men in the Armenian genocide, or the enforcement of psychological torture to force them to view the Raping of their women folk? Can internet provide reporting system for un-prosecuted war rape and military rape crimes? Can internet permeation provide documentation for establishing war rape as a state policy of political persecution for the refugee protection of victims of state policy sexualized violence?

can digital reporting systems help eliminate military rape, and thusly e-govern our soldiers? Can digital archiving systems increase awareness interviews of Holocaust survivors experiences as victims of rape and sexualized violence? Can digital historical record keeping result in a more equitable society? Will e-government towards international law, help propagate internationalized legal norms for Rape Victim Protections under Rape Shield Law or the elimination of Marital Rape Immunity for spousal rape? Will the increasing digitization of shariah, and modern feelings about shariah, change the way shariah is implemented? What is the role of groups like AHA Foundation and Karma Nirvana in documenting the atrocities of child marriage and so-called honour violence and honour killing which punishes women for religious offenses by death? Will child marriage be recognized internationally as a form of human trafficking for sexual exploitation, and will western law enforcement be able to provide education and awareness to transnational communities? How can e-government through facebook based peer pressure systems inhibit the restriction of womens rights in the middle east through the propagation of biographical stories of private denial of justice? How can e-government through internet based peer pressure systems alter Global Gender Based Violence with a special focus on women in the middle east? Can religious co-existence be crafted towards peace with a secularistic governmental basis as advocated by Gita Sahgal, a war rape expert who decries the religious freedom protections unduly granted towards violence to women. Can internet unities of generation Y peer groups over-ride generational hostilities and animosities which have decreasing relevance to young people? Can cultural products function as e-diplomacy as they promote appreciation of cultural experiences which demonstrate cultural shared interests? What is the function of leaks on e-governance? With the leaking by Issa of the Libya files regarding the Assassination of Ambassador Stevens, does his action relieve the burden of localized responsibility for security failings to a larger socialized context of international cooperation towards security? Is the controversial aspect of his data release based on a misunderstanding of our common vision for total information awareness and global security and human rights?

Twitter in particular has a dramatic effect on development of the Iranian youth participation in awareness campaigns in 2009. What role did social media play in the Arab Spring? Is it true that internet disruptions in Libya during the 2011 bombing were designed to reduce communications in the region as a strategy as revealed by internet researchers called Lulzsec? there are more questions than answers for e-governance. an i-phone or android smart phone for every soldier promises a highly surveillable military force. In some ways does electronic tethering of the human psyche serve as an invisible imprisoning effect so that humans with addictive propensities to news intake and hyper-communicative technological information sharing become cyborgian in nature, but easily controlled and surveilled and narcotized on their digital hamster wheels? what is the role of facebook for law enforcement a crime tracking tool? will new systems of electronic financial arrangements alter transnational money laundering capacities, development of e-currencies, and digital banks and investment strategies? how will this affect government and under whose jurisdictional purview will fall such future possible ecurrencies and money harvesting schemes? will potential freezing of assets for groups designated as terrorist become less possible with increased digital money laundering capacity? will shariah prohibitions on interest usury gain wider permeation to non-western-asian cultures, as the ethical influence affects the wider public perceptions of equity and fairness. in that sense does the counterbalancing effects of e-diplomacy occur from East to West in breaking up banking corruption? will this happen through internet based study of anti-usury imperatives? or will market capitalism infect anti-usury economies through internet based expansionisms? these questions are posed by Mary Eng for Middle East politics at Portland State University for Dr. Peter Bechtold for

extra credit 24-October-2012