Smart cities are associated with huge potential to facilitate achieving of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The global reach of the SDGs by the citizens needs a synergy including the grass root individual level of decision-making. The nudge theory, a behavioral economics concept, is considered in terms of its application to smart city planning, implementation and policy making. The paper examines the basis and cases of practical embodiment of the nudge theory in smart cities. Through various strategies nudge theory can help to create more sustainable and resilient urban communities, and thus contribute to the achievement of the SDGs. The smart city planners may practically apply certain elements of the nudge approach. However, it may create not only positives but certain risks as well. The author analyses the potential of the nudge theory in smart cities, providing the recommendations to local and regional authorities and laying down the framework for its ethical, transparent and non-manipulative embodiment.

This paper investigates the development of Belgrade public transport system, and issues arising therefrom, through the lens of two concepts developed by scholars from the field of science, technology, and society: relevant social groups and sociotechnical imaginaries. Both concepts were conceived in order to explain and adequately theorize ways in which society and technology shape each other, with special emphasis on the political aspects of this process. Rather than trying to explain the entire history of the system, the paper will focus on several points of controversy during the 20th and 21st centuries. The main aim of the paper is to show, through these examples, that the proposed conceptual framework could be useful for understanding complex sociotechnical systems such as public transport.

The present study suggests a general framework for better addressing desired changes in the public sector, including transportation and mobility, besides all other objectives related to smarter cities and sustainable goals. It focuses on social innovation as a starting point and root for all long term transformations, those that take place below the visible, surface part of any change process – the transformations defining mindsets and system changes. The aim of the paper is to identify the main questions we need to ask when engaging in a process of public sector with larger and complex societal intended consequences. The suggested framework is based on a literature review and a concept testing stage, during a Think Tank on social innovation in times of crises.

Government worldwide has adopted e-government into their organizations to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery to citizens. However, the non-adoption behavior among public-sector employees is hampering the digitalization effort. This issue has attracted several researchers to conduct a study on e-government adoption among employees in the public sector. Although numerous studies are being conducted on e-government adoption among employees, the effort made to review this topic is still scarce and limited. Nevertheless, only scant researchers have made an effort to review this topic systematically. Therefore, this study aims to conduct a systematic literature review concerning the adoption of an e-government system among employees in the public sector. PRISMA guided the review process. This SLR consists of the following methodological steps: formulating research questions, systematic searching strategies based on identification, screening, and eligibility on established databases (Scopus), then data extraction and analysis. Three main themes were identified through thematic analysis, namely (1) human factors, (2) technical factors, and (3) organizational factors. This review aims to provide reliable knowledge and ideas for academics and practitioners to implement e-government strategies in governmental agencies effectively. Although this study was only restricted to the review, it would provide a valuable basis for empirical research in the future.

Based on the mandate of political representatives and public administration to work in the public interest and to fulfil the legal requirements, it is surprising that the offer of public e-services is making slow progress. Based on this mandate, both the digitisation of the administration and the digitalisation of its services should develop more proactively since it can be observed that citizens readily accept private-sector digital offerings. This observation raises the question of whether politics and public administration accommodate citizens’ preferences by giving low priority to digitisation and digitalisation, or not. By answering this question this paper provides insight into the thinking of citizens and gives politicians, as well as public administration, an idea about their expectations and their idea of Public Value Creation when it comes to digital public services

Digitalization affects public servants’ job demands and resources. The current paper investigates which measures managers can employ to optimize digital work on administrative procedures. Building on a previous study on the impact of digitalization on work experiences and performance in public agencies and on a literature research regarding leadership instruments, we derived two sets of measures on job design and digital communication management. The proposed measures were validated conducting expert interviews with actual and prospective managers from various municipal agencies. Overall, our analyses revealed heterogenous patterns regarding the prevalence of the proposed measures. Experts reported various potential benefits and challenges as well as suitable recommendations regarding their implementations which indicates that the proposed measures could indeed contribute to facilitating digital work on administrative procedures. Finally, the practical implications as well as limitations of our approach are discussed.

Over the past two decades, we have seen how technological advancements have taken the world by storm. However, electronic voting (e-voting) machines are still not widely accepted. This paper analyzes research papers published on electronic voting in the Scopus database between 2000 and 2022. This research aims to analyze the number of studies conducted on e-voting systems and to determine whether the publication patterns match specific events on the timeline. The top five contributors to this research field (namely the United States, India, China, the United Kingdom, and Germany) were examined. Two of the main aspects of this paper are whether there is a trend between the number of papers published and the events occurring in a country and if more studies should be conducted regarding e-voting and its importance.

Abstract: The content of this article reflects the results gathered during the implementation of the project Modernization of Governance Mechanisms focused on the protection of human rights, financed by the State Programme, and initiated in 2020, which main objective is to analyze the particularities of the transition process of the Republic of Moldova to European standards and in the context of digital transformation. Framed by the convergent approach and the opportunities offered by digital tools in the modernization of the state institutions´ activity, the main research steps and some preliminary results are presented. Considering the challenge to successfully develop the capacities and meet the EU accession conditions, altogether with the fast technological progress and the need to harness the opportunities it offers for the governance, we advocate for the need to embrace new development paradigms, new ways of interaction, and new legal mechanisms in order to ensure legality, institutional and professional efficiency.

E-Democracy has gained wide-ranging popularity and became one of the tools that support the government to reach their citizens and to build a connection to make a decision that brings a positive output for critical service delivery in local governance. E-Democracy is still at a nascent stage in Bangladesh, but there is increasing interest in its potential for crisis management. This paper presents a framework for E-Democracy in Bangladesh that can be used for crisis management. The paper discusses the potential benefits of E-Democracy, such as increasing transparency, promoting citizen engagement, and improving governance. Nevertheless, the study also identifies challenges, such as limited access to technology, digital literacy, and inadequate infrastructure, that need to be addressed for effective implementation. The paper provides a roadmap for leveraging E-Democracy in Bangladesh and proposes strategies for overcoming these challenges, including building digital infrastructure, providing training and capacity-building programs, and promoting public-private partnerships. It offers a comprehensive approach to using technology to enhance citizen participation, promote transparency, and improve governance in the country. Finally, the framework provides a roadmap for leveraging technology to enhance democracy and crisis management in Bangladesh.

The study focuses on sustainability, and presents the objectives of the United Nations and the European Union. The Hungarian results in connection with sustainability are also presented, with particular attention to the issue of mobility. In the study, therefore, the concept of sustainability is presented first, followed by the global and Hungarian frameworks. With the exception of air and maritime transport, in the second part of the study certain measurable indicators related to sustainable mobility are highlighted from an environmental and social perspective. These include air quality, the size of green areas, transportation safety, and the state of public transportation.

Recently the continually emerging internet and mobile revolution has had a fundamental societal impact which ultimately changed the ways, modes and devices of communication and mobility. Advances of internet platforms, smartphone and tablet applications, and the rise of social media platforms are becoming increasingly relevant in transport contexts. This paper addresses the need for avoiding the phenomena of the "the commuting paradox," among which the travel-based multitasking could be a crucial opportunity. Based on a representative survey in March-April 2020 Hungary in order to identify the factors, attitudes and demands that influence the use of smart devices during frequent commuting the paper argues that the implementation of travel-based multitasking is influenced by a number of factors, of which labour market status and attitudes towards the adoption of new technologies are of key importance.

Digital farming is a modern paradigm for food production that utilizes modern technology to enhance various benefits for farmers through e-agriculture and provide higher crop yields than those achievable with traditional methods. Agriculture has been a dominant industry since the beginning, and its relevance is more crucial than ever. Population growth requires producing quality food, which may be available through new technology-based solutions. Considering food production a social expectation, managing the problems goes beyond the individual interests of farmers; governmental actions are required in the industry. The focus of the study is limited to the digital technology adaptability of smallholder farmers in the agricultural industry in Bangladesh; however, the results are generalizable. It is assumed that adapting digital technologies can be triggered through e-governance among smallholder farmers. By emphasizing the benefits of adopting this technology and illustrating how it can be best utilized, the productivity of agriculture can be improved among them. Understanding the differences compared to large-scale farming, the maturity of farms, and promoting development actions require a comprehensive framework. The study aims to present the justification of the initial framework elements. There are secondary data sources used for finding critical factors. A comprehensive response must incorporate education, government policies, and capacity building.

The implementation of information and communication technologies in research leads to a big data flow that needs efficient management. In the context of the Open Science movement and following FAIR principles, sharing of research data became an important issue for all research disciplines. In this work we focus on data sharing in agricultural sciences due to the significance of this field for every person, every country and even for the whole humanity. The paper is focused on data produced in agricultural sciences and provides information about types of data produced, on understanding the benefits from open data, provides perception and attitude of scholars towards sharing and reusing research data. The perceptions of agricultural researchers to data sharing are generally positive, but respondents reported a number of fears including lack of time, data security and losing control over intellectual property, possible misinterpretation and misuse of data. They also mentioned the interest in library assistance and the need of training in research data management.

The current situation in the construction sector shows a number of problems that result from incorrectly set public administration, self-government and competences and, above all, from the lack of electronic procedures. Among all industries, construction is the slowest and least effective in applying new knowledge, materials or technologies to its processes. Faster implementation of innovations is a necessary step for the development, economy and ecological impact of the construction industry in Slovakia. Based on the above facts, the government of the Slovak Republic decided to update the construction law, which has not been changed for decades. The contribution provides a brief overview of the basic goals and steps that are part of the creation of the new construction law, defines the main milestones, benefits, solutions and tools that will help the design and gradual implementation of information and communication technologies in individual processes within the framework of building permits.

Data privacy is commonly believed to be an issue of highest priority, and something deserved to be defended by all means. Over the past 50 years increasingly complex legislation has been born out of this assumption; the European GDPR being one such example. While data privacy advocates and lawyers celebrate the increasingly hard to comprehend and to comply with requirements, normal people largely do not care. We describe a field-level case in which utmost intimate data is regularly requested from and happily shared by a large number of applicants to a guestlist-only event. The absence of privacy concerns raised by the applicants might indicate that such concerns are largely a myth that fails to withstand reality.

The rise and spreading of disinformation in the digital era are influencing public policy making across the globe. Governments and public authorities are in this regard seen not only as authorities, who deal with the effects of disinformation, but also as subjects causing the emergence of conspiracy theories, fake news and disinformation. The article is focused on the analysis of the public trust in central governments in relation to the tendencies of believing disinformation. The aim is to highlight, how public distrust leads to disinformation's beliefs and also, to what extent disinformation causes the lack of public trust.

Smart regions are mainly characterized by adopting information technology as a means for improving and enhancing management and economic development at the level of individual villages, cities and regions themselves. This enhancement can be effectively achieved by using smart service systems that focus on value co-creation among all stakeholders. In general, these services have to be engineered in a special way tailored to the particular community and use case at hand. In this paper, we propose an engineering approach centered on the concept of the citizen developer for creating, maintaining and managing those smart services. By using a domain-specific modelling language specially tailored to the smart region context, we develop a platform capable of generating smart services from a high-level description including data sources, transformations and visualizations. This results in an efficient and cost-effective development approach where the stakeholders of the smart region context themselves lead the process of building, deploying and implementing the relevant use-cases for their communities.

The UN General Assembly accepted the “Agenda 2030” UN resolution in 2015. The document specified seventeen so-called Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for countries to follow. It is widely accepted that Universities as scientific hubs should participate in facilitating the knowledge generation and implementation of the strategy. This study analyzed the prevalence of the “Sustainable cities and communities” (SDG-11) goal in academic publications from 2017 to 2021 in Europe, focusing on V4 countries. We analyzed the number of research papers and their impact based on the SciVal and the World Economic Forum's Times Higher Education (THE) university impact ranking databases. Luxembourg leads the ranking of European countries in SDG-11 publications per capita, while less-developed countries tend to be at the bottom of the line. For the V4 countries, not the lower interest in SDG-11 is the main problem, but the weaker interest in SDG-related research in general. Also, there is little overlap between the sub-topics in V4 countries which can hinder possible synergies. To celebrate the few existing sub-topic overlaps between V4 institutions, we introduced a “connection map” that may facilitate stronger collaborations amongst V4 universities.

Budapest has experienced the emergence of shared or private e-scooters as part of a larger global transformation in urban environments and mobility systems. Following an increase in the number of emergencies in recent years, many Hungarian municipalities have agreed with shared e-scooter operators to implement a set of temporal and speed limitations. However, there is still a requirement to understand the dynamics of socio-technical transitions involving e-scooters and to establish the necessary adaptive governance processes. This article focuses on the legislative foundation required for government regulation. In our exploratory research, we conducted three focus group discussions with non-users in March 2022 to examine issues related to public regulation. Using the key concepts they mentioned most often, we have created a nomological network around the phenomenon of electric micromobility, focusing now on the legislative aspect. According to respondents, the current key challenges are the lack of regulation on the maximum speed of electric scooters, the number of people allowed to ride on a scooter at the same time, whether mobile phones can be used while scootering, and where the e-scooters can be legally parked and where they can be safely approached.

Digitalization affects public servants’ job demands and resources. The current paper investigates which measures managers can employ to optimize digital work on administrative procedures. Building on a previous study on the impact of digitalization on work experiences and performance in public agencies and on a literature research regarding leadership instruments, we derived two sets of measures on job design and digital communication management. The proposed measures were validated conducting expert interviews with actual and prospective managers from various municipal agencies. Overall, our analyses revealed heterogenous patterns regarding the prevalence of the proposed measures. Experts reported various potential benefits and challenges as well as suitable recommendations regarding their implementations which indicates that the proposed measures could indeed contribute to facilitating digital work on administrative procedures. Finally, the practical implications as well as limitations of our approach are discussed.

The journey towards digital transformation in an organization is a multifaceted and intricate process that requires effective leadership. In the digital age, leaders must adapt their skills and knowledge in order to drive growth and innovation in their organization. This research paper aims to explore the role of leaders in the digital transformation process of organizations. The study uses interviews as a primary method to gather data, applied on leaders from both public and private organizations. The research focuses on identifying the key leadership traits, skills, and behaviors required for successful organizational change and transformation through digital innovations and technology. This research contributes to the growing literature on digital organizational leadership and provides valuable insights for leaders who aspire to lead successful digital transformation initiatives.

The fundamental motivation for developing e-administration is to improve the efficiency of institutional operations and, thus, the quality of government management. In Hungary, digitising public services is challenging, but the country has made significant progress in several areas in recent years. In this study, we investigated the usage patterns of e-administration services in Hungary, focusing on the relationship between age and usage patterns for web-based platforms and mobile applications and the relationship between usage patterns and opinions on the importance of e-administration. Our results confirm the general hypothesis that younger age groups prefer to use digital tools, including e-administration services. Still, the relationship between age and willingness to use is weaker than expected for app usage. In Hungary, attitudes towards the importance of e-administration systems and actual usage of e-administration services are not closely related. Most citizens consider e-administration highly important, but in practice, the usage rate cannot be regarded as high. The research was not based on representative data provision and should be interpreted as a pilot study.

Germany as Europe's largest and the world's fourth largest economy is experiencing an enormous skilled labor shortage at the moment. This is especially true for the German public sector: According to recent studies, this shortage amounts to 360,000 employees as of January 2023 and could extend to 1,070,000 employees until 2030, if no corrective action is taken. One measure to potentially mitigate this lack of skilled labor can be crowdworking, work processed using digital platforms. This novel form of work organization, which is already frequently used in leading economies such as the US or China, could be part of a solution for this challenge. Using the lens of work system theory and especially its work system framework, this conceptual paper investigates which kind of work performed by employees of the German public sector could be suitable for a conduction via crowdworking platforms. It concludes that application testing, idea generation and innovation, microtask conduction and text creation are among the most promising realms for public administration crowdworking.

The oil and gas market is facing multiple challenges, including COVID-related price collapses, climate change, and net-zero promises, compounded by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which has further worsened the instability. Given that oil remains the world's largest energy source and a critical component of a strong economy, it is essential to carefully consider any future disruptions. Considering the current Russia-Ukraine crisis, there is a growing concern about its potential impact on the global economic market, particularly in the United Kingdom and Europe. This research aims to gather the latest data on the crisis's global economic impact, with a focus on these regions. The strategy tool underlines the key drivers that affect supply chain management and policymaking, providing scientific support for enterprise decision-making strategies and policymakers. Our study's findings have two important implications for policymaking. Firstly, we demonstrate the importance of the European Union developing and effectively managing a unified policy for dealing with Russian gas supplies. Secondly, we stress the need for government and industry to work together to support and promote the growth of the oil and gas industry's supply chain in both domestic and international markets. Furthermore, targeted collaboration between the government and industry can foster investment in innovative technologies that enhance strategic energy security. In conclusion, our research provides a valuable contribution to policymakers by highlighting the need for coordinated action in response to the current crisis and promoting the growth and competitiveness of the oil and gas industry's supply chain.

Due to the Covid-19 lockdown, the diffusion of digital learning methods has been accelerated. Several studies deal with students’ satisfaction and the methodological challenges in the field before and during the lockdown, but another essential factor has received minimal attention. Understanding the lecturers’ attitudes to new solutions deserves additional effort. This pilot study aims to explore lecturers’ experience with Moodle based on a limited sample of 118 respondents at the University of Public Service, Budapest, Hungary. The results show that the lockdown led to a relevant increase in Moodle use, and a significant proportion of them continued to use the services of Moodle. The satisfaction with Moodle does not depend on age or faculty affiliations within the University. The results suggest targeted training for lecturers focusing on experimentalizing to enhance the recognition of Moodle use.

This publication advances some refutable hypothesis concerning user behaviour and learning success in eLearning systems using system simulations. A simulation in this context is strongly interactive HTML 5 content giving users an almost real-life experience of working with an application system, here an ERP system. Simulations can be enriched with addition information, data and process models, user guidance, or business content. This type of content is distinctly different from traditional eLearning content focusing on presentational content and teamwork or quizzes to check progress. To test the hypotheses the paper explores metrics provided by a typical eLearning platform and in how far the metrics can be used to test the hypotheses.

The aim of this paper is to review the situation of mega-journal publishers in the 27 Member States of the EU, with a special focus on the case study of the Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI). Today's evolving higher education sector requires a research-oriented and competitive approach from universities, which puts increasing pressure on researchers to publish in internationally recognised journals. However, due to various barriers, traditional publishers, especially in the Big Five, are not equally accessible to researchers in the core and periphery regions, and it leads to a higher proportion of MDPI publications in the periphery countries. The analysis is based on an empirical comparative methodology using scientometric data. The results show a dynamic increase in the share of MDPI publications in the periphery countries, particularly in the Central and Eastern European region of the EU-27 Member State. The analysis discusses MDPI issues from a Hungarian perspective. However, the scientific value and credibility of MDPI in these countries is also a controversial issue from the perspective of higher education and research policy. The paper discusses some of the arguments, including the role of MDPI publications in maintaining competitiveness in international university rankings, APC charges, and recent changes in higher education in Hungary.

The European Union policy of the EU Green Deal taxation and digital transformation represents a significant change in the EU policy towards more sustainable and innovative practices as well as economic development in the region. Green taxation can be an essential and effective instrument in shaping the new development toward green economics, facing a critical challenge in reducing Carbon emissions and promoting environmental sustainability. The objective of this study is to analyses the potential for using green taxation as a new approach for promoting environmental sustainability and economic development in the European Union. The study will highlight the latest insight into the recent development of the environmental taxation of the European Union. The paper argues that the success of the Green Deal taxation measure will depend on careful design and implementation, as well as coordination with other policy tools. Lastly, Environmental taxation can significantly contribute to the EU achieving its ambitious sustainability goals while also promoting economic growth.

In today's society, both theoretical and practical discussions about the largest businesses, such as joint-stock companies, are still relevant and in demand. The purpose of this research is to analyze the process of institutionalization and formation of joint-stock companies, parallel to other related legal institutions, which is also caused by the aspect of subjective and objective factors from the 16th-18th centuries. The structure of the joint-stock company was not an artificially created theoretical model, its appearance being predetermined by a series of economic, political, social and other circumstances under the influence of which this organizational-legal form appeared and developed, gradually acquiring new features which are easily found in the specific features of contemporary joint stock companies. The problems of the emergence of the first joint-stock companies are debatable among scientists. Some believe that the main specific features of contemporary joint-stock companies can be found in the colonial trading companies founded in Nederland at the beginning of the 17th century, which is a hypothesis possible only because of their business successes, which attracted the attention of all of Europe at the time, or…

The concept of the so-called smart city has been approached in many different ways. One of the most prominent contemporary researchers on smart cities, Boyd Cohen, in a 2015 article entitled ‘The 3 Generations of Smart Cities’, distinguished three phases of smart city projects and initiatives. The service-driven Smart City Phase 1.0 primarily linked to the market penetration efforts of large multinational corporations, the progressive city leader-driven Smart City Phase 2.0 and the Smart City Phase 3.0, now seen as the result of citizen collaboration. What is left out of such an approach is the place and role of higher level development policies in the conceptualization and institutionalization of the smart city. This is particularly true in the case of a Central and Eastern European country like Hungary, which is inherently characterized by a centralized (unitary) territorial system and where, due to its semi-peripheral location, smart city innovations are not the result of organic, autochthonous processes. Taking all this into account, the study, using the methodological tool of discourse analysis, seeks to answer the question of how the smart city concept at EU and/or national level, which is constantly changing according to the rules of the smart city discourse, is reflected in the local (municipal) level of urban development. To answer this question, I will empirically examine the relevant legal sources and other documents of the development policies of the European Union and Hungarian government level, as well as the development documents of Hungarian municipalities that have apparently recognized the need to move towards the smart city and have tried to make their tasks explicit by means of urban development documents that refer to the smart city concept in their title.

The rapid development of information and communication sector provides the possibilities of smart solution implementations in small settlements. Growing scientific literature analyses various effects of smart city development, even the Hungarian legal regulation defines the meaning of smart city. The Cork Declaration 2.0, accepted in 2016, paves the way to the introduction of the EU Action for Smart villages. The Hungarian Digital Village Program was introduced in 2021. The smart village initiatives also appear in the recent Hungarian Common Agricultural Policy Strategic Plans as an obligatory element. This paper argues that the use quality function deployment in smart village strategic planning can improve the impacts of implemented policies. The quality function deployment technique, originating from Japan, is already widely used in various sectors and also in the field of strategic planning. It can formulate a bridge between citizens’ requirements and technological possibilities. It reveals and hierarchizes citizens’ requirements and technological solutions. On one hand it improves cost-effectiveness, on the other hand it promotes higher effectiveness. Quality function deployment can be a useful tool in the strategic policy planning. The Hungarian developmental policy recently prefers to apply top-down approaches which requires a wide knowledge about citizens’ preferences.