Frameworks for fostering cross-agency interoperability in eGovernment initiatives

Interoperability has been identified as a major issue to be addressed by every egovernment initiative. In order to tackle this issue, egovernment agencies have developed tools to facilitate the interchange of information between agencies when providing public services to citizens and businesses through internet. The tools are called frameworks. The chapter surveys a sample of egovernment agencies in Europe and the United States that have developed different frameworks, which are classified as either interoperability frameworks or enterprise architecture frameworks. The survey includes a comparative analysis which shows the common features and differences between both types of frameworks. The survey also shows concrete cases of application of the frameworks and focuses on the use of the frameworks as catalists of cross-agency interoperability. Finally, the chapter proposes an explanation to the adoption of each kind of frameworks by the egovernment agencies.