Agents and workflow engines for inter-organizational workflows in e-government cases

Purpose – The paper aims to propose a web-based “intermediation hybrid architecture” for a workflow management system that integrates services by exploiting and combining the advantages of strict centralized topologies that use workflow engines, with totally distributed systems which use agent technologies. Design/methodology/approach – The proposed operational and technical architectures define the combination of a workflow engine and a software agent platform for the appropriate management of inter-organizational workflow processes. The proposed system is called “hybrid intermediation portal.” Findings – The hybrid system was used in e-government cases for the management of cross-border workflows that span across multiple European chambers of commerce and industry. That demonstrated the usefulness of the specific approach in the inter-organizational workflow management domain. Research limitations/implications – The approach presented in this paper was implemented and validated in real e-government cases that proved the advantages of the potential commercial use of the system. Several limitations were located due to the lack of a wide use of web services within governmental organizations. Practical implications – Concerning security issues, it would be necessary to integrate appropriate security mechanisms without constraining the technical and functional characteristics of the software agents involved. Originality/value – The contribution of the paper concerns the evolvement of the agent-enhanced workflow management systems in order to tackle the intelligence issues and the credibility problems concerning the overall control of dispersed inter-organizational processes.