The first series of the Hub Talks was presented during ACSH Conference 2018. Three speakers from Kazakhstan, USA and UK shared their ideas and experiences on current trends on how disruptive technologies advance public service, what risks they contain, how civil service and civil servants should transform in the frame of Sustainable Development Goals implementation.

Christine Leitner, Senior Advisor and co-founder of the Centre for Economics and Public Administration (CEPA) in London, where she works on public sector innovation programmes, talked on disruptive technologies and the changing dynamics of governance. She shared the ideas and implementation of Estonian e-residency digital innovation along with the most important roles of public service in government where it acts as regulator, promoter/innovator and user. The full talk of Christine Leitner can be viewed here

These ideas were further developed by Pedro Conceição, Director of Strategic Policy Bureau for Policy and Programme Support at UNDP, New York. He spoke on empowering public service to leverage technology to accelerate progress towards the SDGs. Particularly, he mentioned practical experience and researches he and his colleagues have had under the usage of technology and algorithms of automatization in public service. He also highlighted the role of network externalities among the challenges in the fields where we need innovation. To view the presentation of Pedro Conceição please follow the link

The speeches of Sayasat Nurbek, independent expert and researcher in Public Policy from Kazakhstan, and Anir Chowdhury, Policy Advisor, Access to Information Programme, Prime Minister's Office from Bangladesh, concentrated on how quickly civil service can innovate. He shared the results of the most recent McKinsey research and survey on social and cultural capital in Kazakhstan he was involved to. All speakers agreed on the key role of education upon the transition of civil service in digital era and SDG implementation. The speech of Sayasat Nurbek is available here 

The presentation of Anir Chowdhury can be viewed here