For an ordinary citizen, good governance is receiving a service without unnecessary delay.
The best government may be the government that citizens hardly notice, not because it is absent, but because it works so smoothly that dealing with it is not a burden: a pension reaches an elderly citizen on time; a small business pays its taxes in minutes; a student receives financial support directly; a family gets a government benefit without waiting in a queue; an entrepreneur registers a business, opens an account and starts receiving payments without visiting one office after another.
This is no longer a distant dream. In some parts of the world, technology is quietly changing the relationship between citizens and the state. At the centre of this change is something that was once seen mainly as a banking innovation: financial technology, or fin-tech.
For years, the fin-tech debate focused on mobile banking, digital wallets, online lending and payments. Today, its reach is much wider. Digital payments, digital identity, instant transfers and secure exchange of data are becoming part of the basic infrastructure of modern government. This is where fin-tech meets good governance. Good governance is often discussed in terms of transparency, accountability efficiency and inclusion. For an ordinary citizen, it means receiving a service without unnecessary delay. It means not having to submit the same information to several departments. It means knowing where public money is going. It means receiving a payment without having to find an intermediary. Most importantly, it means that the system works for everyone.Technology can help make this possible.
In India, digital transformation has been built around a combination of digital identity, bank accounts and the unified payments interface (UPI). What began as an easier way of transferring money has grown into one of the world’s largest real-time payment systems.
The most interesting part of India’s experience is not the number of digital transactions. It is the idea behind the system. Instead of seeing digital payments only as a private banking service, India treated payment infrastructure as something on which banks, businesses, technology companies and government services could all build.
The result can be seen everywhere, from large businesses to roadside sellers. A person can make a small payment by scanning a code on a mobile phone. The same digital ecosystem can support government payments, financial services and formal economic activity.
Brazil offers another example. Its instant payment system, Pix, was launched by the country’s central bank. It allows people and businesses to transfer money almost instantly at any time of the day. It spread rapidly because it was simple, inexpensive and designed to work across financial institutions.
There is an important lesson here for governments everywhere. States do not always have to compete with the private sector. Sometimes governments can simply build safe road and allow everyone to travel on those. That is essentially what modern digital public infrastructure seeks to do. Most people understand physical public infrastructure more easily. Governments build roads, bridges and electricity networks the society and the economy need. The digital age requires another kind of infrastructure: trusted digital identity, payment systems and secure ways for institutions to exchange information.These digital foundations can become the highways of a modern economy.
Estonia has demonstrated another side of this transformation. For years, it has been recognised for creating public services around digital identity and connected government systems. Citizens can deal with many government services online because departments can securely exchange necessary information.
Governments should not repeatedly ask citizens for information they already have. In many countries, citizens still carry photocopies of identity documents from one public office to another. They repeatedly fill in similar forms. Businesses submit the same information to various regulators. Public officials spend thousands of working hours checking papers that another department has already verified. A well-designed digital system can cut much of this duplication.
Denmark and several other European countries are also moving towards services that are built around people’s lives. A citizen does not particularly care which ministry controls which database. The citizen simply wants a birth registered, a pension received, a tax paid or a business opened. Governments have traditionally been organised around departments. Digital government can increasingly be organised around citizens. That may be one of the biggest governance changes of our time.
The World Bank is now supporting digital public infrastructure programmes across scores of countries. Digital identity, government-to-person payments and fast payment systems are being treated as tools not only for convenience, but also for inclusion and economic opportunity. The benefit can be particularly important in developing economies.
Consider a woman living far from a major city who is entitled to financial assistance. In a traditional system, receiving that money may require travel, paperwork and dependence on several people along the way. In a digital system, her identity can be verified and the payment can be sent directly to her account or wallet.
The technology has done more than transfer money. It has reduced distance between the citizen and the state.
It can also improve transparency. Cash is difficult to follow. Digital transactions leave records. When public payments move through digital channels, governments can better track whether money has reached its intended destination. Citizens can receive confirmation. Auditors can follow transactions. Administrators can identify delays.
This does not mean that technology automatically creates good governance. Technology is just a tool, its contribution depends on how it is designed and used.
Privacy must be protected. Cybersecurity must be taken seriously. Citizens who do not own smartphones or lack digital skills cannot be left behind. There must always be ways for people to seek help and correct errors. But these are reasons to build better systems, not reasons to avoid digital progress.
Artificial intelligence is now beginning to enter government and financial services. Digital public systems may move from responding to citizens towards anticipating some of their needs. Imagine a citizen reaching retirement age and being informed about the pension process. Imagine a small business receiving a reminder about a tax obligation together with a simple digital payment option. Imagine a student who qualifies for assistance being informed about it rather than having to discover the programme independently.
Governments can move from “come, ask us” to “we are ready when you need us.” This is the idea of the invisible government. It does not mean replacing public servants with machines.
The objective is not to put every government function into one giant application. The idea is that different parts of the state should work together so that citizens do not carry the burden of government complexity.
Pakistan already has important foundations in digital banking, identity, branchless banking and instant payments. The opportunity now is to think beyond fin-tech as merely a financial-sector story.
The real measure of success should not be the number of applications launched or portals created. It should be the amount of time saved for citizens; the number of people brought into the formal economy; the speed at which public payments reach beneficiaries; and the ease with which a small business can interact with the state.
For much of history, citizens went to government offices, carried government forms and waited according to government schedules. The digital age gives us the chance to change that relationship. A payment can arrive on a phone. An identity can be verified in seconds. A business transaction can be completed instantly. A public service can appear when it is needed.
The state can be easier to deal with, more responsive to its people and better able to serve them. The most successful digital government may be the one that removes the most friction from people’s lives.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Naveed Rafaqat Ahmad
Dieser Artikel ist neu veröffentlicht von / This article is republished from: The News on Sunday, 06.09.2026
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