Public administrations across Europe are facing the pressure of balancing the ‘twin transition’, by adjusting to the digital age while inducing sustainable development. Sustainability warrants that the quest for satisfying our needs should not compromise the quality of the environment and the ecosystem should be sustained for the sake of future generations (Feroz et al., 2021; Kaswan et al., 2019). The digital transformation on the other hand, is a fundamental change process enabled by digital technologies that aims to bring radical improvement and innovation to a sector such as public administration. This transformation could provide practical solutions to support sustainability efforts. For example big data analytics, social media and AI technologies can help to implement sustainability solutions (Rosário & Dias, 2022). In fact, sustainability problems are often framed as technological challenges and the attention towards electronic governance to find solutions is increasing.

While there is extensive literature on the sustainable transition (Bellandi & De Propris, 2021; Burns, 2012) and the digital transition (Konopik et al., 2022; Oberländer et al., 2020), there is little literature on the twin transition. There is a definite research gap, as there is a limited number of assessments focusing on the interrelations between the digital transformation and the sustainable transformation (Almansour, 2022). We aim to bring together these different strands of literature in order to understand the nexus between the two and provide a new conceptual understanding. There is a need for institutional adjustments which require governments to (re)develop certain capacities and competencies in order to cope with this twin transition. In conceptualizing these actions, we make a distinction between the macro, meso and micro level, since there are specific challenges at different levels. We examine the challenges at these different levels through a literature review plus illustrative cases to come to an identification of capacities and competencies.

The relationship between e-government and sustainable economic development often raises doubts, especially regarding its interplay with social and environmental issues. The United Nations 2030 Agenda emphasized the potential of digitalization to improve economic sustainability by also considering social inclusiveness and environmental issues if digitalization can enable country convergence toward the Sustainable Development Goals established in the United Nations Agenda 2030. Nevertheless, the literature is unclear regarding the relationship between digitalization and sustainable economic development, as the effects of e-government are divisive. Therefore, the paper aims to provide a comprehensive and in-depth examination of the research trends in e-government with a specific focus on sustainable economic development, including selected aspects of economic, social and environmental sustainability. Utilizing several bibliometric approaches (e.g., descriptive overview, scientific production, network analysis and thematic evolution) on the Scopus database of 4550 scientific documents related to e-government and sustainable economic development will facilitate the conceptualization and development of this research topic over time. This will also allow extracting the critical literature-based factors determining the potential of e-government to achieve sustainable economic development, including Sustainable Development Goals established in the United Nations Agenda 2030. The in-depth examination reveals a significant emphasis on sustainable economic development within e-government research, particularly in recent years, driven by the most productive countries. The findings of the paper may be of benefit not only to the scientific but also to evidence-based policymaking to help identify appropriate policy solutions to facilitate sustainable economic development in the future.

The title of the paper illustrates the well-known dilemma in digital governance: The need to develop agile meta governance strategies to adopt to citizens and marked needs, but at the same time develop av policy securing sustainable technological solutions (Dawes 2009, Mergel, Gong et al. 2018, Musiani 2020, Malodia, Dhir et al. 2021). The literature on digital governance is extensive but has broadly been divided into two streams: studies on information systems and studies on public administration. Just a few contributions have tried to integrate knowledge from these two domains (Malodia, Dhir et al. 2021). As a result of this few studies within public administration has served attention to the infrastructures for digital or e-government. Internet infrastructure include physical objects – for example submarine cables that carry global telecommunications, data centers that host content (Musiani 2020). It is the instrumental technological foundations upon which services are built, including the architectures, networks, standards, and middleware that support applications and associated business processes. These ICT infrastructures are most often considered in the context of a single organization, which is generally viewed as a multi-faceted “enterprise (Blanchette 2011; Fuller 2008; Marino 2006). With the connection of infrastructures and objects, the organization of physical flows requires the control of information flows. Massive data are at the heart of this movement, which calls into question the positions of the players in these markets. Recent studies within communication illustrate a multi-actor and multi-layer system of digital infrastructure. These studies show that the rapid digital transformation creates a gap between infrastructure solutions, marked and policy response which leaves governments “lagging behind” in this policy field (Plantin, Lagoze et al. 2018, Plantin and Punathambekar 2019, Flensburg and Lai 2020). Government strategies to regulate to rapid transformation on this policy field calls for agile meta-governance. Meta-governance entails strategies by which governments seek to control indirectly and steer at a distance, to shape and pursue policies. Therefor this study sets out to explore:

What meta-governance strategies does the Norwegian central government apply and how do they relate to rapid changes in the digital infrastructure?

The study relies on a research design of a “extreme” case study of Norway. Norway has a digital infrastructure highly developed, making Norway a clear example of a digitalized system. Norway is also in interesting as the emergence of digital markets, global governance challenges the traditional welfare state policies. Based on qualitative studies drawing on mapping of digital infrastructure (Especially devices and access network and backbone network) and review of regulation and policy (digitalization policy, cable and access policy, internet security policy and telecommunication policy), we explore the multi- actor infrastructure, their position and the degree of policy regulating and meta governing this multi actor infrastructure.

Preliminary results show high degree of national multi -actor infrastructure related to devices and access network and an agile meta-governance policy regulating and adapting to digitalization. On the other hand, mapping of the backbone networks illustrates few marked actors, none of them national and a limited active meta governance policy regulating the backbone infrastructure.

The modern world is striving towards more sustainable solutions, and many industries and organizations have experienced a significant shift in how products are done and processes are executed. Sustainability can be divided into three areas; societal, economical, and environmental. With digital transformation, achieving sustainable changes in all three areas is possible.

Governments are pushing for more green solutions, and the EU has established the Green Deal initiative to try and push all partnering countries for more sustainable solutions. For the public sector, the first step towards a greener future is to transform existing solutions into digital ones wherever possible to reduce the amount of resources needed to offer the service, as well as reduce energy waste that accompanies the traveling to on-site locations. According to a study by OECD, public administrations are not exempted from this shift.

The changes in services can be a complete digital transformation, replacing most or all human interactions with digital counterparts or reforming existing digital solutions by improving or completely changing existing digital services. While the complete transformation will more likely bring more significant benefits, reformation is a substantial possibility that should not be forgotten, as even minor positive changes matter.

Modernizing public services utilizing disruptive technologies makes it possible to promote future-oriented and more efficient services that lead to more sustainable solutions and foster innovation. With the current technological landscape, using artificial intelligence seems to be the solution for the future and the more sustainable change in digital transformation.

In this paper, we explore how a modern electronic identification solution utilizing disruptive technologies could lead to positive changes through the lenses of the three sustainability areas, using the example of six case studies conducted in a 3-year research project financed under Horizon 2020 called IMPULSE (Identity Management in PUblic SErvices). The case studies will provide results regarding the sustainability changes in their respective areas, and together, the case studies will provide generalizable outcomes that can be disseminated. Some case studies will undergo a complete digital transformation, while others will reform their digital solution landscape.

As indicated by the preliminary results, a technological solution based on disruptive technologies has the potential to lead to more significant positive, sustainable changes. However, the drawback of utilizing disruptive technologies is that the citizens will have more doubts and require more convincing to accept and adopt the new solution. In the case of complete digital transformation, the benefits and positive changes are apparent and outweigh most of the potential drawbacks, but when going through digital reformation, the benefits need to be examined in more detail as depending on the sociocultural aspects, the change may not be as positive as envisaged and would call for more actions.

At the intersection of digital and green transitions within urban landscapes, innovation policy emerges as a pivotal and guiding force. This study explores the role and capacities of public administration in steering green and digital development pathways, focusing on Finland's Six City Strategy (6CS). The strategy aimed to tackle environmental and societal challenges while propelling economic growth through digitalization and smart city initiatives. Through an analysis of the Strategy, designed to foster collaboration and innovation, and by utilizing diverse data sources including interviews, surveys, and documents, this study reveals that public administrative bodies can undertake more active roles in facilitating transformative change, transcending their traditional enabling functions. This involves establishing clear directions, creating collaboration platforms, coordinating across policy sectors and levels, and devising new evaluation systems. Nevertheless, achieving lasting change posed challenges, with these activities often confined to project-based endeavours and excluding non-project personnel. The study underscores the significance of bolstering the competencies of public administration personnel to effectively propel green and digital development pathways.

There is a growing consensus among academics that the normative turn in innovation policy - i.e. toward more directed (Bergek et al. 2023), mission-oriented (Mazzucato 2018), or transformative innovation policy (Schot and Steinmueller 2018; Diercks et al. 2019) - requires also significant rethinking of public sector policy and administrative capacities (e.g. Mazzucato and Kattel 2018). There seems to also be a broader consensus among (innovation) policy scholars that collaborative, iterative, co-creative and experimental forms of governance, policy-making and policy delivery are superior to more traditional forms to achieve the transformative goals, such as tackling climate change (e.g. Karo and Kattel 2018a; McClaren and Kattel 2022; Sabel and Victor 2022; Trischler et al. 2022). Public administration scholars, entering these debates, have conceptualized this as the need for transformative government substituting constitutional and discretionary traditions with more collaborative principles (Braams et al. 2021).

Yet, the current framing of this consensus is only emerging and reminds us of the old “Moon and the Ghetto” insights by Richard Nelson (1977) regarding our limited knowledge and capacities to tackle emergent complex challenges based on our existing/legacy knowledge silos (i.e. finance, policy, technology). Indeed, we argue that we seem to be at the midst of a necessary epistemic turn in innovation policy governance to support the broadly legitimate normative turn. Co-creation, design thinking, experimentation and other concepts around governing transformative innovation processes have one common trait - delegation of expertise to open-ended participatory processes - which reflects our profound uncertainties and ongoing search regarding the right (governance) path forward.

All of these conceptual approaches for improving policy interventions tend to assume that once better policy interventions are co-created or co-discovered jointly by a diverse set of actors, implementation and delivery become the easier task as these solutions should be based on more legitimate grounds and lead to much easier necessary changes in delivery and implementation practices. But this can be a dangerous simplification by scholars and policy communities - public sector organizations and processes are characterized by path dependencies, legacies, and routine lock-ins, especially if the policy feedback loops are punctuated and complex (Karo and Kattel, 2018b).

In this paper, we are explicitly interested in a ‘realist’ perspective on delivering the normative turn of innovation policy. We ask conceptually - through literature review and merging of innovation policy and public administration debates - what it takes from governments, in terms of rethinking policy and administrative processes and capacities, to deliver the desired normative turn in innovation policy. We argue that the choice of appropriate methods for the necessary co-creative search and selection of appropriate policy mixes depends on problem-context-method fit, i.e. new innovation policy models and specific methods and interventions need to fit the types of problems and overarching context of policy and administrative cultures or traditions.

Based on the conceptual discussions and framework, we explore empirically - through stylized case studies of current policy initiatives and related governance shifts from different EU member states with recognized mission-oriented policies, i.e. Sweden, Netherlands, Germany - how potentially new paradigms of governing transformative innovation policies are emerging (or not) as a co-evolution of historical innovation governance legacies, politico-administrative traditions, EU’s experimentalist approach to missions attempting to trigger also new direction on national and regional levels, and novel (co-creative) approaches to designing and delivering transformative innovation policies.