Opinion / CHRISTOPHER CERMAK
Time to catch app
Though well known for its efficiency, much of Germany’s bureaucratic life is still about paper. Having recently moved to the US, I was required to send a physical letter to my German bank to register a change of address and phone number. The US can be similarly backward: after using a digital coronavirus vaccine certificate on my phone for more than a year while living in the UK, getting my final booster shot here in the US landed me a physical card as proof instead.
Ukraine is light years ahead of Germany and the US. Mykhailo Fedorov, the country’s deputy prime minister and minister of digital transformation, was in Washington last week to unveil an app called Diia, which has been providing Ukrainians with all manner of public services on their smartphone since 2019. You can use it to open bank accounts, upload a digital copy of your passport or even start a business. Since the war, it has allowed Ukrainians to report Russian troop movements and seek compensation for damage to their homes. As every request is recorded and much of it is automated, it has cut down on government corruption too.
Ukraine is making Diia’s technology open source and has already offered the code to Estonia. Here in Washington, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has partnered with Ukraine and is working with developing nations that want to create their own versions. At its flashy unveiling last week, the head of USAID, Samantha Power, joked that it would be nice to have such an app in the US. She said this with no conviction that it would happen – but is it really so hard to imagine? Has the country given up on making such improvements to how we live? The Ukrainian example (and my German experience) proves that help with bureaucratic tasks can have positive outcomes far beyond cutting down on paperwork.
Christopher Cermak is Monocle’s Washington correspondent. For more opinion, analysis and insight, subscribe to Monocle today.