A System-Engineered Approach to E-Democracy: A Small Island Mauritius

Abstract

As part of the analysis developed for the book, the question was of how might a Systems Engineering (SE) approach work in practice. As it happened, in doing background research on Mauritius and its political institutions, it emerged that Mauritius had a number of institutions that could lend themselves to implementing a SE approach. In particular, the SE feature of a Functional Configuration Item (FCI) had an analogue in the Mauritian political system, namely the National Development Unit (NDU). This presented an opportunity to use Mauritius as a type of proof of concept with which to test the possibility that a SE approach might work in Mauritius, or at least enable a rethinking of the architecture of Mauritian political institutions in a more democratic direction. This also involved conducting a series of interviews with key Mauritian politicians (across the political spectrum) and bureaucrats.