Using the Linked Data Approach in European e-Government Systems

Abstract

This article describes the Linked Data approach, based on principles defined back in 2006, which can play an important role in the domain of semantic interoperabiity of government services. Therefore, this article explores the technical aspects and challenges of implementation of the revised European Directive on the Public Sector Information (2013/37/EU) that provides a common legal framework for a European market for government-held data (public sector information). It examines how the Linked Data approach facilitates the PSI Directive implementation, and in particular, the maturity of standards and tools for statistical Linked Data processing. The statistical domain has been selected due to its relevance for policy prediction, planning and adjustments, and well as its significant impact on the society, from citizens to businesses to governments. The main contributions are related to the delivered state-of-the-art open-source tools for the managing statistical Linked Data and metadata—quality assessment, exploration—and the recommendations that have been integrated in the EU SHARE-PSI Best Practices collection.