Government 2.0 is a label whose convenience should not detract from the significance of the changes it implies. It heralds a sustained process of innovation that will change the way we govern. 

It's easy, given its origins in the world of technical and social networking, to get the impression that the ideas and potential changes with which it is associated are (a) largely the domain of super geeks and (b) ephemeral, easily dismissed as niche or even perhaps a passing fad.

As the essays in this collection demonstrate, nothing could be further from the truth. 

The ideas, examples and advice they present are increasingly the engine for a larger endeavour that is creating new ways to govern, lifting our chances of solving the big dilemmas, and making the most of the big opportunities, with which we are faced. We will find ourselves, in the process, ‘rebooting' government and ‘upgrading' democracy and, as a consequence, refreshing our public culture with new sources of trust and legitimacy.  

The essays here touch on pretty much every dimension of this venture. 

There are technologies to learn and infrastructure to build. There are new behaviours to absorb and some old behaviours to discard. There are large and demanding agendas of institutional, organisational and administrative change to be conceived, to be designed and then patiently to be lead and sustained, often in turbulent and unpredictable conditions. It's a project that has to be prosecuted at every level - political, intellectual, moral, technological, professional, administrative and organisational - pretty much at the same time. 

But at its heart, the Government 2.0 venture is a project whose success is going to depend on changes that will be, in many cases, emotionally confronting. They will challenge much of the received wisdom about what it is to be a good public servant, how to be a successful and effective politician and Minister and, just as importantly, how to be an engaged and effective citizen. They will ask interesting questions about civil society and about our collective capacity to accelerate the velocity of innovation in our policy and governance processes. And they will pose demanding questions too about the definition and distribution of power, authority and control, offering some exciting but unsettling answers at times. They will introduce new dilemmas about accountability and performance.

Embarking on these changes is an imperative about which we don't seem to have much choice. 

The range and complexity of the tangled challenges that crowd the policy agenda are putting existing institutions and aspects of their associated culture and business processes under severe stress. We're beginning to learn that we can't afford to leave any source of insight, innovation and invention out of the mix, either within or outside government. Social technologies of communication and collaboration will increasingly create new tools and platforms that will render our public governance and policy models both more expert and more democratic. They will be enabled and often accelerated by renewed instincts, and a range of new practical methods, for openness, participation and transparency.

But perhaps the most exciting dimension of these remarkable and sometimes uncomfortable challenges is the opportunity they offer for Australia to reinforce and, in some cases to recapture its reputation as a world leader in public innovation. A bit of leadership and imagination coupled with the kind of invention and solid, practical advice captured in the essays presented here, will give us a good chance to turn that ambition to reality.