Foreword
How’s Life in the Digital Age? is the first topical report in the new How’s Life? monograph series. How’s Life? is the flagship publication of the OECD Better Life Initiative, which aims to promote “Better Policies for Better Lives”, in line with the OECD’s overarching mission. While the main How’s Life? report is released every two years, a series of shorter monographs focusing on specific issues will now be published on a regular basis. How’s Life in the Digital Age? documents how the ongoing digital transformation is affecting people’s lives, based on the multi-dimensional framework used in How’s Life? to monitor progress in the key dimensions of people’s well-being. This report is also an input to the OECD Going Digital Initiative, which aims to describe the many facets of the digital transformation throughout a series of publications.
The report was prepared by the Household Statistics and Progress Measurement Division of the OECD Statistics and Data Directorate, with contributions from the Reform of the Public Sector Division in the Public Governance Directorate (Chapter 2). The lead author of the report was Vincent Siegerink, with contributions from Fabrice Murtin who also led the project. Marco Mira d’Ercole and Martine Durand supervised the project. Anil Alpman, Benoît Arnaud, Christopher Jacobi, Christine Le Thi, Michal Shinwell, Laura Springare, Barbara Ubaldi, Joao Vasconcelos, Benjamin Welby are gratefully acknowledged for their contributions to the analysis. Anne-Lise Faron prepared the book for publication.
We are grateful to many colleagues around the OECD for their help, comments and insights, either on the draft text or on specific issues. This list includes, but is not limited to: Shardul Agrawala, Tracey Burns, Stijn Broecke, Duncan Cass-Beggs, Alessandra Colecchia, Paolo Falco, David Gierten, Stéphanie Jamet, Daniel Ker, Molly Lesher, Dirk Pilat, Glenda Quintini, Luke Slawomirski, Mariagraza Squicciarini, Peter Van De Ven, Andrew Wyckoff and Jorrit Zwijnenburg. The report benefited from in-depth discussions with Peter Gluckman, Kristann Allen and members of the International Network for Government Science Advice (INGSA), which are gratefully acknowledged.