The opportunity for this visionary strategy to be effective was in part a result of the current political and institutional context. The political context for initiating and sustaining the Merkava project is a complex one of continuity and change, due in large part to the Government’s structure as a parliamentary democracy. Unlike the two- or three-party political structure of the US or UK, Israel has a multi-party system. The current Knesset (legislature), for example, includes members from 12 parties. It is unusual, therefore, for a single party to gain a majority of seats and form a single-party government. The resulting coalition governments are often unstable; the current government, elected in May, 2006, is the 31st since the formation of the state of Israel in 1948.

As with any long term project, the Merkava vision was at some risk due to changes in the government and political environment. The beginnings of the project date from the 1999 election that brought in a new government led by Ehud Barak as Prime Minister. He formed a seven-party coalition government, led by his Labor party, that took office in July of that year and appointed Nir Gilad as Accountant General. That government could not sustain the project, however, since the coalition did not hold, and Barak resigned in December of 2000. For the project to continue it would need the support of the new government formed by Ariel Sharon in early 2001, and a new Finance Minister, Silvan Shalom. Accountants General do not necessarily change with a new government, so Gilad continued in office and advocated for the ERP project.

The development team soon came to realize the scope and complexity of the project. They realized that strong support from the government would be necessary to achieve the changes on the scale necessary to implement an ERP. The head of the team, Yitshak Cohen, Senior Deputy Accountant General recognized the difficulty. “This was a Parliamentary decision. It’s very difficult; it’s an organizational project; it affects all the employees in the government. It’s the heart of the organization,” he said. Prime Minister Sharon was persuaded to support the project and the parliament approved it in late 2002. That government has remained in power, with Ministerial changes, through to the present. Sharon stood for election in 2003 and was re-elected, but was disabled by a massive stroke in January 2006. The then Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert took over executive duties and was elected Prime Minister in May, 2006. Thus the Merkava initiative, begun through a change of government, survived three subsequent changes and the departure of the Accountant General who helped start it. More than five years later it continues with broad political support. When Cohen was asked how Israel was able to achieve such a massive reform of government, he replied, “We’re small, we have a bureaucratic dictatorship, and we have chutzpah.”

Sustaining the project was made possible in part by consistency in key staff positions and in multi-year planning. Despite the changes in governments, there has been more permanent participation and leadership in the initiative by professional staff as key players. As in any parliamentary system, with elected and usually temporary officials at the top, organizational continuity in ministries often depends on senior staff or contractors less affected by political shifts. For the Merkava project, the key persons in these roles have been Yitshak Cohen and Ronny Jacobowitz, a contractor who has had a major role in the project from the beginning. At the time, as head of the computer unit in the Accountant General’s office, Cohen began work on elements of the e-government initiative in 1997, with the nomination of the governmental Internet committee and the initiation of the “Tehila” (connectivity layer) project. In 2002, the master plan was created and a government decision was made to allocate resources for the e-government services. The continuity has been sustained by these multi-year plans and statutory commitments. The Merkava project has been part of the 2003-05 and the 2005-07 strategic plans.

Formal plans and staff continuity, while important, are not sufficient to move such a broad and ambitious project forward. That requires political leverage within the organization. Political leverage is part of the institutional structure that puts the Ministry of Finance and the Accountant General in charge of agency budgets. With the authority of that office guiding the development and implementation of Merkava, there were powerful incentives for agencies to cooperate. As Nir Gilad put it, “Nobody wants to mess with the Accountant General; he’s too powerful …. Not only does he have the power to make the decision, he has the power to enforce it.” Of course, no one office has absolute power over budget decisions, and some ministries are larger and have more overall political status than others. The necessity to accommodate the needs of various agencies is reflected in some of the implementation strategies described in more detail below.

Of course the unique political and cultural position of Israel in the Middle East and world context are important parts of the institutional setting, as well. The changes in government described above were intimately linked to the Peace Process, according to news reports, and to the complex, ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian and Arab interests in the region. As important as these conflicts may be in the overall political dynamic in Israel, however, direct influences on the design and implementation of the Merkava and the e-government initiatives were not apparent.