Anna Fahlgård Lahache

Governments increasingly engineer institutional roles dedicated to support the effective digital transformation of government and its interactions with citizens. How these roles and related digital policy advocacy evolve are important aspects of digital government. Our study specifically focuses on the role of narrative work in the establishment of the Digital Minister role and related policy advocacy. We examine a case where a governmental "outsider," previously a tech activist, was brought into national government in the official capacity of Digital Minister to advance an agenda of digital transformation and transparency. Using six years of government archival data, news articles, and publicly available archival interview transcripts, we theorize how institutional actors can enact narrative work that strengthens their legitimacy through the intertwined evolution of the role and the enactment of digital policy advocacy. Implications for research and practice are discussed.