Announcements
Prof. Yannis Charalabidis and Assoc. Prof. Charalampos Alexopoulos Inaugurate…
The International Summer School on Digital Government (OpenGov 2026) officially commenced on the island of Samos, gathering international researchers, practitioners, and students to explore the transformative impact of Artificial Intelligence on public governance.
The academic program was inaugurated by Prof. Yannis Charalabidis and Assoc. Prof. Charalampos Alexopoulos from the Information Systems Laboratory (IS-Lab), Department of Information and Communication Systems Engineering, University of the Aegean. Setting the tone for an intensive week dedicated to AI-driven public sector modernization, they outlined the core thematic tracks and officially launched the highly anticipated OpenGov 2026 Ideathon Challenge.
Key Insights on AI Conformance & Digital Governance
During the opening sessions, Prof. Yannis Charalabidis delivered a keynote lecture addressing how Artificial Intelligence can automate and reinforce legal and regulatory conformance assessment, presenting advanced methodologies to ensure public digital systems strictly adhere to regulatory frameworks, notably the EU AI Act.
The opening day featured an exceptional lineup of international keynotes and technical sessions, including:
- Prof. Joep Crompvoets (KU Leuven): Analyzing opportunities, governance readiness, and institutional realities of AI adoption in government, moving beyond technological hype.
- Dr. YoungSik Kim (United Nations University – UNU-EGOV): Examining global AI governance, institutional readiness across the Global South and the EU, and strategic lessons from South Korea’s digital modernization.
- Prof. Iraklis Varlamis (Harokopio University of Athens & GRNET): Presenting practical insights from the GR digiGOV-innoHUB initiative on scaling experimental AI pilots into production-grade public services.
- Dr. Georgia Koutrika & Eleni Petra (Athena Research Center): Demonstrating next-generation, semantic- and NLP-powered data discovery architectures for advanced public information systems.
The successful launch of OpenGov 2026 underlines the active role of IS-Lab faculty members in shaping the international digital government research agenda and fostering cross-border capacity building.
For more information on the summer school’s agenda and proceedings, visit the official OpenGov Portal or contact the laboratory at info-islab@aegean.gr.