Citizen-Centric Governance: Enhancing Citizen Engagement through Artificial Intelligence Tools

Abstract

The public sector presents important steps for digital transformation. Digital transformation uses a series of tools and methods to improve the relationship with citizens and improve benefits. This paper explores the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in governance processes and provides public institutions with insight regarding the impact of integrating chatbot communication tools when interacting with citizens. The present research provides an analysis of the socio-economic factors that determine the use of artificial intelligence tools, i.e., the propensity to interact more with the public administration as a result of improved communication through virtual assistants, and highlights the implications of AI in improving services towards civil society by determining the degree of satisfaction on aspects such as reduced waiting times in queues, access to information regardless of the traditional working hours of civil servants, quicker execution of operations, et al. The results, derived from an analysis of 507 sets of responses obtained from an online questionnaire, indicate that a number of variables, such as residential environment, employment status, household income and education level, significantly impact the effectiveness of artificial intelligence in mediating citizen communication with government.