National e-government performance and citizen satisfaction: a multilevel analysis across European countries

Abstract

Are citizens more satisfied with e-government ranked higher in league tables? In this article, we empirically examine the relationship between objective e-government performance on the supply side and the perceptions of citizens on the demand side. A multilevel analysis of over 28,000 respondents across 32 European countries reveals that highly ranked e-government is warmly welcomed by citizens, suggesting that the supply and demand sides of e-government are, in part, consistent. Specifically, the e-government performance–satisfaction correlations in e-service and e-participation are more prominent than that of e-information. The results also show that citizens’ perceived e-government benefits are mainly from using online services. While e-government rankings are reasonably predictive of citizen satisfaction, they should be referred to with caveats in e-government policies. Points for practitioners The empirical findings reveal that objective e-government performance is partially congruent with citizens’ satisfaction and perceived benefits. While e-government rankings may not be good predictors of citizen use, they do coincide, in part, with citizen satisfaction. Ubiquitous e-government benchmarks can be referred to as reliable gauges of citizen satisfaction, though their susceptibility varies across the purposes of e-government use. The various benefits that citizens perceived from e-government are primarily derived through online services instead of electronic information or participation, and the government should pay more attention to e-service development in order to bring more benefits to its users.