E-government Strategy Research Articles

The impact of adopting e-government as a mechanism to enhance accountability as well as transparent conduct within public institutions

<em>This study examines the impact of adopting e-government as a mechanism to enhance accountability as well as transparent conduct within public institutions in Zimbabwe. There is a belief that e-government brings about better change in governance issues through active disclosure of governance information. The research found out that e-government in Zimbabwe though still being nurtured, has better prospects and there is great need for clearly setting and meeting a conducive environment for it to flourish. That is a set of pre-requirements need to be assessed before trying to implement e-government into full swing. Zimbabwe lacks an unanimous e-government strategy across its ministries hence the existence of disparities in e-government adoption within the country – some ministries are more advanced while others only exhibit the first initial stages of e-government. However, the adoption of e-government in Zimbabwe has been hampered by a plethora of challenges ranging from politics, economics, social and technological. Among them include inadequate or weak legislative frameworks guiding and directing e-government implementation, budget constraints, digital divide as well as technological incompetence. The study also makes some recommendations as to how e-government prospects can be fully attained and such remedies among others include the passing of a comprehensive IT policy which cut across all government ministries, embracing Public Private Partnerships in building IT infrastructure, and redefining government’s top priorities and focus much on e-government investment. The paper also notes the effects of poor governance to a country. Zimbabwe’s e-government strategy if managed properly, would also reduce government external debt, improve service delivery, promote economic development, and increase public accountability and transparency within the public sector.</em>

IT assets, IT infrastructure performance and IT capability: a framework for e-government

PurposeAlthough government investments in IT is growing, it is unclear how and what kind of IT investments lead to desirable E-Government performance. Several studies pertaining to the business value of IT have developed and tested frameworks for IT infrastructure, IT capability and business performance. However, E-Government-related IT investment outcomes cannot be measured by profits and hence requires a separate investigation. E-Government research using theoretical approach has been reported as very scarce in previous studies. This research aims to bridge the gap by developing a model to study IT infrastructure capability and E-Government performance in the emerging context of new IT service delivery models.Design/methodology/approachThis paper follows a case study method in this research witha prioriconceptual framework. The data were collected following an interview method used for deductive theory building.FindingsThe results identified a positive relationship between IT assets and IT infrastructure performance in the presence of service delivery channels and an anticipation of a positive influence of infrastructure performance variables on IT capability which in turn shows positive effect on E-Government performance.Research limitations/implicationsBecause the study followed a qualitative approach, the findings from this study are not useful for statistical generalization. However, the analytical framework provides sufficient ground to test E-Government performance.Practical implicationsThe study provides insights in the choice of IT infrastructure elements fitting an E-Government strategy.Social implicationsThis study provides an integrated framework for measuring E-Government performance, thereby making deployment of IT infrastructure accountable both in terms of IT performance and IT capability. This in turn will lead to improvement in citizen services.Originality/valueThis paper builds on the existing literature on IT assets, IT infrastructure performance, IT infrastructure capability and applies to the E-Government domain.

Governance Models for the Delivery of Public Services Through the Web 2.0 Technologies

The growing participation in social networking sites is altering the nature of social relations and changing the nature of political and public dialogue. This article contributes to the current debate on Web 2.0 technologies and their implications for local governance through the identification of governance models to be adopted by local governments if Web 2.0 technologies are implemented for providing public services. Also, this article analyzes whether the political competition could be an attribute that could explain the governance models to be adopted by municipalities. To achieve this aim, an e-survey during the period of May–July 2014 has been performed by policy makers responsible of strategies for e-government in Spanish municipalities. Findings indicate that policy makers are mainly prone to implement Web 2.0 technologies under the “Bureaucratic Model” framework, keeping the leading role in this implementation. Nonetheless, political competition seems to be essential to understand the findings of this article. Thus, majority governments are prone to implement collaborative models of governance, whereas minority governments are in favor to implement noncollaborative models of governance.

E-Government Information Systems Interoperability in Developing Countries

Objective: This study examines the factors that influence information system (IS) interoperability of e-Government focusing on IS Interoperability as the key concept to reach successful e-Government implementation in Jordan.
 Methodology: Use of qualitative methods of inquiry has been made to explore study variables and their relationships. A variety of published literatures related to scope of the study has been reviewed along with analyzing the e-Government strategy in Jordan during period 2014-2016. The interoperability levels of e-Government IS have been discussed in this paper. Finally, significant barriers that affect IS interoperability have been identified along with the factors that can drive it successful implementation.
 Findings: Technical, semantic, and organizational interoperability are main stages for successful e-Government IS interoperability. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure, top management support, human resources, data and information, security and privacy, and business process have been found as the major obstacles. Whereas, high level interoperability goals, commitment of government bodies, and customer focus have been identified as main success factors that lead to e-Government IS interoperability. The study suggests that strategies and work process should be aligned, common standards and knowledge should be shared to move towards e-transformation in Jordan.
 Implications: This study can be starting point for the real life practical solutions for successful implementation of e-Government conceptual frame work. Finding of the study can be used to generalize about the factors that lead to success of IS interoperability within government agencies in other developing countries. This study enriches existing literature in this context. On practical side, the study contributes by identifying IS interoperability success factors and barriers within government agencies. The proposed conceptual model is first stage in the process of understanding factors that influence e-Government IS interoperability. Further studies may be needed to empirically evaluate the proposed conceptual model.

E-government adoption and user’s satisfaction: an empirical investigation

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships among e-government attributes in terms of social influence, perceived effectiveness, system quality, and information quality user satisfaction and intention to use e-government services in United Arab Emirates (UAE). Design/methodology/approach – This study is based on previous research on e-government services, and has relied partially on Delone and Mclean’s (2004) updated IS success model and the new theoretical and accepted model (UTAUT). These models were used to examine the impact of some selected attributes of e-government on the adoption of e-government services in the UAE from the perspective of a citizen. A questionnaire survey was used to collect data from a total of 1,800 e-government users in the UAE and structural equation modeling was utilized to test the theoretical model. Findings – This study has identified five main findings. First, it provides evidence of the direct effects of e-government attributes on user satisfaction. Second, it provides evidence of the direct effects of user satisfaction on user intention to use e-government services. Third, it provides evidence of the direct effects of e-government attributes on intention to use. Fourth, it demonstrates the positive total effects (direct and indirect) of e-government attributes on the intention to use e-government services in the UAE through user satisfaction. Fifth, two attributes of e-government – system quality and information quality – have emerged as having a strong effect on the intention to use e-government services. Research limitations/implications – The research study was limited to the UAE geographical region. It would be very interesting to see if there are regional variations when compared to the findings of this research study. The target respondents for this study are internet users. Future research needs to be extended to include both users and nonusers of the internet for the purpose of comparison, and looking at the perception of a technology divide among citizens as a factor influencing citizen intention to adopt e-government services. Practical implications – This study would help policy makers understand e-government users and to implement policies at large to meet the citzens ' needs of e-government services. The results of the study and the proposed model can be used as a guideline for e-government strategy formulation and implementation for the Government of UAE. The results of the study imply that decision makers of e-government programs should take into considerations these attributes when developing e-government programs because they affect users’ satisfaction and in turn enhances users’ intentions to use e-government services and consequently increase the success of e-government strategic programs. Originality/value – This paper is one of the few studies on e-government adoption in an Arab country and the first study on e-government adoption in the UAE. The paper’s originality and value comes from its theoretical contribution as a first paper in this region to empirically test the impact of some selected variables (social influence, perceived effectiveness, system quality, and information quality) on user satisfaction and intention to adopt e-government services. In contrast to previous research, this paper selected user satisfaction as a mediated, rather than a dependent variable.

E-government services evaluation from citizen satisfaction perspective

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze and evaluate the current status of e-government services in Afghanistan. To identify the evaluation criteria based on citizen satisfaction from e-government services, the proposed government-to-citizen (G2C) evaluation model is considered in the context of Afghanistan. Design/methodology/approach A conceptual G2C evaluation model and e-government evaluation model are proposed. The criteria used for the G2C evaluation model is based on the demand and supply side, which have an immense effect on citizen satisfaction. The mixed research method (quantitative and qualitative) is used, and quantitative data analysis results are supported through qualitative data analysis. Findings The findings reveal that citizen satisfaction from e-government services in Afghanistan are affected by services availability on multiple channels, citizen-centric features, paralingual support, process performance, skills divide, awareness, information security and transaction security. Research limitations/implications Yet to be addressed, three criteria deemed as significant factors are recommended to be included in the model, namely, government readiness, system quality (usability, service quality and information quality) for supply side and social divide for demand side. These three criteria can help in proposing a successful G2C evaluation model. Additionally, the quantitative data used in this study were collected through paper-based questionnaires. Data collection through Internet can help to get responses from various parts of the country for future evaluation of G2C services. Practical implications The key findings of this study are vitally important for e-government strategies and policy makers to design and disseminate appropriate e-government services to Afghan citizens. The proposed evaluation model can also be used as a guideline for e-government development in Afghanistan. Originality/value A conceptual model for e-government services evaluation approach is proposed based on literature review. The proposed G2C evaluation model identifies and validates key factors and criteria in the context of Afghanistan.

The Austrian eID ecosystem in the public cloud: How to obtain privacy while preserving practicality

The Austrian eID system constitutes a main pillar within the Austrian e-Government strategy. The eID system ensures unique identification and secure authentication for citizens protecting access to applications where sensitive and personal data are involved. In particular, the Austrian eID system supports three main use cases: identification and authentication of Austrian citizens, electronic representation, and foreign citizen authentication at Austrian public sector applications. For supporting all these use cases, several components — either locally deployed in the applications' domain or centrally deployed — need to communicate with each other. While local deployments have some advantages in terms of scalability, still a central deployment of all involved components would be advantageous, e.g., due to less maintenance efforts. However, a central deployment can easily lead to load bottlenecks because theoretically the whole Austrian population as well as — for foreign citizens — the whole EU population could use the provided services. To mitigate the issue on scalability, in this paper we propose the migration of the main components of the ecosystem into a public cloud. However, a move of trusted services into a public cloud brings up new obstacles, particularly with respect to privacy. To bypass the issue on privacy, in this paper we propose an approach on how the complete Austrian eID ecosystem can be moved into a public cloud in a privacy-preserving manner by applying selected cryptographic technologies (in particular using proxy re-encryption and redactable signatures). Applying this approach, no sensitive data will be disclosed to a public cloud provider by still supporting all three main eID system use cases. We finally discuss our approach based on selected criteria.

The Dilemma of Public E-procurement in Costa Rica: Case on the Duality of Technological Platforms and Implementation Models

Due to its characteristics, size and impact, e-procurement has a strategic importance for public administration, since its implementation necessarily crosses many institutional barriers and paradigms of many public managers. Many nations around the world are developing or revamping their National Public e-Procurement Systems. E-procurement brings a set of new rules and dynamics that create ways of doing business with the State in a totally different fashion, with a whole new and bigger set of participants, new incentives and a radically different cost structure. This case describes the experience of Costa Rica in implementing two different approaches for national e-procurement and the implications for public policy, e-government strategy and business development. Costa Rica has become an interesting laboratory for the world, since both approaches are coexisting and operating separately. Nevertheless, the country seeks to maintain a single e-procurement platform. The choice of either one of the platforms will bring serious organizational, economic, technological and political consequences for the government. We used multiple data collection methods. The data were collected from 2009 to 2012 from primary sources, studies, consulting work, official documents and the written press. Lessons drawn can be extended to other e-government ventures.

The Introduction of e-Government in Korea : Development Journey, Outcomes and Future

The Korean e-Government began with the e-Government portal site (www.egov.go.kr) on November 1, 2002. After going through continuous efforts in e-Government and national informatization, Korea has become one of the global e-Government leaders - obtaining the highest scores in ‘E-government Development Index’ and ‘E-participation Index’. In addition, many of Korea’s e-Government practices until now have been introduced to the world as the best cases and received worldwide acknowledgement.The success factors of Korean e-Government are summarized as a strong political leadership, clear vision and policy objective, project’s strategic priority and human & financial resource distribution. The future e-Government is being developed towards seamless and consolidated services, based on the e-Government projects that have been promoted so far. The new e-Government strategies will be taken into account from various perspectives, especially in terms of strategy, e-Government services, citizens’ eparticipation and strengthened infrastructure for e-Government. The Korean e-Government is now progressing, however, it still has a long way to go to reach full interactive service delivery and government integration.

The efficiency of freedom: Single parents' domestication of mandatory e-government channels

The Danish e-government strategy aims to increase the efficiency of public sector administration by making e-government channels mandatory for citizens by 2015. Although Danish citizens have adopted e-government channels to interact with public authorities, many also keep using traditional channels. Previous studies have analyzed citizens' channel choice in non-mandatory settings, and mostly surrounding a single isolated channel. To cover these gaps we present a mixed method study of citizens' actual use of e-government channels using domestication theory as our framework. Our findings indicate that e-government and traditional channels are often used simultaneously, and citizens' perceptions and previous histories with public authorities influence channel choice. Further, citizens' existing routines related to third-party non-official channels also influence their interaction with public authorities. Moreover, we find a series of unmet needs which leads to information requests on traditional channels concerning online transactions. Based on the study we offer recommendations to practitioners to increase the use of e-government channels and reduce traffic on traditional channels.

Proactive e-Governance: Flipping the service delivery model from pull to push in Taiwan

Governments are well on their way to realizing many of the efficiency gains and administrative improvements promised by traditional e-government. Leveraging this mature infrastructure, Taiwan and other leading implementers have begun to explore ways to harness IT innovations beyond efficiency to also alter how government delivers services and solves public problems. Accordingly, Taiwan's fourth e-government strategy includes a notable commitment to “proactive” service and information delivery. The aim is to flip the service delivery model by shifting from the “pull” approach of traditional e-government—whereby the citizen must seek out government services—towards a “push” model, whereby government proactively and seamlessly delivers just-in-time services to citizens shaped around their individual needs, preferences, circumstance, and location. The article explores Taiwan's implementation of this new approach through three case studies. From this, the authors extract common trends and characteristics to articulate a consolidated framework for Proactive e-Governance based on citizen-centricity, data-driven personalization, and the empowerment of frontline civil servants. The article concludes with a discussion on the importance of shared global learning as leading e-governments simultaneously seek to uncover new models for governance in the 21st century.

-government Strategic Plan Implementation in Tanzania: Learning from Challenges and Experiences from Kenya, Korea, India and Malaysia

For the past two years, the implementation of e-government strategic plan in Tanzania has been in a mixed approach resulting from lack of conceptual understanding: firstly, is the lack of a conceptual framework as a baseline for e-government strategic plan implementation. Secondly, is the mixture of understanding the two concepts, the institutional accountability and institutional ownership. The failure to understand these two concepts obscures the institutional process efforts to implement the e-government strategic plan. The study pointed out that such complexities continue to disrupt the institutional efforts in dealing with competing conflicts of interest, corruptions and delays between institutions process, resources and the enhancement of guidelines factors. Thirdly, is the idea that the implementation of the e-government strategic plan can be explained in view of mono-tasking; in a sense that tasks of developing the e-government strategic plan focusing on the guidelines, the institutional process, and enhancing the resource factors are reduced into a single task. In additional, the failure of e-government strategic plan was regarded as a linear timeline factor: for instance, there is a persisting lack of guidelines, resources and institutional process framework in the development of the specific sectorial guidelines. The aim of this research is twofold: First, is to identify factors that affect the successful implementation of the e-government strategic plan. Second is to suggest a conceptual framework for implementing the e-government strategic plan in the context of Tanzania. To do so, the current study examines these factors using a descriptive cases drawn from four countries: Kenya, Korea, Malaysia, and India. The study analyzed different models from these cited countries and suggests a spectacular method on how the e-government conceptual framework can be established within their effort of achieving the e-government strategic plan. The study concluded that a conflict of interest, IT/e-government system ownership and accountability, within the institutions and the private sector were the stumbling block to forward the implementation of the e-government strategy plan. For the success of implementing the e-government strategic plan more efficiently therefore, ties with guidelines, resources and institutional process that should be monitored by e-government task force to eliminate barriers and forge ahead to results oriented. The proposed conceptual framework is inevitable to address the problems that a parasite to the implementation of the e-government strategic plan in Tanzania.

Revisiting the Technological and Non-Technological Challenges to Municipal E-Government in Spain

In the past decade, society and technology have made remarkable progress in the realm of the digital economy. Public administrations, in their double role as part and servant of society, must keep up with this progress, but this development does not happen without its difficulties. This paper aims to explore whether the transformation of local e-government environment has made a significant impact in the way municipalities face their challenges when implementing an e-government strategy. To do so, a longitudinal research was conducted to explore any changes within the perceived value of challenges to municipal egovernment initiatives over the past 8 years by local Chief Information Officers in Spain. This theoretical and empirical research contributes to the ongoing discussion on the varying role of technology as an explicit hindrance and as base for other challenges, and the impact of other non ICT-driven challenges for e-government. It also proposes a set of managerial implications to help overcoming said challenges based on the knowledge of local government experts in a contingent manner. The paper’s results establish the significant and persistent effect of political interference in local e-government success in Spain, asserting that they are mostly non ICT-driven challenges that are viewed as significantly bigger obstacles today.

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English

A study of issues about Accredited Certification methods in Korea

In line with the e-Government strategy, Korea has implemented a global standard electronic signature and certification system since the Electronic Signature Act was enacted by Act No. 5792 in 1999. Over a decade Korea has been using the electronic signature and certification system in daily life. In the cyberspace where the contracting parties cannot meet face to face, electronic signatures and authentication are inevitable. On the other hand, with the explosive use of smart devices, some critics argue that the current certified electronic signature is regarded as uncomfortable system in electronic commerce. They also point out that such certified electronic signature system is not commonly used in foreign countries. Yet, so far, the accredited certificate is still the most reliable method even though the usage of accredited certificates presumably decreases in the areas that do not require security significantly. Thus, it must be unwise to discard the accredited electronic signature on account of an “unnecessary obstacle”. Therefore, legal and technical issues regarding the accredited certificate need to be discussed. Additionally, methods to promote certified electronic signature and to improve certification system should be explored.

Design strategies for a privacy-friendly Austrian eID system in the public cloud

Secure identification and authentication are essential processes in sensitive areas of application such as e-Government or e-Health. In Austria, the official eID is the so called the Austrian citizen card and a means of choice for secure citizen identification and authentication. To facilitate the adoption of citizen card authentication at service providers within the Austrian e-Government strategy, the open source module MOA-ID has been developed. It acts as identity provider for different service providers and manages identification and authentication based on the Austrian citizen card. Currently, MOA-ID is deployed locally in every service provider's domain and is assumed to be fully trusted. With the increasing use of eIDs, however, a move into a public cloud might be advantageous due to benefits provided cloud computing, e.g., cost savings or scalability. Nevertheless, the move of a trusted service into the public cloud brings up new obstacles, in particular with respect to security and privacy. Therefore, in this paper we introduce and evaluate three different approaches on how the Austrian eID system based on MOA-ID could be securely moved into the cloud without violating any privacy or data protection aspects. To achieve this, we rely on various cryptographic methods and focus on minimum changes of the current identification and authentication process flow. Based on an evaluation of these three different approaches, we propose a model which can be generically used for eID identification and authentication in privacy-invasive environments such as the public cloud.

How e-Government managers prioritise rival value positions: The efficiency imperative

E-Government strategies, investments, project selection, and implementations are influenced by value positions deeply enshrined in the traditions of public administration, which are in turn reflected in the everyday discourse of public managers. We analyse value traditions in the public administrat ion literature and their adaptation for e-Government and synthesise three prominent positions. Administrative efficiency focuses on cost-effectiveness logics highlighted by New Public Management thinking. Service improvement, derived from the tradition of public service, emphasises the provision of better services for citizens. Citizen engagement, with its roots in liberal democracy arguments, promotes responsiveness, consultation, collaboration and participation. A set of foundational values grounded in the deeply rooted bureaucratic tradition is also distinguished. A qualitative survey of Danish local authority managers' value positions shows a heavy bias towards administrative efficiency and an absence of concern for citizen engagement. The implications of this efficiency imperative are discussed.

State of The Art in Adoption of E-Health Services in Italy in The Context of European Union E-Government Strategies

Abstract This case study analyses to what extent the shift to e-government required by the latest EU strategies is changing public service delivery in health services. The following details present an overview of the consequences that e-government technologies, embedded in European governments’ strategies, have on public service delivery at a practical stage. The research draws upon an in depth study of the e-government strategies of the European Union and Italy, with regard to deployment and adoption of eHealth applications, and with a look at infrastructure implementation aspects and at organizational and legal issues. We aim at assessing the extent of the shift to eHealth technologies in the declared strategies of the analyzed country, and at ascertaining alignment among declared strategies and actual practices put in place to foster public health and well-being in Italy.

E-Government Strategy and Plans in Jordan

Life is being developed every day in all of the life aspects. One of the major developing aspects is information technology (IT), and communication technology which makes life easier, faster, and more connected. ICT is evolving fast in Jordan and offering the government to deliver multiple delivery services with different characteristics among E-government services. The Jordanian government has invested heavily in E-government initiatives for the last 10 years to transform from traditional service delivery to more effective and efficient service to deliver high-quality customer-centric and performance-driven services to E-government stakeholders. However the global rank of E-government readiness as well as regional rank of Jordan is still in low rank according to the global countries but it is still quite according to the Arab countries. This research provides a trend analysis to find the trends (positive or negative) in the UN E-government indicators in Jordan and provides an overview to the E-government in Jordan where the researchers analyze the development of E-government in Jordan by introducing a general framework for the E-government through discussing the past, present status and the future plans for E-government in Jordan to get better service to their recipients and to improve overall progress of Jordan achievements compared with regional and global countries.

La estrategia de gobierno en línea: ¿un mecanismo efectivo para la participación ciudadana en la administración de lo público?

A partir del open government, las entidades gubernamentales vienen aplicando estrategias como la de gobierno en línea para recuperar legitimidad y mejorar la calidad del servicio público, garantizando la participación fácil y efectiva de la población; sin embargo, estas estrategias parecen tener un bajo impacto por restricciones de parte de la ciudadanía en el uso estos nuevos mecanismos. De ahí la necesidad de determinar cuáles son las posibles limitaciones que disminuyen el impacto de la implementación de la estrategia de gobierno en línea como instrumento de participación ciudadana, propósito para el que se hizo seguimiento, durante los últimos dos años, a diez entidades territoriales del departamento de Cundinamarca que vienen empleando la estrategia. Los resultados preliminares demuestran que pese a la disposición de canales de interacción por parte de las administraciones municipales, la participación de la población en los asuntos locales sigue siendo bastante precaria, haciéndose evidente la necesidad de empoderamiento previo de la ciudadanía, más aún cuando median mecanismos novedosos que implican mayores niveles de aprendizaje y comprensión