Mass e-mail campaigns are the organizational tool of choice for environmental activists seeking to inform and mobilize their constituencies. Some democratic theorists and reformers pin their hopes for more responsive and informed government policy on Internet-enhanced dialogue and debate. Electronic advocacy campaigns and action alerts are changing the nature and scope of public deliberation in contentious federal rulemaking. This paper examines the new digital landscape of electronic rulemaking through a case study of the recent mercury rulemaking at the US Environmental Protection Agency. Results are presented from an effort to code a sample of 1,000 e-mails selected at random from a dataset of approximately half a million. Particular attention is paid to the unique additions made to form letters.
This research develops a methodology to examine the usability of the Websites of the most populous counties in the United States. It establishes that there are variables that enhance users' abilities to benefit from e-government along six dimensions (online services, user-help, navigation, legitimacy, information architecture, and accessibility accommodations). Benchmarks are derived using a composite usability index through online content analysis. Descriptive statistics characterize variations among counties while addressing a gap in the local government literature about e-government. The research supports establishment of county Website usability benchmarks and speculates on the implications of such benchmarks for improved public management practice.
A critical element of the overarching realm of e-government is the appropriate delivery of government services over the Internet. To date, guidance for government service design has been based on usability and, lately, security issues of the new medium and simple demography-based segmentation approaches aimed at structuring the presentation of government to its constituents. This paper introduces a novel market segmentation approach that allows e-government service designers to prioritise and target online services at individual constituents in a way that is expected to increase adoption of online government services. The segmentation approach and the characteristics of the segments that result are described within the broader context of e-government in Australia. After describing the segmentation, four key issues impeding e-government implementation in Australia are discussed with insights into priorities developed from the segmentation. The paper concludes with a summary of ongoing research in the area that this paper introduces.
E-mail provides many benefits to local elected officials, but its usefulness is limited by certain problems and concerns. Using a survey of 184 elected city and county representatives, this paper discusses the main issues identified by local officials as areas where improvement is desired in e-mail communication. ‘Spam’ is the most frequently cited problem. Complaints also arise regarding the volume, content, clarity, and tone of e-mail correspondence. Concerns about e-mail privacy, ‘public record,’ and open meetings limit e-mail communication. Substantive limitations and procedural constraints may present more formidable obstacles than technological shortcomings.
This paper analyzes current e-government trends in Latin America and the Caribbean and discusses the challenges and opportunities of using new technologies as a tool to transform the public sector, enhance democratic governance, and prepare countries to compete in the networked, knowledge-intensive and fast-paced global economy. Among key findings, the region is falling behind others in government readiness and usage. Despite outstanding exceptions, e-government initiatives throughout the region have focused on front-end service transactions but little on process innovation and institutional transformation. This paper discusses the key policy challenges to progress. It points out that e-government is essentially a political, not a technical project. Recognizing the political and institutional change nature of e-government provides the key to moving e-government beyond 'window dressing' and towards realizing the transformational potential of ICTs for governance and public service performance. The paper suggests key measures to harness this potential for public sector reform, including informed and committed leadership, national consensus on ICT-enabled reforms, incentives for sustained institutional change and process innovation, ICT governance and institutional framework for interagency coordination, public-private partnership, and linking vision to implementation mechanisms, multi-year investment plans, and continuous monitoring and evaluation.
Abstract Efforts to create e-democracy do not necessarily enhance liberal democratic politics, tending instead toward illiberal polities because of the underlying technological culture of e-democracy. Technologies are not value-neutral artifacts but rather social practices in which values and meanings are central elements. The complex of values and meanings creates a culture to each technology that is implemented along with that technology. Implementing a technology thus moves society in the direction of the underlying culture of the technology. Electronic liberal democracy cannot be constructed by simply adapting Internet-based technologies as is because the underlying culture of those technologies, when implemented in specifically political practices, runs counter to the principles of liberal democracy. Three aspects of that culture in particular-that the Internet is a commodity, that direct democracy is the most preferable form of democracy, and that the Internet is an individualized public forumshape ...
The establishment of e-govemment has been an important policy goal within contemporary Singapore government. Recognizing the gains to be made by harnessing ICTs to strengthen and streamline the business of governance, Singapore has successfully developed its e-government sector across three strategic plans focusing on developing a world class e-government experience that will delight customers and connect citizens. This paper reviews the development of e-government in Singapore focusing on the outcomes of e-government strategic plans and discussing issues and outcomes associated with developing a fully mature e-government position.
In a critical endeavor, the rationalities existing in the design of public e-services are investigated using the quasi-market for education in Sweden as an example. This study explores the following questions: (1) What rationalities exist in the discourse on the design of public e-services? (2) What can be said about these rationalities from the point of view of a critical perspective on the design of public e-services in a quasi-market situation? The study shows that in the processes of design economic, service, networking as well as institutional and ideological rationalities appear. In the specific context of a quasi-market for education, public e-services might be seen as part of the emergent construction of the market adding new complexities to these rationalities.
The Hong Kong Government promulgated the 1998 Digital 21 Information Technology (IT) Strategy in November 1998. The primary focus of this strategy was to build up capabilities and infrastructure to support a thriving information economy, and to create a strong foundation for business growth and governmental service expansion in the use of IT. Hypotheses are formulated to test research concepts from Information Systems related to technology adoption. We find that managerial issues, rather than technological problems, led to the low adoption rate. Implications of our findings from a practitioner's perspectives are discussed.
This essay looks at the development of the “information society” in the People's Republic of China to attempt to discern the future of a social consensus regarding personal privacy. In particular, the essay examines the intersection of technological diffusion of Chinese society to determine the consequences of informatization on the formation of personal privacy. Although China lacks historical foundations for privacy recognition and protection, and there is still no meaningful privacy regime, the essay draws upon Lawrence Lessig's fourfold “modalities for control” to argue how these social factors (the law, market, social norms, and the architecture) interact to create new pressures and imperatives for privacy recognition and protection.
Along with the rapid diffusion of Internet connectivity in China, many commentators, politicians, and pundits have speculated about the potential of the Internet to facilitate political change and undermine the dominance of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but the CCP regime has managed to stifle most attempts to use the Internet to promote political change. The centerpiece of its strategy for limiting what it perceives as the adverse consequences of the spread of the Internet has been the construction of a system of high-tech Internet controls, which have been dubbed the “Great Firewall.” Although it remains far from impenetrable, the Great Firewall has become increasingly technologically advanced and effective. Various parties outside of China have responded by developing technologies designed to circumvent these controls. For those trying to use technology to foster change in China, however, it is not simply a question of outsmarting the censors, but also one of dealing with more fundamental obstacles to finding a workable model for using the Internet to disseminate information and facilitate change.
Electronic government initiatives in the majority of cases pass a number of different stages, starting with a static Web site and ending with fully interactive sites that are capable of handling a multitude of transactions. The possibility of transferring money online plays an important role for those e-government initiatives that include financial transactions, such as paying taxes, fees, or fines. This paper combines the issues of e-payment and e-government, and proposes a model that depicts important factors influencing users' online payment behavior. A structural equation modeling (SEM) approach has been used to assess the strength of the relationships among different constructs, including users' previous experience, their trust in e-payment security, and the perceived convenience of the payment process. Our results indicate that trust (both in a frictionless use of the system and in e-payment security) can be seen as an important antecedent for the adoption of online payments on the part of the users. From the government's point of view, the potentials of exerting influence seem to be somewhat limited: while national institutions in developed countries are usually perceived as trustworthy, users' attitudes toward the Internet may be more skeptical, depending on their previous experiences.
ABSTRACT E-Government is being developed according to Government strategic plans. These plans constitute a framework for digital public services that will benefit both citizens and public administration. The Digital City can support e-Govemment evolution by offering a global environment for public transactions. The Digital City's definition is extended to “the global Information Environment, focusing on the needs of a city area.” Moreover, the Digital City comprises a new virtual environment, which administers others-in either the private or public sector-where both marketing and social aspects must be administered and support public benefit. In this paper both the contribution of the Digital City to e-Government and the development methodology of the Digital City of Trikala, Greece (e-Trikala), are presented. The methodology shows the procedure by which the Digital City forms an e-Government environment, offering more than administrating services. Furthermore, the methodology can be considered as a general implementation model for developing similar municipal-area environments for e-Government. The model adopts participatory design issues, while on the other hand some relative considerations are analyzed.
ABSTRACT Electronic delivery of information and services has been a key element of many e-government efforts. Interactive e-government functions allow two-way communication and facilitate information exchange and service delivery in a timely manner. This paper presents the findings of a content analysis of 242 local government Web sites about their e-government practices, and considers whether the content of these sites is related to higher levels of computer and Internet use by citizens in those jurisdictions. E-government functions are examined in terms of the level of user control and system responsiveness, which range from one-way, semi-interactive to two-way interactive. This study also develops an index to assess the level of interactivity of e-government functions. Major findings indicate that local governments tend to offer more interactive e-government services on their Web sites in areas where the number of households with computer(s) and Internet connection athome is higher. With knowledge of the current range of information and services available online and the level of interactivity of e-government practices, local governments can learn from one another and better prepare themselves to develop and implement more versatile and interactive e-government services.
Albeit a late developer in high technology terms, a pattern arguably commensurate with Modern Greece's politico-economic position in the world today, the idea of grasping the nettle of technological advancements and applying it towards the recreation of a government-citizen relationship through an electronic forum reminiscent of the ancient Greek Pnyx or the Agora, has captured the imagination of the Greeks in the 21st century. This case study paper follows chronologically and examines critically alongside, the build-up of ventures towards establishing e-government and initiatives for e-democracy in Greece, their aims and scope, limitations and context, attempting a projection of future directions based on these early experiences and the lessons learnt.
ABSTRACT The Internet is increasingly being used by both citizens and governments for the transfer of information. There is a need to extend access to municipal websites to the portion of the population with disabilities. In 1998, Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 was amended by Congress to require federal government agencies and those agencies that receive funds from the federal government to ensure that their websites are accessible to the public. This paper presents the results of an evaluation of the level of accessibility of the 100 largest municipalities' websites. Webmasters in these cities were surveyed to determine their awareness of accessibility issues and their plans to make their municipalities' websites accessible. The results of this study show that while a number of cities have accessibility statements, overall compliance with Section 508 is low. However, compliance with accessibility standards can only be expected to increase in the future as technology improves and city staff...
This paper discusses the development of e-government in the People's Republic of China (PRC). The paper conceptualizes a political economy framework for evaluating the development of e-government in the PRC by integrating socio-economic approaches for the study of state in terms of maximizing service quality and enhancing economy and cost-efficiency, as well as using a model of democracy which sees political deliberation and participation as the potential for the development of a civic society. It argues that while researchers actually aim at capturing a picture of politico-economic development of the states through a close examination of their digital arms, e-governments, their frameworks to examine the latter, are out of the political or economic focus: that is, these conceptual frameworks are simply a mismatch to what they would like to explicate. With a new model applied to the PRC's e-government of the central authorities, we find out that the PRC's e-government is highly tinted toward a service model, and if any political function that a certain e-government of a certain bureau has to carry out, it is an ideological propaganda or its equivalence.
This paper illuminates the recent stages of e-Government facilitation in the UK local authorities and shows how British local authorities are improving their public service delivery and governing in the digital environment on the other side of the Atlantic. It explores congruence between user and provider perspectives on e-Government. Giddens's (1984) dimensions of the “duality of structure” are used as a “sensitising device” to analyse findings from an extensive literature survey, document analysis and semi-structured interviews with e-Government managers, Heads of IS and IS Project Managers. A rich picture is presented of differences between user and provider views. This paper argues for a greater understanding between the views of the providers and the users of technology in e-Government facilitation in local authorities.
Information technology has changed the way people practice their everyday activities. In this article, the application of IT for election is discussed. The requirements of e-voting systems are described and experiences of achieving e-voting in small scales are explained. Finally, the results are analyzed and a conclusion is made.
ABSTRACT This paper attempts to analyze the web sites of party candidates in the October 2002 prefecture elections in Greece. Candidate web sites regarding the 2002 prefecture elections are analyzed in terms of their political content, level of interactivity, use of multimedia techniques and level of professional appearance in their web campaign. Findings reveal that candidates are likely to present personal and political information on the web, without making negative statements regarding their opponents, make limited use of interactivity and multimedia techniques and rely less on professional web experts and more on the enthusiasm of volunteers or friends. The Greek prefecture election systems allow us also to make some tentative remarks about the impact of web campaigns in elections, comparing results between candidates with and without web sites in the second round of elections, where only two are the competitors.
