Evaluating e-government services : a citizen-centric framework

Abstract

In a quest to offer better services to both citizens and businesses throughout Africa, efforts to adopt e-government projects are gaining momentum. As a result of this, there is a need for effective measurement of delivery and quality of such e-services. Currently, there are several metrics applied to measure and rank the e-readiness of various African countries. However, while these measures have provided a source of comparative analysis between different e-government projects, they are far from being perfect. For example, most of these measures are diverse and difficult to compare, since they assume ‘one size fits all’ and ignore differing environmental, cultural and contextual factors of various countries. Further criticisms of these measures are that they are ‘first generation metrics’ designed for developed countries, as opposed to developing countries. Thus, the crux of the research problem was that there are no suitable evaluation strategies for understanding and measuring the effectiveness of e-government services in order to improve the management thereof, and thereby attain the best possible value for citizens. The objective of this study was to develop a framework, for evaluating the effectiveness of e-government services in a typical developing country. Tanzania’s mainland was chosen as the context for this study: as a typical developing African country, its early phase of e-government development provided an optimal case for this study concerned with the useful and effective evaluation of e-government services. I have chosen a qualitative research method paradigm, underpinned by an interpretive approach, to facilitate both research objectives: developing an evaluation framework after determining the necessary evaluation parameters. Empirical evidence was gathered via interviews with e-government practitioners in Tanzania and via focus groups with selected citizens. Other sources of data included government documentation (policies and strategies) and government websites. The data was analysed through the combined application of an adapted grounded theory method and interpretation. Using the latter analytical processes several effectiveness dimensions of e-government services were derived. Through further analysis these were synthesised into the main output of the study viz. an e-government citizen satisfaction framework (ECSF). This framework, a unique contribution to the existing body of knowledge, demonstrates how citizen and government imperatives should be amalgamated to evaluate the effectiveness of e-government services. The findings further support and advance Information Technology management within government, as this is the first comprehensive framework to ensure an integrated approach for monitoring and evaluating e-government programmes. This study also combines important ideas from two existing domains—service management and IS evaluation—to generate new foundations leading to further work by researchers.