National e-government performance and citizen satisfaction: a multilevel analysis across European countries
| DOI | 10.1177/0020852317703691 |
| Author | Liang Ma,Yueping Zheng |
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
Article
National e-government
performance and citizen
satisfaction: a multilevel
analysis across European countries
Liang Ma
Renmin University of China, China
Yueping Zheng
Sun Yat-sen University, China
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 per-
formance 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 citi-
zens’ 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 con-
gruent 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 partici-
pation, and the government should pay more attention to e-service development in
order to bring more benefits to its users.
International Review of
Administrative Sciences
2019, Vol. 85(3) 506–526
!The Author(s) 2017
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0020852317703691
journals.sagepub.com/home/ras
Corresponding author:
Yueping Zheng, Sun Yat-Sen University No. 135, Xingang Xi Road, Guangzhou, 510275, P. R. China
Guangzhou, 510275, China.
Email: zheng_yueping@126.com
Keywords
citizen satisfaction, cross-country analysis, e-government, Europe, multilevel model,
public service performance, supply–demand gap
Introduction
The rapid development and extensive penetration of information and communica-
tion technologies (ICTs) help governments around the world to innovate and
improve public services through various e-government features (West, 2005).
In comparison with traditional channels of service delivery and interaction,
e-government is much more convenient, useful, and beneficial, and citizens, busi-
nesses, and other clients of e-government have benefited tremendously from these
online services (Reddick and Turner, 2012). It is thus understandable that several
studies find a strong relationship between e-government use and satisfaction
(Tolbert and Mossberger, 2006; Welch et al., 2005).
Some countries outperform others in harnessing ICTs, and the last two decades
have witnessed the burgeoning of ratings and rankings of e-government maturity,
development, and performance, for example, the Global E-Government Report
from Brown University (West, 2005), the Waseda International E-Government
Rankings Survey (Obi, 2008), Rutgers University’s Digital Governance in
Municipalities Worldwide (Holzer and Manoharan, 2016), and the United Nations
E-Government Survey (UN, 2012). By benchmarking e-government best practices
and highlighting performance gaps, these rankings inform governments as to how
to improve online appearances and services.
The e-government rankings ubiquitously used among researchers and practi-
tioners, however, are predominantly derived from the supply side, for example,
the delivery and quality of e-government features (Seri et al., 2014). These rankings
often draw on objective indicators or experts’ judgments to gauge e-government
performance, for example, whether specific features are equipped and how many
steps or clicks are needed to process a request (Rorissa et al., 2011). The under-
standing of e-government from the demand side, in contrast, is largely limited.
Specifically, the users’ perceived quality, subjective judgment, and satisfaction
have not yet been systematically incorporated into these rankings (Barnes and
Vidgen, 2006), though their importance has been increasingly acknowledged in
the literature (Bertot et al., 2008).
The gap between the supply/objective and demand/perceptual sides of
e-government has not been fully examined (Gauld et al., 2010). Government
websites score well in objective indicators from the supply side; however, this
may not hold true in terms of perceptional assessments from the users’ perspective
(Park et al., 2013), which are determined by various factors. Could a country’s
excellent performance in e-government rankings result in higher citizen satisfac-
tion? If the answer is ‘yes’, through what mechanisms? If the answer is ‘no’,
then why?
Ma and Zheng 507
To continue reading
Request your trial