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Top1. Introduction
E-Government is described as the use of technology to enhance access to, and delivery of, government services to benefit citizens, business partners and employees at local, municipal, state and national levels (Grant & Chau, 2005; Ke & Wei, 2004). Ke and Wei (2004) defined it as the use of Internet technology to enable greater interaction between government organizations and its citizens. Based on those interactions e-Government has been classified as interactions with government and citizens (G2C), government and business (G2B), government and its employees (G2E), and government and government (G2G) (Carter and Belanger, 2003; Tan et al., 2005).
Government to Citizen (G2C) focuses on making information accessible to citizens online. Through an integrated web-portal, it will be possible for citizens and businesses to complete a transaction with government agencies without having to visit several separate ministries/departments in separate physical locations (Zakareya & Zahir, 2005). Government to Business (G2B) focuses on strategies using technology to facilitate government interactions with the private sector to procure goods and services and to coordinate transactions from private companies. Government to Employee (G2E) focuses on relationships within government among employees to coordinate internal operations and improve the internal efficiency of business processes. Government to Government (G2G) focuses on providing services to governments through intergovernmental relations.
There are many benefits to transforming traditional public services into e-government services, such as efficiency and cost reduction for both the government itself and the adopter of e-Government services (Gil-García & Pardo, 2005); assurance of providing better quality of services provided by government agencies to citizens (Davison et al., 2005); faster adaptation to meet citizens’ needs (Akman et al., 2005); economic development (Gil-García & Pardo, 2005); reducing corruptions (Al-Khouri & Bal, 2007); strategic advantages such as improved decision making through streamlining of information, enhanced knowledge sharing and organizational learning, and greater ability to effect organizational change management (Grant & Chau, 2005).
In recent years, Tunisian’s effort to provide e-Government services in government to government (G2G), government to business (G2B), government-to-internal employees (G2E), and government to citizens (G2C) has been recognized. Tunisia is a representative of developing country in the North Africa region. It is situated on the Mediterranean coast of North Africa.
Tunisia started developing e-administration in the 1990s with the definition of an institutional and legislative framework supporting e-government implementation (e-signature and protection of personal data). The objective of e-government, since the beginning, was to modernise the administration. Recent efforts covering 2006 and 2009 have been directed towards the generalisation of e-services and creating the framework conditions for agencies involved in e-government to realise their stated objectives. The objective of the plan is to create a platform for electronic communication between government institutions and to reinforce the capacities of public servants to meet skills requirements. Large projects involving the whole government have been elaborated, including the creation of a system for sharing information electronically among agencies. Other efforts are directed to diffusing common standards (systems and data) across the administration and introducing a common terminology on e-government. Pilot projects have been launched, e.g. central electronic or databank for all the administrations and e-civil status documentation. Fore example, birth certificates will be obtainable from all municipalities in Tunisia regardless of the residence of the person requesting them.
The Tunisian government portal (http://www.tunisie.gov.tn) provides a ‘Most Used Services’ section on the home page that provides quick access for citizens to information on services such as obtaining a driver license, inquiring about traffic violation, submitting application forms for purchase of apartments, searching for school information, employment search, health, education, and acquiring personal and home loans. Information regarding government services is also laid out by sector, providing quick and efficient access to comprehensive data by citizens and organisation.