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Top1. Introduction
Many countries are moving toward government 2.0 to enhance transparency, develop citizens’ involvement and trust, and increase the efficiency of government transactions. In today’s government, information and communication technologies (ICT) have influenced not only the efficiency of service delivery, but also the transparency and accountability of administration and operation (Lathrop & Ruma, 2010). Government 2.0 can be defined as “the use of emerging [web 2.0 applications] technology, such as social networking, to engage citizens as active participants, characterised by two-way online interaction” (Thornton, 2010, p. 6). The functions of government 2.0 can be acquired by adopting web 2.0 technologies, which include blogs, wiki, social networking, multimedia sharing, Really Simple Syndication (RSS), and widgets.
Because highlighting the key factors that influence the continuance intention of information systems (IS) is crucial to the long-term success of the IS project goals (Chen and Chen, 2009; Vatanasombut et al., 2008), the scope of this paper is to study the factors that affect the citizens’ continuance intention to use government 2.0 services to achieve government goals. Generally, the success of information systems depends not only on the initial use, but also on the continued use of the information systems (Limayem et al. 2003; Bhattacherjee 2001). Initial adoption and subsequent continued usage of e-government is necessary to receive the maximum benefits of e-government. Similarly, the desired outcomes of e-government systems will be achieved when citizens use the e-government services on a continued basis (Wangpipatwong et al., 2008).
The rationale of this study is based on the contention that understanding the factors that affect the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services is an essential step toward achieving government goals. Although, IS continuance intention is widely discussed in literature, there is little empirical research that investigates the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services. Thus, the motivation of this study is to gain an insight into the factors that influence the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services. Based on the literature review, we argue that the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services is primarily affected by two factors: citizens’ involvement and satisfaction. The significance of citizens’ involvement in e-government systems is highlighted in e-government literature (Cullen & Hernon, 2004; Cook, 2000; Kumar et al., 2007). Inadequate citizens’ involvement can “reduce the reliability, completeness, consistency, accuracy, and creditability on both government and e-Government” (Chutimaskul, 2002). Research also shows that satisfaction is considered a major factor that leads to IS continuance intention (Bhattacherjee 2001; Teo et al., 2008). Although citizens’ involvement and satisfaction are obviously important to the success of government 2.0 services, the literature lacks empirical research that confirms (or refutes) this importance. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to propose a citizen-centric model, based on IS and consumer behaviour (CB) literature, to examine the influence of “involvement” and “satisfaction” on the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services. The model is validated by conducting a web survey with 392 users of Bahrain’s e-government national portal.
This paper has theoretical as well as managerial contributions. The key theoretical contribution of this paper is developing and validating a model that is capable of explaining the relationships between citizens’ satisfaction, involvement, and the continuance intention to use government 2.0 services. The results of this research make a practical contribution by considering citizens’ satisfaction as a prerequisite for their involvement. In other words, practitioners should first satisfy users before encouraging their participation and involvement with government 2.0.