There are many different benefits that a government can obtain from encouraging the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in its public sector delivery frameworks. Utilization of ICTs as a socio-economic stimulant has long been recognized by governments the world over. Electronic government utilizes ICTs to provide all the access to a wide range of public services. Today, different government departments and/or units at all levels of the governance hierarchy respond to millions of citizen demands electronically. The rising interest of many stakeholders in e-Government calls for a conceptual model that will guide implementation regardless of context. This chapter argues that several key success factors are appropriate and need to be considered for successful e-Government implementation. About one hundred e-Government Websites were examined upon those key success factors. Sixty-one university students took part in this investigation. Using t-test, the chapter investigates the appropriateness of the proposed model.
TopIntroduction
In recent years, nearly all countries have integrated Information Technology (IT) and Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) into their national economic development strategies. Governments see IT and ICTs as ways to improve the quality of life of their citizens. The scale of activity on the part of public sectors in leveraging IT has increased in volume (Smith, 2008). E-Government is enabling government companies to provide better services to their customers. The ability to improve citizens’ access to services online has made e-Government a desirable application for government organizations (Gorla, 2008; Donna, Yen, 2006). Governments around the world are implementing e-Government. In every part of the world - from industrialized countries to developing ones, governments are putting information online to provide better services for citizens (The Working Group, 2002; Chircu, Lee, 2005; Palmer, 2006). Transactions such as renewing drivers’ licenses, applying for jobs and filing tax forms can now be conducted online, quickly and efficiently (West, 2008-2). IT and ICTs are viewed as the major platform for realizing citizens’ access to the aforesaid transactions through ICTs.
Developing countries are behind in this race to provide e-Government services to their citizens. This can be due to many reasons such as lack of a good communication infrastructure, low computer literacy, and limited access to the Internet and so on (Akther, Onishi, & Kidokoro, 2007). These issues have to be addressed before developing e-Government applications. Officials should be aware of the obstacles before starting an e-Government project because such projects take a long time to accomplish and are generally very costly)The working group, 2002).
The 2012 United Nations E-Government Survey (UN, 2012) reports that many countries have put in place e-Government applications for the people to further enhance public sector efficiencies and streamline governance systems to support sustainable development. In the present recessionary time, some countries have been better able to continue to invest in IT infrastructure and service improvement for their citizens. The following table shows the world e-Government ranking in the top 20 countries worldwide.
Table 1. World e-Government development leaders (source: UN, 2012)
| Rank | | Rank | | Rank | | Rank | |
| 1 | Republic of Korea | 2 | Netherlands | 3 | United Kingdom | 4 | Denmark |
| 5 | United States | 6 | France | 7 | Sweden | 8 | Norway |
| 9 | Finland | 10 | Singapore | 11 | Canada | 12 | Australia |
| 13 | New Zealand | 14 | Liechtenstein | 15 | Switzerland | 16 | Israel |
| 17 | Germany | 18 | Japan | 19 | Luxembourg | 20 | Estonia |