Challenges in Citizen Centric E-Government

The promise of E-Government (and its more recent spin-offs of E-Democracy,E-Participation, E-Procurement, and a range of other “E-‘s”) is to engage citizenry in government in a citizen-centered manner, but also to develop quality government services and delivery systems that are efficient and effective. Citizen-centered
E-Government suggests that governments will provide services and resources tailored to the actual service and resource needs of users, including citizens, residents, government employees, and others. Efficient and effective E-Government suggests that
governments will gain economies of scale, reduce costs, and provide technology-enabled user services. There have been many predictions that E-Government will revolutionize democratic participation or that it will revolutionize the delivery of government services in one of these ways for a number of years citizen-oriented E-Government requires a number of planning and design processes to be successful and that using such an approach may, in fact, increase the costs of providing E-Government services. Users of e-government comprise a number of groups—citizens employing government information and services; residents and immigrants seeking
information about their new country; government employees using e-government in their job functions; people in other countries wishing to know more about a nation; and on and on. Typically, “top-down” or systems-based E-Government design
fails to adequately consider citizen information needs. Thus, the degree to which both goals of improved user-oriented EGovernment and more efficient (reduced costs of) government services can be accomplished simultaneously through EGovernment
may be problematic. There are number of questions to answer before initiating a comprehensine EGovernment framework:
User Level Questions:
1)What are user expectations from E-Government services
and resources?
2) What are the issues and barriers users encounter when
using E-Government services and resources?
3) What factors facilitate and enhance do users experiences
with E-Government services and resources?

Government Level Questions:
Questions with federal and state government personnel
responsible for E-Government services and resources included:
1) What are the primary drivers of the development and
implementation of E-Government services and resources?
2) To what extent are citizen needs and expectations
included in the design and implementation of EGovernment
services and resources?
3) How are citizen identified expectations and desires in EGovernment
services and resources incorporated into the
overall design and continual enhancement of E-Government
services and resources?

REFERENCES:
Paul,John,C, Charles,R. "Citizen Centric E-Government Services:Cost,Benefits and Research Needs"ACM,2007.

Millard, J. (2006). User attitudes to e-government citizen services
in Europe. International Journal of Electronic Government
Research, 2(2), 49-58.

Noveck, B. S. (2003). Designing deliberative democracy in
cyberspace: The role of the cyber-lawyer. Boston University
Journal of Science and Technology, 9, 1-91.