Till Örebro universitet

Evaluating e-government has proven difficult. Reasons include the complex nature of e-government, difficulties in measuring outcomes and impact, and the evolving nature of the phenomenon itself. Practical and effective evaluation methods would be useful to guide the development. To gauge the state of the art in the field, a review of contemporary literature investigated the status of research on e-government evaluation. We found the issues involved to be described by five critical factors: maturity levels, evaluation object, type of indicators, evaluation timing, and stakeholder involvement. The review suggests that there is no best model but rather that e-government evaluation must be situated and take a formative approach to guide the next step. However in doing so there is a need for a clear perspective on where e-government development is going. On this point research is more in agreement, and we provide a model to conceptualize this development.

Electronic government (e-government) faces challenges impeding its successful implementation. In the least developed countries, where e-government initiatives are developing but little research is done, it is difficult to know how to move forward with the development. As a contribution to increased knowledge, this study identifies e-government challenges in Rwanda. To this end, the study takes an interpretive approach and, from interviews and document analysis, identifies key e-government challenges. Those challenges include lack of a change management strategy, limited cooperation, language and literacy barriers, incomplete automation, difficulties with system integration, and a lack of intermediaries' management mechanisms. This paper analyses the challenges service providers would have to manage for e-government to improve and informs policymakers of the areas that need their attention for Rwanda to evolve towards the desired e-government. The study contributes to the yet scarce literature of e-government in Rwanda.

E‐government implementation is growing worldwide. In the context of developed countries, as well as some developing ones, research provides tools to evaluate e‐government services and reflect on e‐government performance. However, in the least developed countries (LDCs), where the preconditions are in many ways more challenging, little is known about those services. While information technology can be imported, social, organizational, and infrastructural arrangements conducive to high‐quality service delivery must be developed locally. In contributing to understanding the challenges as well as opportunities involved, this paper explores the qualities of e‐government services in Rwanda, an East African LDC. The investigation focuses on service providers' views of the qualities, as it is only through their understanding of the situation that service quality can be improved. This is a qualitative study based on interviews with employees of government organizations and document analysis. We identify and discuss 28 e‐government service quality factors, which are grouped into nine quality dimensions—accessibility, availability, awareness, responsiveness, information quality, information security, ease of use, support, and cost. This research contributes to raising awareness about the qualities of e‐government services in Rwanda in particular but may also have relevance for other LDCs.

Purpose: To design an improved evaluation process for e-government services in Rwanda. This includes an overall process design based on the information systems artifact concept and a technical system soliciting and analyzing feedback from users and allowing service providers and monitoring organizations to conduct both formative and summative evaluations.

Design/methodology/approach: A prototype of the web-based Rwanda Online Service Evaluation (ROSE) approach was developed and tested guided by the Content, Context, and Process framework through semi-structured interviews with senior managers in six Rwandan organizations involved in e-government service delivery, policy formulation, and service monitoring, and through an online survey with a sample of 60 users.

Findings: Both the technology component and the evaluation process redesign were perceived as useful and usable in the context of Rwanda. Following the tests, managers devised concrete suggestions regarding how the redesigned evaluation process could be implemented for fruitful use in Rwanda.

Practical implications: The research process was useful for policy decision for an enhanced understanding of e-government service evaluations and the process could be replicated in other developing countries so as to inform and guide the development there.

Originality/value: This research proposes an evaluation process redesign with special attention to creating a conducive cooperative environment involving service providers and users, and where the evaluation information flows through and is processed and stored by the designed technology component.