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Previous studies have identified leadership as an essential factor influencing inter-agency collaboration and information sharing in government settings. This study argues that some unique characteristics of inter-agency information sharing (IIS) initiatives across different jurisdictions and levels of government call for particular types of leadership. Specifically, this study uses data from in-depth interviews with fifteen public officials in Indonesia to better understand the role of leadership in inter-agency collaboration and information sharing initiatives. Findings from the interviews support two leadership mechanisms influencing IIS in Indonesia: executive involvement and exercise of formal authority, whereas the role of informal leaders seems to be less important in this case. It seems that in some developing countries such as Indonesia, informal leaders are not as influential to the success of IIS initiatives as formal ones, due to the influence of organizational culture.

Citizen-government interactions through performance information have recently gained attention in public administration. To enhance these interactions, governments utilize interactive information p...

Different actor roles in inter-organizational digital public services are often neither understood nor acknowledged. This can result in challenges regarding the proper design and result in a lack of adoption of these services. In the literature, there exist various taxonomies outlining roles such as users, consumers or co-creators, although their value is limited. We define roles as the expectations regarding the actors and their responsibilities in the governance of a digital public service. The aim of this research is to better understand the various roles in inter-organizational digital service provisioning. This objective is achieved by examining existing classifications and using them to analyze the roles in three inter-organizational cases in Belgium. The multiple-case study reveals natural persons and legal entities often combine several roles. Public administrations have to collaborate to establish inter-organizational digital public services, but might be confronted with different perspectives regarding the end-user or other roles. This might lead to tensions and could have consequences regarding adoption. The results show that intermediary roles performed by non-public sector parties, such as mandate holders or private service providers, are lacking in existing classifications. A novel classification is proposed together with suggestions for the concept of roles, taking a comprehensive view on actor roles in the entire service delivery chain.

The role of public libraries in communities across the United States has evolved over time from book repositories to anchor institutions with great potential in contributing to the development of smart cities and communities. However, current literature on smart cities mainly focuses on the definitions of smart city and some frameworks for smart city development, and refers to public libraries in a relatively limited way. In addition, there is no clarity in terms of how local governments and public libraries value the potential benefits, costs, and success factors of public libraries’ participation in building smart cities and communities. Therefore, based on a comparison of survey responses from local governments and public libraries in the United States, this research explores local governments’ and public libraries’ perceptions in relation to the characteristics of smart cities and communities. The research also analyzes the role of public libraries in developing smart cities and communities, as well as the benefits, costs, challenges, and success factors of public libraries’ participation in developing smart cities and communities.

Cities throughout the world are changing. To respond to these changes mayors and other urban policy makers are investing heavily in innovations aimed at making their cities “smarter.” This essay presents the argument that making a city smarter rests on the capability of that city to create public value for those who live and work there. Such capability, in our view, is a function of context. Our goal in presenting this essay is to incentivize researchers and urban policy makers to systematically consider context in smart city investment decision-making. For academics and researchers, we call for new research that systematically examines the interplay between innovation, context, and public value creation in urban environments. For urban policy makers, we call for a new focus on context-informed decision-making about smart city investments.

The relationships between citizens and public organizations have long been explored, particularly through the lenses of service provision and, more recently, participation and engagement. Previous research has described how citizens could interact with government agencies as well as some of the reasons why they are willing to do it and why governments promote or hinder certain interactions with citizens. However, the complexities of these relationships, especially as they evolve into more collaborative expressions such as information sharing, require further study. Particularly, willingness to share information among citizens and public organizations is not well understood and more details about different information sharing flows and a diversity of perspectives are needed. Using data from focus groups with first responders and local residents in a rural community, this paper analyzes multiple interactions focusing on specific information sharing flows (i.e. Citizen to Government; Government to Citizen; Citizen to Citizen; and Government to Government). We found that there are important differences and similarities between the perspectives of first responders and local residents in terms of the importance and rationale of sharing information among different actors. We are also providing more details about the willingness of citizens and first responders to share information with different actors in the context of emergency management in a rural community as well as some of their main reasons.

Information and information technologies have become ubiquitous in the public sector and it is difficult to think of a public problem or government service that does not involve them in some substantial way. Public management (PM) research now incorporates the effects of the availability and quality of data as well as the technologies used in the public sector. From a PM perspective, digital government (DG) could be considered an essential aspect of innovation, co-production, transparency, and the generation of public value. However, studies that attempt to understand the role that DG research plays in PM theory and practice are scarce. As a research field, DG emerged from multiple disciplines, including public administration, information science, management information systems, computer science, communication, and political science. There have been numerous efforts in the last decade to delineate this emergent academic community by assessing the growing body of research represented by hundreds of...

The use of information technologies for the delivery of government services is core in the mission of government around the world. Although the promise of public value creation through digitizing government services is a recurrent theme in the literature, we still know little about the actual mechanisms of value creation from the citizen’s perspective. Understanding public value creation through digital service delivery is a complex and important research problem. Recent attempts to understand the impacts of electronic services value from the citizens’ perspective suggest that dividing service delivery in several stages could be a valuable approach to understand the different models of managing public service delivery, as well as the main sources of value to citizens and society. Moreover, the approach provides a model that can be used by public managers in the design, implementation, and evaluation of citizen-centered and value-based government services. We explore the usefulness of the framework through a series of focus groups with citizens in Mexico. As a result, we identified 3 families of services that follow trajectories with similar stages in the citizen government interaction, and we describe citizen’s perception of value from these conversations.

Purpose This paper aims to argue that the structure of the response to the World Trade Center (WTC) crisis can be characterized as an inter-organizational network and the majority of the activities can be identified as network management. Design/methodology/approach Using a mixed-method research strategy encompassing in-depth interviews and a sociometric survey, the authors characterize the response as an inter-organizational network and describe significant factors that facilitate the effective functioning and management of an emergency response. Findings The results provide empirical support for the claim that the management of the WTC response was very different from normal government operations in many respects. However, it was also found that complete detachment of the network-form of organization from bureaucratic hierarchy is not always possible in an emergency response, particularly in terms of leadership and the availability of resources. Originality/value The authors argue that bureaucratic leadership exists in political layers and is sometimes needed to provide social value to the general public and promote their engagement. Finally, the authors found evidence that the effectiveness of networks in an emergency response is influenced by certain enabling conditions, such as the severity of events, and suggest some implications for government operations.

Despite the increasing importance of cross-boundary research collaboration to tackle socio-technical challenges in digital government, little is known about how such research collaboration emerges, grows, and comes to fruition. This study investigates the social dynamics of cross-boundary collaboration for digital government research and identifies key variables that can affect the emergence and development of collaborative research networks. Using mixed methods, including social network analysis, we analyzed longitudinal data collected from a North American digital government research group whose members gather across disciplinary, organizational, and geographical boundaries. Social networks among the members heavily influenced the formation and maturation of the research group; face-to-face communication, grant-sharing, and coauthoring relationships coevolved over time in the observed network. It was also found that the impact of telecommunication on this process was limited, while government funding for digital government research played an important role. Based on the main findings, we then developed five propositions for future studies to empirically test.

Smartness has recently emerged as a desirable characteristic of governments, cities, communities, infrastructures, and devices. Within the public sector, smart city has become a popular term and municipal governments around the world are using multiple strategies to become smarter. However, there is no consensus about what smartness means and how to identify its key components or dimensions. Some definitions highlight information technology and data, while others pay attention to sustainability, openness, innovation, or resiliency. Based on a review of current literature, this paper identifies multiple dimensions of smartness and proposes an integrative view that highlights how each dimension contributes to the understanding and development of smart governments. We argue that smartness should be conceptualized in a broad and multifaceted way. The framework we present serves as a foundation to understand and measure smartness in government and provides guidelines for the comprehensive development of smart governments. Some of the dimensions have been identified and studied explicitly in the realm of smart government. A number of other dimensions are embedded in the literature as individual characteristics of a good government; although they are not explicitly referenced in relationship to smart government, we argue that they are important components of a government being smart. The paper also suggests that public managers do not control all dimensions equally. Some dimensions could be seen as relatively direct outputs of their actions, while others could be better understood as outcomes that could be affected, but not solely determined, by strategic interventions or deliberate actions.

In an era of wicked social problems, a smarter, more responsive, more efficient governance structure is necessary to take advantage of the enormous capability of the public to congregate, interact, and collaborate in finding solutions to intricate sociotechnical challenges. The bedrock for such a structure is open and shared information; the key to opening and sharing information lies in interagency information sharing and integration. With the objective to supplement previous research based on rich qualitative data, this study systematically identifies and tests some important determinants of the success of inter-organizational collaboration and information sharing initiatives through quantitative empirical analysis. Based on a national survey of government managers from two policy domains (criminal justice and public health) in the United States, this study found four statistically significant predictors of inter-organizational information sharing success. From those, we found compatibility of technical infrastructure and formally assigned project managers as the two most important predictors explaining the success of inter-organizational information sharing initiatives.

Smart community is a term that has been recently used to characterize efforts to transform communities and make them more sustainable, efficient, transparent, and where citizen participation is the norm. Information technologies are many times seen as enablers of these potential changes. In smart communities, the role of public libraries is key. This poster analyzes current practices in public libraries and identifies the expertise, knowledge, and background that help them contribute to citizen engagement in smart community initiatives. Practices in infrastructure, technology, programming and services, and stakeholder partnerships were classified in three levels: building blocks, good practices and unique practices.

This case study proposes to rethink context as a determinant of digital government success and elaborate on the variables that affect these initiatives in specific contexts. When talking about contextual variables, researchers often categorize them as social, political, and economic. Regarding social conditions, the digital divide is probably the most studied concept, although the conceptualization can vary for authors from different disciplines and theoretical traditions. For instance, many authors use the digital divide to not only refer to access to the Internet and related technologies, but also the skills and capabilities of users and how they use technologies to generate value in their daily lives. This case study argues, however, that the social context goes well beyond the digital divide and includes additional important factors like extreme poverty and legal vulnerability. Using the case of immigration services in the southern border of Mexico, this paper shows how multiple variables from the social environment affect digital government success and its impact on multiple users.

Historically, e-government approaches have focused on citizens as the most important audience for government information and services. This focus is appropriate for most traditional public services. However, a large number of service users are noncitizens, including, for example, people applying for immigration services. Theoretically and practically, there are interesting differences between government services targeted to citizens and migration services. Some of these differences are due largely to the rules and laws that apply in each case, but there are also differences related to the fact that the majority of users of migration services are not citizens and they are very diverse in many respects. For instance, in the case of noncitizens the audience and their needs can be as broad as their different nationalities and different contexts they reside in. This chapter identifies and explains some of these differences and also a few similarities. It considers the variables from Fountain’s technology enactment framework and includes some additional environmental conditions based on a previous extension of that initial model, applying them to the case of immigration services for border workers in the south of Mexico. Based on this analysis, this chapter suggests a preliminary reinterpretation of the technology enactment framework and highlights the differences between e-government services for citizens and for noncitizens, in order to propose a discussion about a group of users that has not been thoroughly analyzed in the literature, but which is important for scholars and practitioners to consider.

Mobile technologies are growing rapidly in all countries, but they are particularly important for developing countries. Since more and more citizens are using cell phones and other mobile devices, it seems clear that there is an opportunity for government agencies to provide information and services using these technologies. Despite the relative success of some growing applications and the great number of mobile phones, mobile government has not evolved as one of the main channels for interacting with citizens. Aiming to understand the configuration of mobile government projects in practice, our research question is: how environment, structure, leadership, strategy and sustainability configure and interact in mobile government business models? The research has a qualitative character with multiple cases studies based on the analysis of twenty Mobile Government Projects using short message service (SMS) in the government of Parana, Brazil. The life cycles of the twenty cases were identified and represented, from the birth to the survival phase. The major contribution of this paper is proposing a Dynamic Business Model for Mobile Government using SMS technology, based on the phases of the project life cycle.

Many researchers of open government data raised the question as to whether transparency also promotes accountability. Concerning the unclear relationship between transparency and accountability, this case study first develops the conception of accountability in the context of open government and finds that accountability relates to the organizational need for an assessment of policy goals. This paper then examines the process in which a state health agency implements data visualization tools in an attempt to enhance the outcome of its open data policy goals. Drawing on the results from semi-structured interviews with a diverse set of internal users at the state agency, this case study provides some evidence as to how the gap between transparency and accountability can be closed at the organizational level. It also finds that data intermediaries can help government agencies overcome their resource constraints by critically assessing data usability while providing the technological expertise to align their open data policy goals with user expectations. Future research is necessary to examine the role of data intermediaries in wider open data ecosystems including multiple external stakeholders.

Social1 media sites have become a very important part of the life of many individuals, and they have become the tool to express ideas freely, which can influence the opinions of others, and help to organize people to protest policy changes. Such could have been the case of the protests and plundering resulting from the release of fuel prices in Mexico. We hope to better understand this phenomenon by analyzing tweets posted within the dates that preceded and followed the increase of fuel price, by applying techniques of topic extraction and automatic text analysis. This research can be useful to governments to understand their citizens' reactions and needs.

Interagency collaboration and information sharing in the public sector is a complex enterprise laden with risks. In this type of environment, past studies find that trust is key to the success of inter-organizational information sharing (IIS) initiatives. Based on a review of current literature and a national survey conducted in the US, this paper quantitatively explores the role of trust in mediating the relationship between multiple variables and the success in IIS. Overall, we found that trust is significant in mediating the relationships among four determinants of IIS success, namely: a) effective communication, b) clarity about their roles and responsibilities and expectations about other participants' roles and responsibilities, c) competence inferred from past experiences, and d) judicious exercise of formal authority, which reduces participants' uncertainty and anxiety about the project. Furthermore, our analysis indicates that the role of trust in mediating the relationships depends on how success is measured in an IIS project. Testing the roles that trust plays through statistical analysis makes an important contribution to the literature, as well as to government practice.

Open Government (OG) is pushing towards an important change in terms of how we currently understand public management. Recently, OG has attracted the attention of multiple actors from within the governmental sphere and beyond. However, little is known about how this new paradigm is evolving. For the development of this investigation, we surveyed all Spanish municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants and asked about the level of association of selected concepts with OG. We carried out an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to determine the factors in which the concepts are grouped. This led us to determine the existence of three perspectives from which local governments are developing and implementing OG: a) democratic values of coresponsibility, b) technological innovation, and c) availability and access to information.

Adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT) in governance contexts is considered empowering for governments and the citizens. Digital governance aims at transforming internal processes, structures and working practices leading to greater efficiency and transparency. Simultaneously, with open and digital governance accompanied by the Internet and other emergent technologies, the engagement between citizens and governments is expected to be greater than ever. However, it is not clear to what extent ICT initiatives are truly empowering citizens and government managers. In order to understand how ICT initiatives have been empowering citizens, we propose a conceptual framework and some preliminary findings. Based on a systematic review of recent literature, the framework should be useful for assessing the levels of empowerment produced or facilitated by different ICT initiatives. As an ongoing research, we also share some preliminary findings from selected ICT initiatives across India.

Adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT) in governance contexts is considered empowering for governments and citizens. Digital Governance aims at transforming internal processes, structures and working practices leading to greater effectiveness, efficiency, and transparency. Simultaneously, with open and digital governance accompanied by the Internet and other emergent technologies, the engagement between citizens and governments is expected to significantly increase in the near future. However, it is not clear to what extent ICT initiatives are truly empowering citizens and government managers. In order to understand how ICT initiatives have been empowering citizens, in this paper we propose an assessment framework and provide some evidence from cases in India. Based on a systematic review of recent literature, the framework should be useful for assessing the levels of empowerment produced or facilitated by different ICT initiatives. In this paper, we also share some preliminary findings from selected ICT initiatives across India.

Researchers and practitioners around the world recognize the potential of information technologies to promote government transformation. This transformation has been understood in at least two different ways: (1) as a transformation of internal processes and (2) as a transformation of the relationships between governments and other social and political actors (institutional transformation). Unfortunately, there is little or no evidence of such transformation, and current studies reveal that for this transformation to happen, a better understanding of the complex relationships between information technologies, organizations, and institutions is still required. This paper presents a theory of the co-evolution of technology, organizational networks, and institutional arrangements in the transformation of government. The theory uses the grammars of system dynamics and builds upon institutional approaches to understand interactions among all these variables in the development of information and communication technologies in government. Although the theory suggests the relevance of some specific reinforcing processes in this transformation, the endogenous view used in the theory empowers all stakeholders by illustrating how transformation could be promoted from any individual position involved in the process of developing digital government applications.

Information technologies are increasingly important for political and social activism. In particular, web 2.0 tools and social media applications have recently played a significant role in influencing government decision making and shaping the relationships between governments, citizens, politicians, and other social actors. After the Arab Spring and the uprisings that have led to significant political changes in Egypt, Tunisia, and Iran, commentators argue that information technologies have the potential to strengthen social movements and ultimately transform society. However, this influence is not new. There were movements in the 90s, using the new technologies of e-mail and websites, which were able to gather significant social attention and generate political pressure. Based on three Mexican social and political movements that span close to 20 years, this article identifies key similarities and differences in the use of information technologies and proposes a framework to understand the evolution of cyberactivism. Initially, activists used information technologies to promote a movement's main ideas and gain global support. More recently, a single tool or application, such as Twitter, has been the technological basis for certain social and political movements. However, there is a trend towards a more integrated use of social media tools and applications, generating what could be called cyberactivism 2.0. In addition, there are some distinguishable stages in the development of social protests using information technologies; this evolutionary model seems to be useful to understand very different social and political movements using very different levels of technological sophistication.

Smart government is used to characterize activities that creatively invest in emergent technologies coupled with innovative strategies to achieve more agile and resilient government structures and governance infrastructures. However, there is no consensus in terms of what this term includes and how it is related to emergent technologies and innovation in the public sector. This introductory paper provides readers with ways to think about smart government and summarizes findings from twelve articles included in this special issue. These articles, which are the best papers of the 6th International Conference on the Theory and Practice of Electronic Governance (ICEGOV2012), contribute to emerging understanding of being smart in government settings. The articles span a great diversity of related topics such as smart cities, open government, and participation mechanisms. Collectively, the articles provide perspectives on the nature of smart governments and illustrate exemplar practices and initiatives on how governments are opening up and transforming service delivery to become smarter. The special issue in its entirety contributes to understanding governance structures, technical infrastructures, and other requirements geared toward supporting the operations of smarter governments around the world.

Previous research has shown that clarity of roles and responsibilities (CRR) influences the performance of individual organizations as well as inter-organizational efforts. In the context of cross-boundary information sharing (CBIS), CRR has been found to enable other important determinants of success, such as building trust among members, increasing their willingness to participate, and mitigating some of their concerns about security, among others. However, few studies have attempted to understand the determinants of CRR in government CBIS initiatives. Sayogo, Gil-Garcia, and Cronemberger's (2016) analysis of results of a national survey identified three significant determinants of CRR in CBIS, (1) the extent participants use boundary objects, (2) participant skills in terms of collaboration, coordination, and communication, and (3) the diversity of the participating organizations and their goals. Seeking to expand on their findings in terms of new understanding about the influence of significant determinants of CRR in CBIS, this study draws on findings from eight U.S. state and local government public health and criminal justice CBIS cases. This study contributes to existing knowledge about CBIS in the public sector by characterizing the determinants and providing new understanding of the nature of the influence of the determinants of CRR on CBIS. In particular, it shows how the extent of boundary object use, collaboration, and the diversity of participants affect CBIS initiatives in different contexts. In practical terms, creating new understanding of the determinants of CRR has value for public managers and their leadership as they must increasingly collaborate and share information across the boundaries of organizations in the process solving increasingly complex public problems.

Social media in government is becoming one of the major trends in Electronic Government (e-government) research and practice worldwide. During the last few years, several authors have addressed the potential of social media for the innovation of public sector organizations. Most of these contributions have focused on the technical dimensions of social media, while other aspects have not attracted equal attention. In contrast, this introductory article interrogates the role of social media in the basic areas of e-government: government information flows and the availability of government information; the use of information technology to create and provide innovative government services; the impact of information technology on the relationships between the governed and those governing; and the increasing importance of information policies and information technologies for democratic practices. Accordingly, the next few pages propose and develop three dimensions of social media in government: tools, goals, and topics. We think that these dimensions could help to better understand the use of social media in government settings. Then, after a brief review of current trends in social media and government research, we present the articles included in this special issue. Finally, we present some practical lessons and suggest ideas for future research. This special issue could be seen as a starting point for the development of innovation through social media in public administrations around the world.

Researchers around the world propose different ways to assess the performance of electronic government portals in order to understand the factors that influence the quality of the information and services they provide to citizens, businesses, and other stakeholders. Most of these evaluation models only consider the results or outputs in terms of information, services, or other portal functionalities, ignoring the inputs of capabilities and resources that governments have and make available for these efforts. This paper argues that a more comprehensive approach is necessary, and using data envelopment analysis DEA could help to better understand how efficient governments are in their use of certain "inputs" to produce high quality e-government portals. DEA calculates an efficiency score based on some portal characteristics outputs, such as information, interaction, transaction, integration, and participation, and some organizational, institutional, and contextual factors inputs, such as government capacity, potential demand, and operation costs. The empirical analysis focuses on the state government portals in Mexico. Our results indicate that while there are some states that are never in first place in terms of portal quality or functionality, they also have very few resources and capabilities, which means they are highly efficient. Therefore, DEA could also improve the fairness and equality of portal assessment methods, particularly for governments with few initial resources and capabilities and/or adversarial environmental conditions.

Governments have long attempted to actively engage with their citizens. With the advent of new communication tools fueled by the wide availability of Internet, two-way interaction between the public and government entities has become easier. However, just like with any other new tool, government agencies must learn how to incorporate social media platforms into their existing organization and how to use them effectively. The aim of this chapter is to present general principles for social media use in government related to general strategy, project implementation, organizational pitfalls, rules, and procedures for interaction. We expect that technologies will improve not only citizen engagement but also bureaucracy and cost efficiency of the government actions.

Part 4: Critical Reflections; International audience; Innovation is a recurring theme in public administration. Governments around the world are always exploring innovation alternatives. However, the way public organizations innovate has evolved in the last few years from “in-house” innovation to open innovation. Although the literature is rich in references to innovation in the private sector, how open innovation processes can become a true and effective tool for governments is still an underexplored topic. The few studies that have tackled it have mainly addressed one main question: how can a successful private sector practice be introduced in public sector organizations? In contrast, this paper aims at making a contribution to the existing literature on open innovation in the public sector by addressing one issue that is key in open innovation processes: the role of intermediaries. Intermediaries are important actors in the open innovation ecosystem as they facilitate activities in all stages of the innovation process and help government agencies to achieve their goals.

The Once-Once Principle (OOP) suggests that citizens and businesses should have the right to supply information only once to a public administration. It would then be the respon- sibility of public administration offices to take all necessary actions in order to internally share this data by respecting the relevant data protection rules. The overall aim is to reduce administrative burden. The implementation of the OOP is high on the political agenda of many countries including the Member States of the European Union. The aim of this panel is to enable an open discussion between the panelists and the audience in order to exchange good practices and also identify and prioritize benefits and barriers as well as possible next steps towards widely imple-menting the once only principle in public service provisioning.

We expand the current understanding of leadership's influence on the success of inter-organizational information sharing and integration (IIS) by testing and proposing direct and indirect relationships using structural equation modelling (SEM). We analyzed data from a national survey of 173 professionals from IIS projects in Public Health and Criminal Justice in the US. We evaluated the direct and indirect relationships of three leadership mechanisms -- executive involvement, exercise of formal authority, and informal leaders. By testing the causal relationships between two types of leaders: bureaucratic-based executive leader and network-based informal leaders, we substantiate how embeddedness in bureaucracy influences the relationship between leadership activities and success of IIS projects. Our findings show the significant role of executive involvement to the success of IIS. We found that the influence of informal leaders is magnified by the involvement of executives. Our finding also support the importance of informal leaders both directly to the success of IIS or in curbing the potential negative impact of misuse of authority in the collaboration. Finally, we found that perceptions of participants in terms of how IIS project success is measured, influences the impact of leadership on the success of IIS projects.

Cross-Boundary Information Sharing (CBIS) has become increasingly important for public and private sector entities around the world. Studies critical to advancing what is known, have focused primarily on information sharing and integration among government entities at the same level of government or between governments from different levels. Within the context of government regulation, information sharing typically occurs among a more diverse network of actors and processes with overlapping regulatory responsibilities and information needs. The variety of actors and overlapping regulatory relationships can contribute to a gap between the level and nature of information sharing required for individual actors to meet their obligations. This ongoing research paper looks at the socio-technical nature of information sharing among public and private sector actors and examines what is known about public-public and private-private CBIS sector in order to inform future research..

Based on a review of recent literature and a set of group and individual interviews, this poster proposes a preliminary multidimensional framework to assess an agency's readiness for mobile government. The poster also shows how these dimensions have been integrated into a tool called Mobile-Readiness Assessment, which public managers can use to better understand mobile technologies and help them ask the right questions before starting any mobile government project.

Information technologies IT can now be considered one of the key components of government administrative reform. The potential is even greater when working across organizational boundaries. Unfortunately, inter-agency collaboration appears to face an even greater number of challenges than similar IT initiatives within a single organization. The challenges include data and technological incompatibility, the lack of institutional incentives to collaborate, and the politics and power struggles around a pervasive silo structure in most governments, among many others. This paper argues that there are clear trends towards greater inter-organizational collaboration, information sharing, and integration, which could lead, in the near future, to what might be called a smart State. The paper starts discussing the promises and challenges that have already been identified for government information sharing and integration initiatives. Then it describes two trends in terms of inter-organizational collaboration and information technologies in government settings. The paper ends by providing reflections about the technical and political feasibility, as well as the social desirability, of an integrated virtual State in which the executive, legislative, and judicial branches^1 are actively collaborating and sharing information through the use of advanced information technologies, sophisticated coordination mechanisms, shared physical infrastructure, and, potentially, new organizational and institutional arrangements.

Scholars and practitioners argue that the most important interactions between citizens and government happen at the local level. These relationships could become closer and more frequent with the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs). In fact, portals could be seen not only as channels for providing government information and services, but also as powerful tools to exchange information and knowledge between different social actors and government entities and to enable participation in collective decision-making efforts about important public affairs. For instance, social media and other Web 2.0 tools could provide new electronic channels for these interactions through their inclusion in local government portals. This paper argues that although important modifications to the organizational and institutional frameworks would be necessary, the potential for local electronic governance through networks of government and non-government actors via internet portals is clearly present. However, a very important first step would be the inclusion of more interaction, participation, and collaboration mechanisms in government portals. Similar to previous efforts with data from the U.S., this paper describes the results of a recent assessment of local government portals in Mexico. The conclusion is that progress toward citizen engagement is slow in local governments and there are very few efforts to increase interaction, participation, and collaboration channels on their portals. Most of them are still following the vision of information and services providers and a local electronic governance model is still in its very initial stages. It seems that e-government in municipalities is still more rhetoric and less reality, at least in some countries.

Electronic government has the potential of transforming the way government works and interacts with citizens. However, recent research has found that the promised benefits are rarely completely achieved. Some of these studies highlight the importance of institutions in shaping the development, implementation, and use of information technologies in government settings. Based on a survey of Mexican federal government managers, this article explores the relationships between institutional arrangements, organizational forms, information technologies, and the outcomes of Mexican IT initiatives. Overall, it was found that there are important interactions among these variables and important similarities exist between developed countries and other realities, such as Latin America. The research presented here contributes to the field by testing causal relationships often cited in the digital government literature, but with little empirical quantitative exploration. Moreover, understanding those relationships offers guidance in the implementation of inter-organizational IT applications in government, potentially increasing their probability of success as well as the benefits for citizens and other stakeholders.

The use of information and communication technologies in government has been characterized as one powerful strategy for administrative reform. From recent experiences around the world, it seems clear that in order to enjoy some of the greatest benefits of digital government, the integration of information across organizational boundaries is necessary. However, these digital government initiatives face additional challenges, since the required level of interorganizational collaboration and trust is often not supported by existing institutional arrangements, organizational structures, and managerial processes. In fact, many institutions and administrative structures found in government contexts offer incentives for single-agency work only, which produces stove-pipe systems. Based on an extensive case study in the Mexican federal government, this paper explores how certain institutional arrangements and organizational structures can enable or hinder cross-agency collaboration and consequently, interorganizational information integration.

Information-sharing projects are becoming increasingly important in both public and private organizations. Generally, organizations base their decision to move forward with an information-sharing p...

After six years of challenges and learning pushing forward the e-Government agenda in Mexico, the Presidential succession brought an opportunity for assessing the current progress, recognizing the main unsolved problems, and planning the vision for the future of e-Government in Mexico. This case provides a rich description of the e-Mexico system, including its main objectives and goals, governance structures, IT infrastructure, collaboration processes, main results, and current challenges. Some background information about Mexico is also provided at the beginning of the case. Playing the role of a consultant working for the new Mexican CIO, the reader is asked to evaluate the current situation and help in the design of a work plan, including a proposal for organizing the ICT function, the main strategic objectives, and some specific lines of action for the next six years.

The purpose of this poster is to present the current state of this study. The objective is to know whether the Mexican National Migration Institute web portal provides the results users expect; in particular to obtain the entry permission to foreign workers, and if the process is easier, cheaper, and faster now with the implementation of information technologies than it was before. This is particularly interesting, since the main users of these processes are not citizens, but national from Central American countries. The question that leads this research project is the following, which are the organizational and institutional variables that have influenced the technological characteristics of INM's web portal and how those characteristics produced benefits and respond to the user's expectations? Are the influences similar to the ones present in citizen-oriented applications and systems? To reach this goal a mixed methodology is applied with three different techniques: interviews of coffee growers and Guatemalan workers, an assessment of the technical features of the web portal and an analysis of the official documents of National Migration Institute.

Mobile government could be conceptualized as the use of diverse mobile technologies to provide information and services to citizens, businesses, and other stakeholders. Governments around the world, particularly in developing countries are finding mobile strategies to be useful ways to reach to their citizens, including disadvantaged groups. In fact, individuals are increasingly using mobile phones for accessing information and this trend is becoming stronger with the improvement of long-range technologies and the high penetration of mobile devices in developing countries. However, their use to deliver government services to citizens remains generally low. This research argues that the government use of Short Message Service to offer information and services to citizens is low because of a lack of a clear and actionable business model for this technology. So, it proposes a conceptual business model for SMS-based government services.

The idea that government transparency is directly related to the use of technology was boosted when Barack Obama's Transparency Memorandum was published in 2009. According to this view, the implementation of information technologies in government has significant effects on efficiency, transparency, and corruption, among other variables. However, it is not clear if citizens perceive these effects. Based on a pilot survey conducted in 2014, this study systematically examines the role of technology use and its effects on transparency, efficiency, and corruption in a Mexican municipal government. Our preliminary analysis suggests five distinctive variables within the technology use construct (ICT interaction; use of social media; use of chat, e-mail, and kiosks; mobile technology and security; and artificial intelligence and free Internet). Overall, the results seem to indicate that interactions between citizens and governments supported by emergent technologies improve citizens' perceptions of transparency and efficiency. In contrast, we could not find supporting evidence regarding the effect of technology use on citizens' perceptions of corruption.

Drawing on a review of government information management and information technology (IT) success factors, this paper compares the availability of IT policies and standards in the states. Two main objectives guide the comparative review effort. The first is to show what kinds of information policies the different states make available to citizens through their Web sites. This paper offers a preliminary list of the main IT policies that are available to the public through the Internet. The second objective is to present a theoretical framework to understand the importance of IT policies and standards to government organizations. This paper compares what theory has established about IT policy with the practices of the various states. In general terms, there seems to be some degree of consistency among the states regarding which IT issues to take into account for policy and standard development. Security, internal networks, e-mail usage, software standards, and privacy show up as the most important and frequently selected IT-related topics and concerns.

Interagency information sharing (IIS) is a complex endeavour in which various participants must cross the boundaries of their respective agencies and work collaboratively. Achieving success in such an undertaking can benefit from clarity of roles and responsibilities within the collaboration. Based on a national survey distributed to public managers and other actors involved in IIS in public health and criminal justice in the USA, this study aims to evaluate the influence of six determinants of clarity of roles and responsibilities on the success of an IIS project. Our findings indicate the significant roles of (a) the use of boundary objects, (b) communication skills, (c) the diversity of participating organisations, (d) respect for autonomy, and (e) the exercise of formal authority to the development of clarity of roles and responsibilities and the likelihood of attaining IIS project success. However, the influence of these predictors on the achievement of success depends largely on how success is defined and measured.

Inter-organizational information sharing has proven to be a complex phenomenon and scholars have already identified key challenges in previous studies. Among other variables, the existing literature points to the critical role of governance structures and their determinants as important success factors for inter-organizational information sharing (IIS) initiatives. Most of the current research is based on qualitative cases and there are very few quantitative empirical studies about this topic. Based on a national survey of government managers in two policy domains, this study systematically examines the role of several determinants of governance structures in the success of IIS initiatives. It examines the role of these determinants as a way to capture and to start understanding their effects. Our quantitative analysis suggests three variables, determinants of governance structures, as key predictors of IIS success: (1) knowledge of information needs (2) knowledge about participating organizations and (3) executive support and involvement.

Executive agencies are not the only entities generating websites and using other information technologies. The judicial branch is also making progress toward developing better portals to improve their processes and strengthen the relationships with citizens and other stakeholders. In fact, most judicial agencies have created their own websites with different levels of technological sophistication and functionality. However, very little is known about the structure, usability, content, and impacts of these websites. Based on previous research developed in 2010, this study proposes a framework to measure and evaluate judicial websites and performs a pilot test of the instrument in 20 states in Mexico. Implications for research and practice are derived and ideas for future studies are also suggested.