E‐government evolution in EU local governments: a comparative perspective

The purpose of this paper is to describe an empirical study of the advances and trends of e‐government in transparency, openness and hence accountability in European Union (EU) local governments to determine the extent to which the internet promotes the convergence towards more transparent and accountable government. The paper also tests the extent to which different factors related to the implementation of information and communication technologies (ICTs), the number of inhabitants and the type of public administration style have influenced e‐government developments in the cities studied.

A comprehensive content analysis of 75 local government web sites was conducted using a 73‐item evaluation questionnaire. The evaluations were performed in 2004 and 2007 and 15 EU countries were covered (five per country). To analyse the evolution of e‐government, several techniques were used: tests of difference of means, multidimensional scaling and cluster analysis. The contribution of the different contextual factors to the development of government web sites was tested with OLS regression analysis.

The results show noticeable progress in the application of ICTs and increasing EU local government concern for bringing government closer to citizens and for giving an image of modernity and responsiveness, although few web sites show clear signs of real openness to encouraging citizen dialogue. The evolution of the e‐government initiatives analysed shows that, at present, they are still overlapped with the public administration style of each country as an extension of traditional front offices with potential benefits in speed and accessibility.

Although a growing number of e‐government studies are appearing, previous research has not analysed the evolution of EU local governments from a comparative perspective.