The Public Value Creation of eGovernment: A Test of the Respecified IS
Success Model
Olusegun Agbabiaka Reginald Ugaddan
National eGovernment Strategies, Abuja, Nigeria Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, South Korea
segun.agbabiaka@negst.com.ng rgu1216@skku.edu
Abstract
The success and impact of eGovernment depend
on its value perceptions by citizens. This paper seeks
to investigate the salient factors that are significant
in predicting the public value creation of
eGovernment from the citizen perspective. To fulfil
the purpose of this research, a theoretical model
based on the updated DeLone and McLean IS
Success Model and the public value approach is
adopted. Through data collected from Korea, the
model is empirically tested and validated using
structural equation modeling technique. Findings
reveal that information quality and system quality
significantly predict trust in eGovernment, while for
citizen satisfaction, information quality and service
quality are critical. Information quality, service
quality and citizen satisfaction are significant in
predicting net benefits. Furthermore, while trust in
eGovernment has no mediating effect on the model,
citizen satisfaction mediates the relationship between
the quality constructs and net benefits. This research
has both theoretical and practical implications.
Keywords: Public Value, eGovernment, Net Benefits,
IS Success Model
1. Introduction
eGovernment can be defined as the use of
information and communication technologies
including the internet to facilitate access and delivery
of government services for the benefits of citizens,
businesses and other stakeholders [1, 34]. Though
eGovernment has been acknowledged to serve
different stakeholders and diverse interests [1],
citizens are still considered the greatest beneficiaries
[2]. This is due to the ever increasing demands and
expectations of the citizens and the growing pressure
on governments to meet and satisfy these changing
needs [1]. Against this backdrop, substantial
resources have been committed to improving public
sector service delivery through eGovernment over the
last few years [49]. This huge investment is spurred
by the perceived benefits of eGovernment to
transform operations of government, promote
accountability, deliver cost-effective, quality services,
foster better citizen-government engagement,
improve greater access to public services and open up
new opportunities for citizens to participate in
democratic processes [1, 2]. According to Jones,
Hackney and Irani [35, pp. 145], eGovernment has
become a “burgeoning phenomenon globally with
huge investments being made to modernise and
transform the public sector”. Despite the huge
investments being made, there seems not to be a
universal or consensus method to evaluating the
impact of these initiatives [49] as several approaches
have been developed [7, 8, 37]. However, these
approaches have focused largely on cost-efficiency,
payback period, return on investment etc [9, 27]
without taking into consideration the broader socio-
economic and socio-political benefits that
eGovernment is expected to deliver [10].
Furthermore, these evaluation approaches have been
concentrated on the supply side with little being done
to assess the impact of eGovernment from the
perspective of the citizens [11, 12].
In response to this, the public value approach has
been developed to overcome the limitations and
shortcomings of these earlier approaches [13]. Public
value refers to “the value created by government
through services, laws, regulations and other actions”
[5, pp. 4] and this value as argued further by Kelly et
al., [5] is shaped and defined by the citizens through
their preferences. According to Grimsley, Meehan,
and Gupta [14], public value can be described as the
value or benefit which citizens desire in relation to
strategic outcomes of government policies as well as
their experience of using public services. In essence,
it is the value citizens derive from government and
can serve as a benchmark with which to evaluate
performance of government [24].
From the review of literature, there are few
empirical studies on the evaluation of the impact of
eGovernment from the citizens’ perspective based on
the public value approach [4, 36]. This study is
therefore, a contribution to the existing gap in
literature on the public value creation of
2016 49th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences
1530-1605/16 $31.00 © 2016 IEEE
DOI 10.1109/HICSS.2016.366
2923