Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Apr 17;15(4):e0231585.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0231585. eCollection 2020.

Characterization of e-Government adoption in Europe

Ainhoa Yera  1 , Olatz Arbelaitz  1 , Oier Jauregui  1 , Javier Muguerza  1
Affiliations

Characterization of e-Government adoption in Europe

Ainhoa Yera et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

The digital divide in Europe has not yet been bridged and thus more contributions towards understanding the factors affecting the different dimensions involved are required. This research offers some insights into the topic by analyzing the e-Government adoption or practical use of e-Government across Europe (26 EU countries). Based on the data provided by the statistical office of the European Union (Eurostat), we defined two indexes, the E-Government Use Index (EGUI) and an extreme version of it taking into account only null or complete use (EGUI+), and characterized the use/non use of e-Government tools using supervised learning procedures in a selection of countries with different e-Government adoption levels. These procedures achieved an average accuracy of 73% and determined the main factors related to the practical use of e-Government in each of the countries, e.g. the frequency of buying goods over the Internet or the education level. In addition, we compared the proposed indexes to other indexes measuring the level of e-readiness of a country such as the E-Government Development Index (EGDI) its Online Service Index (OSI) component, the Networked Readiness Index (NRI) and its Government usage component (GU). The ranking comparison found that EGUI+ is correlated with the four indexes mentioned at 0.05 significance level, as the majority of countries were ranked in similar positions. The outcomes contribute to gaining understanding about the factors influencing the use of e-Government in Europe and the different adoption levels.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. CTC tree obtained for Denmark which has a very high EGUI+ level.
Fig 2
Fig 2. CTC tree obtained for Belgium which has a low EGUI+ level.
Fig 3
Fig 3. CTC tree obtained for Poland which has a very low EGUI+ level.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. European Commission. “The Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI)”; 2019.
    1. Shareef MA, Kumar V, Kumar U, Dwivedi YK. e-Government Adoption Model (GAM): Differing service maturity levels. Government Information Quarterly. 2011;28(1):17—35. 10.1016/j.giq.2010.05.006. - DOI
    1. Layne K, Lee J. “Developing fully functional E-government: A four stage model”. Government Information Quarterly. 2001;18(2):122–136. 10.1016/S0740-624X(01)00066-1 - DOI
    1. Brown MM, Brudney JL. Achieving advanced electronic government services: An examination of obstacles and implications from an international perspective. In: National Public Management Research Conference, Bloomington, IN. vol. 2; 2001. p. 143–49.
    1. Carter L, Bélanger F. The utilization of e-government services: citizen trust, innovation and acceptance factors*. Information Systems Journal. 2005;15(1):5–25. 10.1111/j.1365-2575.2005.00183.x - DOI

Publication types

MeSH terms