Title: Significant socio-economic factors for local e-government development in Portugal

Authors: Gonçalo Paiva Dias; Marco Costa

Addresses: Higher School of Technology and Management of Águeda, University of Aveiro, Apartado 473, 3754 – 909, Águeda, Portugal ' Higher School of Technology and Management of Águeda, University of Aveiro, Apartado 473, 3754 – 909, Águeda, Portugal

Abstract: In this paper, we present an empirical study of local e-government in Portugal and an investigation of the socio-economic indicators that are most significant to explain its development. The websites of all Portuguese municipalities were analysed according to three dimensions: government information, service delivery and participation. The results were investigated using regression models to identify the socio-economic indicators that are most significant to explain development and clustering techniques to identify homogeneous groups of municipalities in what concerns that development. We identify the socio-economic factors that are most significant to explain the results of municipalities and the discriminating factors for development in each dimension of analysis. We also identify seven main profiles of municipalities with different median scores in the three dimensions, which allow us to validate our own methodology and, generically, the ordered stages paradigm of the majority of the existent e-government maturity models.

Keywords: e-government; local government; Portugal; e-participation; e-services; regression modelling; electronic government; electronic participation; electronic services; online services; online participation; government information; service delivery.

DOI: 10.1504/EG.2013.058785

Electronic Government, an International Journal, 2013 Vol.10 No.3/4, pp.284 - 309

Received: 22 Jan 2013
Accepted: 02 Jul 2013
Published online: 19 Jan 2014 *

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