Social media for openness and accountability in the public sector: Cases in the Greek context

• Conceptualises social media use for openness and accountability
• Shows the use of social media drawing on the “affordances” lens
• Affordances can orchestrate design strategies for social media in e-government.
• Affordances are building blocks of national policy for openness and accountability.
• Discusses the implications of the affordances lens for policy and practise

This paper explores the use of government social media for openness and accountability. The extant literature has highlighted the benefits of social media use in this context to enhance citizen participation and engagement in decision-making and policy development, facilitate openness and transparency efforts, and reduce corruption. Yet, there are limited studies that discuss those properties of social media that can afford openness and accountability, and their implications for policy and practise. To address these gaps, a study is conducted in the Greek context using interviews with top managers, policy makers, and relevant stakeholders across five initiatives. We discuss distinct affordances for openness and accountability, and propose their inclusion as building blocks of the national ICT policy for openness and accountability. Finally, we provide the implications of the affordances lens for policy and practise, the limitations of the study and future research avenues.