Enhancing the case for Electronic Government in developing nations: A people-centric study focused in Saudi Arabia

The pace of implementing Electronic Government (E-Gov) is rapidly increasing. However, despite high levels of investment, a broad range of applications, and various methods of access relatively low levels of various methods of access, relatively low levels of usage (and even familiarity with e-gov) are still common. For example, in Canada, long recognized as a leader in implementing e-gov, less than 27% of Canadians used E-Gov during the past 12 months and 81% of c non-users report a low level of familiarity with either federal or provincial governmental services available through e-gov (Canada, 2004). Or, consider the showcase e-gov Gyandoot project in the Dhar district in central India, whose population is estimated at 1.7 million. Even after implementing e-gov in a showcase project for the rural poor, a study by the Center for Electronic Governance, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad concluded that this model of “government to citizen” service delivery has serious sustenance problems (World Bank, 2004). The research reported in this paper takes a step back and focuses on the acceptability of e-gov by individuals. It is a people-centric approach to determine the overall acceptability of e-gov to people in a developing country, Saudi Arabia. Although this research may be generalizable to other situations, the primary intention of this project is to shed light on how to approach and manage implementation projects in developing nations.