Sustainability Framework for E-Government Success: Feasibility Assessment

E-government improves and more importantly transforms the public sector. To take advantage of such benefits, developing countries have been investing a lot on e-government initiatives in spite of their limited budget. Sustaining successful e-government initiatives is of utmost importance especially for developing countries to let them attain what they aspire for in transforming government functions. Extant literature, however, show that there are only few success stories whereas majorities of those efforts end up in a failure. Literature also reveal that sustainability aspect of e-government initiatives is a neglected topic and calls to extend e-government research beyond success. The research tries to explore two concepts (e-government success and sustainability) in an integrated manner and is aimed at exploring the potential relationship between the two concepts. In order to achieve this objective, the research was conducted in two steps. First, a conceptual framework is proposed based on a multiple exploratory case study based on four G2G cases selected from rural areas in Ethiopia. Second, feasibility of the proposed conceptual framework is assessed in another related setting. Focusing on the second step of the research, this paper looks at a G2C Court Case Management System (CCMS) at Federal Supreme Court of Ethiopia (www.fsc.gov.et). The CCMS has been in operation over a decade and transformed registrar business process by automating its record management from start to finish and facilitated citizen's request for court information. It is credited for reducing delay in retrieving court information, simplifying the process, and reducing the potential for corruption. The findings elaborate on the potential of the initial conceptual framework for understanding success and sustainability of e-government initiatives by uncovering the relationship between the enablers of e-government success and sustainability. Building on the initial conceptual framework, this paper ultimately proposes a revised sustainability framework to guide understanding of the phenomenon in the ground. The outcome of the research is also of value for practitioners as a quality tool to assess success and sustainability aspect of e-government initiatives.