ELECTRONIC GOVERNMENT IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: AN ASSESSMENT OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT WEB SITES IN TURKEY

Abstract

Electronic government (e-government) has been transforming the relationship which governments have traditionally had with the citizens and render governments’ services and information to be more efficient, accountable, effective and accessible. Web sites are the key tools of e-government and the right channel for communication and service provision. Web platforms provide governments to improve their efficiency and effectiveness, strengthen democracy and public trust. This is much more important at local levels as the most basic public services are provided in the cities and citizens are most connected to government. As web content and use continues to increase, local governments monitor regularly and enhance the quality of their sites to attract and satisfy users. This study tries to evaluate the e-government development and early practices in Turkey through greater municipalities. The research analyzes the official web sites of sixteen greater municipalities in Turkey and evaluates them in terms of main e-government categories. The categories determined for this research according to the literature are; services provided, information available, security, government transparency/openness, and citizen outreach/interactivity. It is important to see the results to assess and discuss the current condition of local e-government implications in Turkey by means of government transparency, information flow and citizen participation.

Keywords

• e-government, greater municipal web sites,citizen interaction, government transparency

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