Toward a Conceptual Model for Citizens’ Adoption of Smart Mobile Government Services during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Jordan

With the accelerated evolution of smart mobile applications, more government organizations are putting forth efforts to motivate their citizens to utilize mobile government (m-gov) applications and services. Accordingly, the citizens’ perspective is vital to improve the applications and promote their engagement in the public services. The current study explored an important issue related to the factors affecting citizens adoption of smart m-gov services in the Jordanian context in order to develop a conceptual framework. Previous research on e-government adoption has paid attention to traditional web-based services. Yet, given the distinguishing characteristics of mobile technology and its application, more study of m-government is warranted. The current study expands the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) by integrating its original variables (i.e., Performance Expectancy PE, Effort Expectancy EE, Social influence SI, Facilitating Conditions FC) with contextual variables (i.e., Fear of COVID-19, Trust, Corruption Avoidance). The proposed model will contribute to academic literature and provide practical implications, advancing the understanding of mobile-based governmental services and applications during crisis time (e.g., COVID-19)

Toward a Conceptual Model for Citizens’ Adoption of Smart Mobile Government Services during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Jordan

With the accelerated evolution of smart mobile applications, more government organizations are putting forth efforts to motivate their citizens to utilize mobile government (m-gov) applications and services. Accordingly, the citizens’ perspective is vital to improve the applications and promote their engagement in the public services. The current study explored an important issue related to the factors affecting citizens adoption of smart m-gov services in the Jordanian context in order to develop a conceptual framework. Previous research on e-government adoption has paid attention to traditional web-based services. Yet, given the distinguishing characteristics of mobile technology and its application, more study of m-government is warranted. The current study expands the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) by integrating its original variables (i.e., Performance Expectancy PE, Effort Expectancy EE, Social influence SI, Facilitating Conditions FC) with contextual variables (i.e., Fear of COVID-19, Trust, Corruption Avoidance). The proposed model will contribute to academic literature and provide practical implications, advancing the understanding of mobile-based governmental services and applications during crisis time (e.g., COVID-19)

The effects of national integrity policy, e-government and legal framework on the perception of corruption practices in Malaysia: The perspective of legal practitioners

Corruption is a menace which has created unfavourable business environment in one country thus erodes the confidence to do business and to invest. In Malaysian context, it is claimed that the widespread of corruption practices is caused by the inadequacy in the system. This study examines the effects of the implementation of Malaysian National Integrity Policy (NIP), e-Government and legal framework on the corruption practices from the perspectives of legal practitioners. A total of 378 usable data were obtained from the legal practitioners practising in Penang, Selangor, Kuala Lumpur and Johor. The data were analysed using SPSS 22.0 and multiple regression analysis was performed to test the hypothesis relationships. The findings reveal that the legal practitioners perceived corruption practices in Malaysia as prevalent and the Government needs to be sincere, transparent and more proactive in executing the NIP, e-Government and legal framework. The results also show that the NIP, e-government and legal framework need to be more comprehensive in order to ensure that corruption can be stamped out. In general, the legal practitioners who participated in this study are generally skeptics and unsure of the Government’s initiatives to fight corruption but believe that a more comprehensive and transparent efforts to fight corruptions via the NIP, legal framework and e-Government could have positive impact in curbing corruption practices. Hence, the Government’s initiatives could be further improved, amended and improvised to ensure that corruption practices can be curbed. Although it is acknowledged that there are no anti-corruption measures that could fight corruption in totality, it is hoped that the more comprehensive, transparent and well-implemented NIP, e-Government and legal framework could reduce the likelihood of corrupt behaviours in Malaysia. Future research should fill in the gap by investigating other relevant factors such as religion, and goverment enforcement to fight corruptio

Electronic government and corruption: Systematic literature review, framework, and agenda for future research

The notion of corruption has emerged as a prominent topic against the backdrop of e-government. However, there are diverse but disorganized viewpoints about the relationship between e-government and corruption, thus creating difficulties in obtaining a structured overview of the existing literature and identifying the avenues to take this research area forward. Despite this, prior studies have made limited attempts to gather these fragmented observations to guide future research holistically. To address this concern, we conduct a systematic literature review (SLR) of 63 articles discussing e-government and corruption and provide a comprehensive synthesis of the current knowledge in this domain. In particular, we offer a thematic classification of prior studies, uncover the key gaps in the literature, identify the potential research areas, and provide recommendations to broaden the avenues for future studies. Furthermore, we propose an integrated conceptual framework to caution policymakers about the incomplete understanding offered by the existing studies and to inspire further research in several ways.publishedVersio

The landscape of public procurement research: a bibliometric analysis and topic modelling based on Scopus

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the structure and dynamics of academic articles relating to public procurement (PP) in the period 1984–2022 (up to May). The researchers also intend to analyse how this knowledge domain has grown since 1984. Design/methodology/approach A bibliometric analysis was carried out to examine the existing state of PP research. Based on 640 journal articles indexed in the Scopus database and written by 1,247 authors over nearly four decades, a bibliometric analysis was conducted to reveal the intellectual structure of academic works pertaining to PP. Findings Findings reveal that PP research from Scopus has significantly increased in the past decade. Major journals publishing PP research are International Journal of Procurement Management, Journal of Cleaner Production, Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management and Public Money and Management. Results also indicate that authors’ cooperation network is fragmented, showing limited collaboration among PP researchers. In addition, results suggest that the institutional collaboration network in PP research mirrors what is commonly referred to as the North–South divide, signifying insufficient research collaboration between developed and developing countries’ institutions. According to the co-occurrence keyword network and topic modelling, PP revolves around five main themes, including innovation, corruption, sustainable and green PP, PP contracts and small and medium enterprises. Based on these results, several directions for future research are suggested. Social implications This paper provides an increased understanding of the entire PP field and the potential research directions. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first-ever application of bibliometric techniques and topic modelling to examine the development of PP research since 1984 based on scholarly publications extracted from the Scopus database

Analisis Implementasi E-Procurement Terhadap Kinerja Pada Pengadaan Barang Dan Jasa Di Pemerintah Daerah Kabupaten Situbondo

E -procurement telah berkembang menjadi penggunaan teknologi elektronik untuk merampingkan dan mengaktifkan kegiatan pengadaan suatu organisasi (Hawking et al., 2004). E -procurement menawarkan kesempatan yang menjanjikan sebagai cara untuk efisiensi, transparansi, keterbukaan pengadaan public, kepastian kontrak yang diberikan kepada penawar dengan nilai terbaik (Oliveira dan Amorim, 2001). Tonggak pengembangan e -procurement di Indonesia dimulai tahun 2003 dengan terbitnya Keputusan Presiden Nomor 80 Tahun 2003 tentang Pedoman Pelaksanaan Pengadaan Barang/Jasa Pemerintah. Dalam Keppres ini, pengadaan mulai dimungkinkan diproses dengan memanfaatkan sarana elektronik. E - procurement merupakan sebuah inisiatif dalam tata kelola pemerintahan sebagai salah satu cara untuk mewujudkan system pemerintahan yang lebih baik sehingga dengan adanya implementasi e -procurement yang sesuai dengan tujuan diharapkan dapat meningkatkan kinerja bagi organisasi yang lebih baik. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah menganalisis nilai-nilai dalam implementasi e - procurement danmengetahui apakah dengan adanya penerapan system e - procurement di pemerintahan daerah akan menjadikan proses pengadaan barang dan jasa menjadi lebih baik sehingga dapat meningkatkan kinerjaprocurement. Penelitian ini menggunakan analisa kuantitatif dan kualitatif (mixed method) dimana peneliti mengumpulkan data kuantitif dan data kualitatif dalam waktu bersamaan pada tahap penelitian, kemudian membandingkan antara keduanya untuk mengetahui perbedaan atau kombinasi sehingga melengkapi hasil analisa yang dilakukanapakah kedua data saling memperkuat, memperlemah atau bertentangan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa terdapat hubungan yang saling melengkapi antara hasil pada analisa kuantitatif dan hasil analisa kualitatif. Hubungan antara masing-masing variabel dan domain menunjukkan bahwa besarnya penggunaan e -procurement berpengaruh terhadap nilai-nilai dalam kegiatan pangadaan barang dan jasa di pemerintahan daerah. Nilai-nilai yang meliputi efisiensi, efektifitas, transparansi dan keterbukaan yang dipengaruhi oleh besarnya penggunaan layanan pengadaan secara elektronik mempengaruhi kinerja dalam kegiatan pengadaan barang dan jasa. ===================================================================================================== E -procurement has evolved into the use of electronic technology to streamline and enabled the procurement activities of an organization (Hawking et.al., 2004). E -procurement offers a promising opportunity as a way to efficiency, transparency, openness of public procurement, the certainty of the contract awarded to the bidder with the best value (Oliveira and Amorim, 2001). Development of e - procurement in Indonesia began in 2003 with the Promulgation of Presidential Decree No. 80/2003 on Guidelines for procurement of good government. The procurement process began is possible by utilizing electronic means. E -procurement is an initiative in governance system that the implementation of e -procurement accordance with the objectives expected to improve performance procurement for better organization. The purpose of this study is analyze the values of procurement implementation and determine whether the application the system of e -procurement in local government will make the process of procurement much better and improve the performance of procurement. This study uses quantitative and qualitative analysis and collect the data at the same time and than compare to determine the differences or combinations that completement the results of the analysis if the two data mutually reinforcing, weaken or contradict. The result showed that there is a complementary relationship between the quantitative and qualitative analysis. Each variable and domain shows that the use of e -procurement affect in procurement values. The usage of e -procurement influence efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and openness so that affect to procurement performance

Deliberative Democracy in the EU. Countering Populism with Participation and Debate. CEPS Paperback

Elections are the preferred way to freely transfer power from one term to the next and from one political party or coalition to another. They are an essential element of democracy. But if the process of power transfer is corrupted, democracy risks collapse. Reliance on voters, civil society organisations and neutral observers to fully exercise their freedoms as laid down in international human rights conventions is an integral part of holding democratic elections. Without free, fair and regular elections, liberal democracy is inconceivable. Elections are no guarantee that democracy will take root and hold, however. If the history of political participation in Europe over the past 800 years is anything to go by, successful attempts at gaining voice have been patchy, while leaders’ attempts to silence these voices and consolidate their own power have been almost constant (Blockmans, 2020). Recent developments in certain EU member states have again shown us that democratically elected leaders will try and use majoritarian rule to curb freedoms, overstep the constitutional limits of their powers, protect the interests of their cronies and recycle themselves through seemingly free and fair elections. In their recent book How Democracies Die, two Harvard professors of politics write: “Since the end of the Cold War, most democratic breakdowns have been caused not by generals and soldiers but by elected governments themselves” (Levitsky and Ziblatt, 2018)

An Empirical Evaluation Of The Potential Of Public E-Procurement To Reduce Corruption

One of the significant potential benefits of e-procurement technology is reducing opportunities for corruption in public procurement processes. The authors identified anti-corruption capabilities of e-procurement through an extensive literature review and a theoretical model representing the impact of three latent variables: monopoly of power, information asymmetry, and transparency and accountability upon the dependent variable, the intent-to-adopt e-procurement. This research was guided by the Principal-Agent theory and collected the perceptions of 46 government officers of the potential of public e-procurement to reduce corruption in public procurement processes. Results were analysed using the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) approach. The findings suggest that the intent-to-adopt e-procurement has a positive and significant relationship with the independent variables that might inform developing countries in strategies to combat corruption in public procurement

ENABLING LOCAL GOVERNMENTS TO DESIGN AND IMPLEMENT ANTI-CORRUPTION STRATEGIES THROUGH DYNAMIC PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT AND GOVERNANCE. A CASE-STUDY OF AN ITALIAN MUNICIPALITY

Lo scopo principale di questa ricerca è quello di inquadrare le possibili relazioni causali fra corruzione negli approvvigionamenti pubblici e performance delle amministrazioni locali. A tal fine, viene adottato un disegno di ricerca che integra dinamicamente metodi quantitativi e qualitativi in ogni fase del processo di studio. Gli approcci Dynamic Performance Management (DPM) e Governance (DPG), supportati da interviste approfondite non-strutturate, modellazioni formali e simulazioni quantitative, sono qui adottati per analizzare un caso di studio rappresentativo di un piccolo comune italiano in cui si sono verificati alcuni episodi di corruzione nelle attività di approvvigionamento nei primi anni 2000. In particolare, l'Ente locale in questione è stato sciolto due volte per infiltrazioni di stampo mafioso e, attualmente, versa in una situazione di dissesto finanziario. Il lavoro analizza i possibili esiti di tali fatti sulla performance organizzativa dell'Ente nel suo complesso sulla base di tre fonti: dati primari qualitativi generati da interviste frontali convergenti non-strutturate; dati secondari estrapolati da sentenze passate in giudicato e da archivi ad accesso aperto; ed un'ampia rassegna della letteratura. All'inizio, una panoramica della letteratura aiuta il lettore a comprendere i contenuti, le teorie ed i confini della corruzione. Successivamente, viene proposto un esame delle strategie di misurazione e delle misure più diffuse per prevenirla e contrastarla. Nel complesso, una particolare attenzione è riservata agli approvvigionamenti nei contesti pubblici locali. A seguito di una discussione sui possibili vantaggi e svantaggi, in termini di opportunità e deterrenze corruttive, derivanti dall'adozione dei paradigmi di governance nel settore pubblico più diffusi, gli approcci DPM e DPG vengono analizzati per comprendere il loro contributo teorico nel supportare i responsabili politici ed i manager ad arginare i fenomeni di corruzione. Successivamente, sulla base di alcune tecniche di codifica applicate alle interviste frontali non-strutturate svolte con alcuni Pubblici Ufficiali, un approccio esplorativo-descrittivo del caso-studio selezionato consente di comprendere la misura in cui gli eventi corruttivi investigati in questa sede abbiano inciso nel tempo sulla performance complessiva del Comune preso in esame. In seguito, viene adottata una prospettiva sistemica e dinamica di performance management per inquadrare le relazioni di causa-effetto emergenti dal caso di studio. L'assunzione di un approccio DPM consente ai politici ed ai dirigenti pubblici di progettare, implementare e valutare strategie anticorruzione fattibili, efficaci ed efficienti a livello di governo locale. Più precisamente, l'utilizzo, in un grafico DPM, di driver di performance adeguati al rischio di corruzione legato alle sue cause strutturali ed individualistiche può porre rimedio non soltanto alle riconosciute ambiguità e carenze derivanti dall'adozione di “bandiere rosse” nei processi di approvvigionamento pubblico, ma anche ai fallimenti dei controlli direzionali meccanicistici nel rilevare l'effettiva presenza di corruzione, fornendo ai decisori tempestivi segnali derivanti dagli effetti deleteri prodotti da siffatte pratiche clandestine. Inoltre, enfatizzare il ruolo della moralità civica comunitaria a livello di sistema può supportare la comprensione di alcuni risultati controintuitivi della passata ricerca sulla corruzione negli approvvigionamenti pubblici e dedurre in che modo gli investimenti nelle tecnologie dell'informazione e della comunicazione (TIC) e la formazione del personale possano migliorare responsabilità e competenza dei governi locali. Per quanto riguarda la professionalità dei dirigenti e dello staff quale causa individualistica di corruzione, il patronage politico derivante da opportunità legali risulta, per il caso di studio, significativo nello spiegare il cattivo andamento degli approvvigionamenti pubblici nel tempo. All'interno di questo quadro, la visualizzazione DPM consente altresì di distinguere più dettagliatamente la corruzione dallo spreco di risorse dovuto ad azioni non corruttive. In sintesi, un approccio DPM può consentire ai manager pubblici di mantenere i loro “radar cognitivi” costantemente (re)attivi, in modo da: identificare e sopprimere pratiche illecite negli approvvigionamenti pubblici; rilevare illeciti emergenti che potrebbero essere trascurati dai tradizionali approcci diagnostici e interattivi del controllo direzionale; favorire l'apprendimento etico e migliorare il valore pubblico generato. Infine, la prospettiva DPG può essere efficace nel supportare la formulazione e la messa a punto di strategie anticorruzione basate sulla collaborazione multistakeholder, nonché nel sondarne la fattibilità e gli impatti nel tempo all'interno di aree locali caratterizzate da strutture di governance carenti. Pertanto, sulla base di precedenti progetti di successo realizzati da governi locali di diverse parti del mondo, nell'ultima parte di questa tesi di ricerca viene utilizzato un approccio DPG per delineare e valutare una strategia anticorruzione per il caso in esame secondo un'impostazione di collaborative governance, così da inquadrare possibili sinergie ed interdipendenze tra i soggetti rilevanti, quali leve critiche per contrastare il rischio sistemico di corruzione a livello locale.The main purpose of this research is to frame the possible causal relationships between corruption in public procurement and performance of local governments. With this aim, a fully-integrated research design is adopted to dynamically mix quantitative and qualitative methods at every phase of the research process. The Dynamic Performance Management (DPM) and Governance (DPG) approaches, supported by in-depth interviews, formal modelling and simulations, are here adopted to analyse a representative case-study of an Italian small Municipality, where some corruption episodes in procurement activities occurred in the early 2000s. In particular, the local Authority in question was disbanded twice for mafia-like infiltrations and is currently facing a financial instability. In the light of that, the overall work studies the possible outcomes of those facts on the organisational performance as a whole, based on three sources: qualitative primary data generated by face-to-face convergent interviews; secondary data retrieved from both documents describing legal cases and open-access repositories; an extensive literature review. At the beginning, a broad and composite literature overview helps the reader become aware about the contents, theories and boundaries of corruption. Thereafter, an examination of the most widespread measurement strategies and measures to either prevent or repress it is proposed. Overall, a special focus is set on procurement in local public contexts. Following a discussion on the possible advantages and disadvantages of the most common public sector paradigms in terms of opportunities and constraints for corruption, the DPM and DPG views are explored to understand their theoretical contribution in supporting policy- and decision-makers to curb corruption phenomena in heterogeneous governance contexts. Afterwards, based on coding techniques, an exploratory-descriptive approach of the selected case-study allows for a better understanding of the extent to which the investigated corruption events impacted on the overall performance of the Municipality under scrutiny over time, by means of non-structured face-to-face interviews held with some Public Officials in 2019. Therefore, a system perspective in performance management is adopted to frame the emerging cause-and-effect relationships of the case-study. Assuming a DPM approach allows politicians and public managers to design, implement and assess feasible, effective and efficient anti-corruption strategies at local government level. More precisely, the use in a DPM chart of performance drivers adjusted for the risk of corruption linked to its structural and individualistic causes may not only put right to ambiguities and flaws deriving from the adoption of ‘red-flags’ in public procurement, but also to failures of mechanistical controls in detecting the actual presence of corruption, thus providing decision-makers with prompt signals arising from the emergent effects of clandestine practices. In addition, emphasising the role of community civic morality at system level may back up the understanding of some counterintuitive results in the past research on corruption in public procurement and deduce to what extent investments in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and personnel training may enhance local government accountability and expertise. With regard to managers’ and staff’s professionalism, as individualistic cause of corruption, political patronage stemming from legal opportunities results significant in explaining poor performance in public procurement over time. Within this framework, the DPM view also allows for better singling corruption out from resource waste due to non-corrupt actions. In summary, a DPM approach may lead public managers to constantly maintain their ‘cognitive radar’ reactive, so as to identify and suppress unlawful practices in procurement, detect emerging malfeasances that could be otherwise overlooked by traditional static diagnostical and interactive approaches, foster ethical learning and enhance community outcomes. Finally, the DPG perspective may be effective in supporting formulation and fine-tuning of collaboration-based anti-corruption strategies and probing their feasibility and impacts over time within local areas characterised by poor governance structures. Hence, on the basis of previous successful projects throughout the world, in the last part of this research thesis a DPG approach is used to outline and evaluate an anti-corruption strategy for the case under scrutiny according to collaboration settings, in a way to frame possible synergies and interdependencies among relevant participants as critical levers to hinder systemic risk of corruption at local level