E-government principles: implementation, advantages and challenges

As internet growth provides new communication pathways and transaction models, many countries are positioning to take advantage of the possibilities for effective and efficient provision of government services to their populations. E-government is a form of information system and requires not only appropriate infrastructure to deliver it but also a level of e-readiness within government and the population. The objective of this paper is to review the available literature about e-government implementation stages, its challenges and benefits. This paper gathers and consolidates several relevant issues regarding e-government such as the definitions of e-government and e-readiness, classification of implementation stages, advantages of e-government implementation and particularly focuses on the challenges of e-government implementation. Analysing a brief study of Saudi Arabia’s developing e-government programme indicates that most of the issues raised in the literature are relevant. It is expected that this review will form a conceptual basis for a new wave of research into effective e-government acceptance and adoption.