Understanding Cross-Sector Collaboration in E-Government Development: Theoretical Consideration Based on Extended Bryson's Framework

With the rapid development of e-government, cross-sector collaboration has been one of the most important issues to academia and practitioners. Although collaboration was a classical topic in public administration research, digital age and e-government environment complicate the related issues from multi-perspectives. Based on accumulated literature in the public administration research area and e-government research area, this paper tries to introduce Bryson’s Framework, an important theoretical framework of collaboration in public administration provided on 2006, for analyzing cross-sector collaboration based on e-government development more deeply. Considering the e-government environment, we redefine and extend the detail items of five basic dimensions in the framework, called initial conditions, process, structure and governance, constraints on collaboration, outcomes. The research plan of an empirical study in a local government in China for utilizing this extended framework was also discussed briefly in the paper. Keyword: Cross-sector collaboration, E-Government, Bryson’s framework, Public management reform, ICT