Towards the Maturity of Open Public Data Portals in the Public Sector. A Comparative Analysis of the Local Level of Government in Spain

Open public data portals have become one of the main technologies of public administrations for the exercise of transparency, accountability, citizen participation and co-production of public services. Few empirical studies have analyzed on a large scale the use of these platforms considering their multidimensional nature. This research offers an empirical analysis of how these technological artifacts are being used at the Spanish local level An observation of 66 open public data web portals enabled by Spanish municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants has been carried out through a framework of indicators and dimensions based on previous literature. The results, derived from a descriptive statistical analysis of the state of evolution of the portals observed, show a certain preference for a technical development linked to transparency, as opposed to a social and reuse dimension. The implications of this study highlight an incipient transformation of local public administration, whereas the paradigm of smart public management -more participative and collaborative- has not yet fully accomplished. Also, this study provides a basis for the development of future research that requires further study of the dimensions of citizen participation and co-production by the advent of open public data.