Improving qualities of e-government services in Rwanda: A service provider perspective

E-government implementation is growing worldwide. In the context of developed countries, as well as some developing ones, research provides tools to evaluate e-government services and reflect on e-government performance. However, in the least developed countries (LDCs), where the preconditions are in many ways more challenging, little is known about those services. While information technology can be imported, social, organizational, and infrastructural arrangements conducive to high-quality service delivery must be developed locally. In contributing to understanding the challenges as well as opportunities involved, this paper explores the qualities of e-government services in Rwanda, an East African LDC. The investigation focuses on service providers' views of the qualities, as it is only through their understanding of the situation that service quality can be improved. This is a qualitative study based on interviews with employees of government organizations and document analysis. We identify and discuss 28 e-government service quality factors, which are grouped into nine quality dimensions-accessibility, availability, awareness, responsiveness, information quality, information security, ease of use, support, and cost. This research contributes to raising awareness about the qualities of e-government services in Rwanda in particular but may also have relevance for other LDCs.