Public centric e‐governance in Jordan: A field study of people's perception of e‐governance awareness, corruption, and trust

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to assess the efforts made by Jordan in the direction of e‐governance and people's perception of corruption, trust, and e‐governance.

Design/methodology/approach

Desk research was conducted using secondary data sources followed by a field survey conducted with 412 sample respondents in three major cities of Jordan. Following the triangulation approach, the responses of university professors and the common people were also secured.

Findings

The Jordanian government's efforts towards e‐governance are commendable in the Middle East. However, there are certain impediments that are witnessed in the form of the digital divide, corruption, social bottlenecks, the stage of democratization, the lack of marketing to stakeholders, and the citizen's lack of adoption of technology. Educated people are aware of the merit of e‐governance contrary to the uneducated ones and perceive that corruption in the Jordanian public sector is increasing.

Research limitations/implications

The study mainly reflects the views of the educated people. The views of the uneducated ones are secured through basic interactions as they expressed their inability to respond to the questionnaires. Somehow, the respondents are not very open to freely share their opinions or have abstained from participation‐since they consider this a sensitive issue within the Jordanian cultural and political setup. Further, asking opinions of members of the public might not be the ideal way of judging the level of corruption, or changes in it.

Originality/value

People's perception is that Jordan is affected by a low level of corruption and that its citizens lack awareness of e‐governance. To remedy this, its citizens need to be motivated to trust and to participate in the process of e‐governance and to increase their understanding of the tools and technologies available.

Citation

Belwal, R. and Al‐Zoubi, K. (2008), "Public centric e‐governance in Jordan: A field study of people's perception of e‐governance awareness, corruption, and trust", Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, Vol. 6 No. 4, pp. 317-333. https://doi.org/10.1108/14779960810921123