ILS faculty member, Dr. Alice Robbin participated in the 14th Annual International Conference on Digital Government Research held June 16-21, 2013 in Quebec City, Canada. She gave a talk titled “Theory, Method, Evidence” as a part of a panel presentation “Big Questions in E-Government Research.” The abstract of her talk is included below.
Other colleagues on the panel were Mete Yildiz (Hacettepe University, Turkey), Tim Turner (University of New South Wales, Australia), Nitesh Bharosa (Delft University of Technology, Netherlands), and Hans Jochen Scholl (University of Washington, USA.)
The conference theme this year was “From e-Government to Smart Government.”
Talk Abstract:
Three of the four “big questions of e-government research in public administration” connect theory, method, and evidence. We are asked to develop “novel and more usable concepts, models, and theories,” conduct research that is “more multidisciplinary and comparative,” and improve “measurement and assessment of performance and results.” These questions can be examined as premises cum objectives, accomplishments, or outcomes of the e-government study domain. What Yildiz contends is that e-government research has not yet accomplished these objectives in the disciplinary problem space of public administration. My presentation addresses the empirical evidence for Yildiz’s assessment. I expand the disciplinary problem space to include seven disciplines named by Scholl (2007) and analyze the published e-government journal literature between 2007 and 2012 to test whether Yildiz’s premises about theory, method, and evidence are supported. The results of my analysis are discussed.
Photo Credit: Quebec City Summer 2009 by Derek Hatfield
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Posted July 19, 2013