Does the Answer to eGovernment Lie in Intermunicipal Collaboration? An Exploratory Italian Case Study

The paper analyses Italy’s recent attempt to build new intermunicipal structures to support eGovernment development also in peripheral areas of the country. Preliminary findings for an individual region (the Piedmont Region)show that intermunicipal collaborations can facilitate the coordination of interdependent subjects, rationalize existing resources (e.g. through the use of application software solutions), and prevent the dispersal of government funds. At the same time, the new intermunicipal structures alone do not seem to have the authority needed to ensure that the decisions made by the technical round table participants will automatically translate into a concrete and binding commitment for all the municipalities potentially involved. The paper seeks to use the analytical frameworks offered by organization science to interpret the effects of collaborative arrangements on eGovernment implementation.