Measuring the Public Value of e-Government: Trust in Measurement Processes or Processes of Building Trust?

In the recent past several authors have addressed the issue of the 'e‐Government paradox' which is exemplified by the contrast between the level of investments made on deploying ICT‐enabled services and the little impact produced and/or demonstrated so far. To this regard, in most maturing countries, main barriers hindering the adoption of e‐ Government services are those related to the lack of both a structured policy measurement process and an effective stakeholders' engagement. In particular, critical success factor for e‐Government adoption seems to be a transparent and trustworthy policy decision‐making process and its key prerequisite is the definition and implementation of a well organized and fully participatory measurement framework, enhancing stakeholder trust in policy decision. Starting from these findings, the paper explores the existing relationship between measurement and trust on e‐Government decision‐ making processes, discussing which could be the possible trade‐off between high quality measurement of public e‐services and the high level of trust in policy decisions for their adoption and long term sustainability. The methodological approach underpinning the analysis is based upon a critical review of main e‐Government measurement frameworks, selected according to their effective capability to support policy decision‐making in implementing e‐Government strategies as well as their expected value to reinforce 'trust' with citizens and stakeholders.. As a result of the analysis a new measurement model capable of measuring the public value of e‐Government services is proposed. The model has been tested in a real context of usage for the measurement of the Telematics and Informatics Policies Implementation Plan (PiTER) of the Emilia‐Romagna Region in Italy in the period 2011‐2013. The paper therefore discusses the main findings emerged from the concrete application of the proposed model in light of the feedback received from the public administration and the stakeholders participating to the measurement process. It then outlines its conditions of applicability in other policy contexts as well as new possible research directions.