IRÉNE BERNHARD E-governm

ent and E-governance

TRITA SOM 2014-11ISSN 1653-6126ISRN KTH/SOM/14-11/SEISBN 978-91-7595-238-3

KTH

2014

E-government and E-governanceLocal Implementation of E-government Policies in Sweden

IRÉNE BERNHARD

DOCTORAL THESIS IN PLANNING AND DECISION ANALYSISSTOCKHOLM, SWEDEN 2014

KTH ROYAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGYSCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE AND THE BUILT ENVIRONMENTwww.kth.se

1

E-GOVERNMENT AND E-GOVERNANCE:

LOCAL IMPLEMENTATION OF

E-GOVERNMENT POLICIES IN SWEDEN

IRÉNE BERNHARD

2

Doctoral Thesis

Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan

Royal Institute of Technology

School of Architecture and the Built Environment

Department of Urban Planning and Environment

Division of Urban and Regional Studies

SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden

http://www.kth.se

TRITA SoM 2014-11

ISSN 1653-6126

ISNR KTH/SoM/14-11/SE

ISBN 978-91-7595-238-3

© Iréne Bernhard 2014

Printed by Universitetsservice AB, Stockholm

3

Acknowledgements

Having arrived at finishing my dissertation, I want to take the opportunity to thank several

individuals who have been invaluable during my PhD studies.

My first thanks goes to my supervisors at KTH, Department of Urban Planning and

Environment; Professor Hans Westlund and Associate Professor Jonathan Metzger.

Besides giving comments on my texts, they have always been encouraging and shared their

experiences and knowledge with me and I am truly grateful for this. It is really a luxury to

have two people coaching and supporting you like that in your work. A special thanks goes to

Hans Westlund for his positive feedback on my idea to apply for doctoral studies at KTH.

Associate Professor Vania A. Ceccato, Department of Urban Planning and Environment,

KTH, for her critical and constructive comments on my PhD thesis cover essay.

Susan Hellström, Administrative officer, Department of Urban Planning and Environment,

KTH, who has been a great help in all administrative issues.

Professor Elin Wihlborg, Linköping University, with whom I have had valuable discussions

as co-author of some of the articles. A special thanks goes to her as she made it possible for

me to develop my research at an early stage by involving me in a relevant research project.

My local supervisor at University West, School of Business, Economics and IT, Dr. Urban

Gråsjö, who has contributed with constructive discussions.

Elisabeth Jansson, Head of Department, and Lars Johansson, Head of Division of Media and

Design, at the same institution, from whom I have received encouragement and resources to

complete my dissertation.

Professor Kerstin Grundén and the participants within the research project “Innoveta” at

School of Business, Economics and IT, at University West, Trollhättan, as well the

participants in this project from Sambruk1, for enrichment and fruitful discussions.

Swedish Agency for Innovation Systems (VINNOVA), for having partly financed my

research studies.

A number of friends and colleagues at University West, School of Business, Economics & IT,

who have supported me also in periods of doubt. It has been a reflective time and an

invaluable source of inspiration.

I also want to thank all the interviewees who have shared their time and experiences with me.

It has been invaluable.

Last but not least, my family who have always been supportive and encouraging during my

research studies in Stockholm.

Thank you!

1 A Swedish association of municipalities for joint development of e-services.

4

Abstract

It is recognized in international research that the public sector has been transformed into a

networked, open and more flexible, informal and interactive governance structure. This is

described as a transition from “government to governance”. Sweden is one of the international

leaders with regards to e-government development. The objective of this thesis is to provide a

deeper understanding of how e-government policies are implemented in an e-governance

context, through empirical case studies in Sweden. The focus is on the local level. The overall

research question is: How is e-government policy put into practice when focusing on the local

level? This is reported in four articles.

Case study methodology is used as research method, including interviews, focus group

interviews, document studies, and some participatory observations. The analysis is partly

based on an inductive methodological approach, since this is a new, emerging field of

innovative policy and practice.

The analysis arrives at three overarching conclusions: (1) In practice, when e-government

policy is implemented and translated at the local level, it tends to happen in an e-governance

setting conducted by policy entrepreneurs or promoted by entrepreneurial behaviour in public

administration. E-government policies are implemented in relation to local cultures, norms

and economic structures. (2) Implementation of e-government and e-governance initiatives

requires trust in the service provision among public administrators as well as among citizens.

Efficiency and citizen-centred approaches in the redesign of information relationships

between public administration and citizens to create some sort of added value are crucial. (3)

The thesis indicates that there are two main implications of municipal contact centres (CCs):

they localize public services and they combine different services into a one-stop practice

striving to provide “holistic” services to the individual citizen. However, although the use of

ICT is essential for the organisational transformation, the results indicate that the

organisational settings and internal anchoring are greater constraints than new technology for

implementation of local e-government and e-governance initiatives in the form of contact

centres. One example for potential added value is the source of information of citizens’ issues

through the implementation of municipal contact centres, which may have a positive impact

on the conditions for local planning.

Keywords: e-governance, e-government, implementation, policy entrepreneurs, municipal

contact centres, policy networks, New Public Management, Sweden.

5

Sammanfattning

Enligt internationell forskning har den offentliga sektorn omvandlats till en nätverksliknande,

öppen och mer flexibel, informell och interaktiv ledningsstruktur. Detta har ofta beskrivits

som att det skett en transformering från "governmnet till governance". Sverige är ett av de

ledande länderna när det gäller utveckling av e-förvaltning. Syftet med denna avhandling är

att ge en djupare förståelse för hur svensk nationell e-förvaltningspolicy implementeras i

denna styrningskontext genom empiriska fallstudier. Den övergripande forskningsfrågan är:

Hur implementeras nationell e-förvaltningspolicy med fokus på den lokala nivån?

Analysen baseras på fyra artiklar. Fallstudiemetodik används som forskningsmetod, inklusive

intervjuer, fokusgruppsintervjuer, dokumentstudier och vissa deltagande observationer.

Analysen är delvis byggd på en induktiv metodstrategi, eftersom detta är ett nytt, innovativt

framväxande område och ny praxis.

Analysen kommer fram till tre övergripande slutsatser: (1) När e-förvaltningspolicy

genomförs på lokal nivå, tenderar det att ske i en e-governance praktik och implementeringen

utförs till stor del av policyentreprenörer eller främjas av entreprenöriellt agerande av

administratörer inom den offentliga förvaltningen. Genomförandet sker utifrån lokala

kulturer, normer och ekonomiska strukturer. (2) Införandet av e-förvaltningsinitiativ kräver

tillit och förtroende i serviceutövandet av såväl anställda inom offentlig förvaltning som bland

medborgarna. Effektivitet och medborgarcentrerade strategier i den nya utformningen av

relationer mellan den offentliga förvaltningen och medborgarna för att skapa någon form av

mervärde är central. (3) Det finns två huvudsakliga konsekvenser av kommunala

kontaktcenter: de lokaliserar offentliga tjänster och de kombinerar olika tjänster till en ”one-

stop praktik” i en strävan att ge en helhetsservice till den enskilde medborgaren. Även om

användningen av modern informationsteknologi är av väsentlig betydelse för den

organisatoriska transformeringen, tyder dock resultaten på att den interna organisationen och

förankringen är större begränsningar än ny teknik för att implementera lokala e-

förvaltningsinitiativ i form av lokala kontaktcenter. Ett exempel på potentiellt mervärde

genom införandet av kontaktcenter är att samtliga ärenden registreras. Denna information om

medborgarnas frågor, kan ha en potentiell positiv inverkan på förutsättningarna för lokal

planering.

6

List of appended articles

This thesis is based on the work presented in the following four articles:

I. Bernhard, I. & Wihlborg, E. (2012). Trust in secure public e-services: translating

policies into use, in: C. Karlsson, B. Johansson & R.R. Stough (eds.),

Entrepreneurship, Social Capital and Governance. Directions for the sustainable

development and competitiveness of regions, Cheltenham, UK & Northampton, MA,

USA: Edward Elgar, 241-262.

II. Bernhard, I. & Wihlborg, E. (2014) Policy entrepreneurs in networks: implementation

of two Swedish municipal contact centres from an actor perspective, International

Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 21, No.3, pp.288-302 DOI:

10.1504/IJESB.2014.060893.

III. Bernhard, I. & Wihlborg, E. (2014). Regional e-Governance: promoting

Entrepreneurial Behavior in Public Administration, in: C. Karlsson, B. Johansson &

R.R. Stough (eds.), Agglomeration, Clusters and Entrepreneurship: Studies in

Regional Economic Development. Cheltenham, UK & Northampton, MA, USA:

Edward Elgar.

IV. Bernhard, I. (2014). Local e-Government in Sweden – Municipal Contact Centre

Implementation with Focus on Public Administration and Citizens, The Journal of

Community Informatics. Vol. 10, No 1. http://ci-

journal.net/index.php/ciej/article/view/860/1044.

7

Preface

In addition to being a lecturer in media and communication studies at University West, I have

been working with local and regional development issues for several years. Since 1998 I have

organized and coordinated an annual scientific international conference in regional science

and entrepreneurship named “Uddevalla Symposium”. In 2002 the research theme concerned

innovations, regional development and public policy in the digital economy.

My first concrete experience studying e-governance and e-government issues related to local

and regional development actually was discussed and planned in 2008 at the Uddevalla

Symposium. I was asked to participate in a research project and make a case study on the use

of an innovative public e-service: an electronic application system for upper secondary

schools in Fyrbodal – a county of West Sweden. This case study was made in early 2009 and

later on the same year I presented a paper based on the analysis and results at the European

Regional Science Association conference.

The second concrete experience studying local e-government and e-governance policy

implementation was when I had the opportunity to work within a three-year e-government

research project financed by VINNOVA from 2009 to 2011 at University West. I evaluated

and analysed the implementation of municipal contact centres and public e-services in five

Swedish municipalities. This was one of several reasons for applying for PhD studies. I

started my PhD studies in planning and decision analysis at KTH in 2010 when working in

this research project. I wanted to deepen the understanding, focussing on the local level,

regarding the emerging development of reforming the public sector by using ICTs as a

platform for communication with and providing services to citizens and businesses.

As I have been aware of several unanswered research questions after having finalized this

doctoral thesis project, there is room for doing further research. Hopefully there will be a

continuation to this research.

Uddevalla, September, 2014

Iréne

8

1. Introduction Since the late 1990s, we have witnessed an increasing interest in reforming the public sector

by using information technology (ICT) as a platform for communication with and providing

services to citizens and businesses. This rapidly growing phenomenon is internationally

labelled “e-government” (Ho, 2002; Heeks, 2006; Löfgren 2007; Worrall, 2011; Rabiaiah and

Vandijck, 2011; Meijer and Bannister, 2011; United Nations, 2012; Norris and Reddick,

2012). E-government has over the past decade been considered an important managerial

public reform (Rose and Grant, 2010; Lee et al., 2011) as governments have sought new ways

to control costs and improve organisational efficiencies (Gil-Garcia and Pardo, 2005; Worrall,

2011; Larsson and Grönlund, 2014). Different concepts have been used to characterize this

era: the “information economy” (Heeks, 1999), the “knowledge economy” (Stough, 2006;

Westlund, 2006, 2013), the “digital revolution” and “the new economy, information age and

network society” (Castells, 1996; 2010), “Digital-Era Governance” (Dunleavy et al., 2005),

the digital economy or “New Public Governance” era (Osborne et al., 2012). It is further

argued that there has been a shift from a “managed” economy toward an “entrepreneurial”

economy in this era (Audretsch and Thurik, 2000).

The European Union and all other levels of government in Europe form policies, which are

translated at the various levels to manage the praxis of e-government. Implementation is the

process of turning policy into practice. To better understand the implementation process it is

argued that it is relevant to discuss the context of the implementation (Löfgren, 2007). The

implementation of e-government initiatives is claimed to be in a governance context as

researchers seem to agree that the public sector has transformed to a networked, open and

more flexible, informal and interactive governance structure (Montin and Hedlund, 2009;

Sorensen and Torfing, 2008; Torfing and Triantafillou, 2011). This idea is rooted among

many scholars arguing that a fundamental shift has taken place in most Western countries

regarding governing, organisation and methods of working in the society and that there is a

movement of regulation and implementation of policies from central government to other

levels and social spheres (e.g. Pierre and Peters, 2000; Löfgren, 2007). This shift is

characterized by a process opening up government towards broader governance of

partnerships and network-oriented decision-making in an intricate interplay among public,

private and non-profit organisations (Wihlborg and Palm, 2008). The role of local government

then changes. Governance structures have developed in response to the state’s increased need

to mobilize actors and their resources outside their formal context to e.g. implement public

policy. This change is recognized in the international research and then described as a

transition from “government to governance” (Pierre and Peters, 2000; Cars and von Sydow

2001; Hajer and Wagenaar 2003; Kjaer, 2004; Sørensen and Torfing, 2007; Gjelstrup and

Sørensen, 2007; Healey, 2007). However, some researchers (Pierre and Sundström, 2009;

Jordan et al., 2005) claim that governance has not replaced government – rather, government

provides the framework within which governance exists.

Several researchers emphasize that this emerging information society challenges the relations

between public institutions and citizens as well as within the organisations in many ways

9

which has led to change in the role, work and function of public administration in recent years

(e.g. Bannister, 2001; Beynon-Davies and Williams, 2003; Heeks, 2006; Worrall, 2011;

Jansson, 2013). It is further argued that within public administration there is a growing

integration of public and private collaboration, public procurement and project management

as expressions of New Public Management (NPM) (Homburg, 2008; Hall, 2011). In this

context within the information society, contemporary entrepreneurship takes place (Castells,

2002). The networked governance of NPM is formed and developed by entrepreneurial actors

in the networked governance context (von Bergmann-Winberg and Wihlborg, 2011).

Sweden is one of the international leaders with regards to e-government (United Nations,

2012). The Swedish government has had a strong policy aspiration in this progress. In 1999

the Swedish government stated that their ambition was to become an internationally leading

information society accessible to all, 24 hours every day and aiming to improve efficiency

(Government Bill, 1999/2000). The Swedish government stressed that the needs of the users

are to govern the development of e-government (Regeringskansliet, 2008). In 2010 a national

policy was proposed under the title, “As simple as possible for as many as possible – from

strategy to actions for e-administration” (SOU, 2010:20). The concept of e-government is

here translated as a part of the development activities of public administration that not only

benefits from ICT, but also ensures that the development will lead to necessary organisational

changes and training of employees within public administration. The key words of the policy

are “simple, open, accessible, efficient and secure e-government” (SOU, 2010:9). Sweden

today has a relatively high rate of Internet use (Findahl, 2011; 2012) which in a way may

allow for and thus also demands improved and developed governmental services on-line.

In Sweden, public polices cannot be forced on regional and local public agencies, because

public administration relies on the dual governing approach, with strong, constitutionally

mandated regional and local autonomy. Instead, European and national policy statements

become soft policy instruments in the regional and local context, and their implications rely

on regional and local uptake in the specific setting, and on the competencies of the

professionals in regional and local public administration. National as well as European Union

grants are examples of financial instruments in order to implement the policies in the desired

direction and create good examples.

Although there is a large amount of earlier e-Government research (Larsson and Grönlund,

2014), there is relatively little systematic research undertaken focusing on the local level

(Deakins et al., 2010). A case study of implementing e-government at the local level in Serbia

indicates that appropriate managerial and technical backgrounds, careful planning, and

competent and strict management of implementation plans based on precise goals led to

speedy development of e-Government even under severe financial constraints (Paroski et al.,

2013). Swedish research shows that there is a need for deeper investigation of the

consequences for the organisational structure of public agencies when local e-government

initiatives are implemented (Lindblad-Gidlund et al., 2010). A study of the implementation of

two contact centres in Sweden uncovers a range of management and organisational issues

including the self-protecting attitudes and actions of staff who feel threatened by technology

10

(Bernhard and Grundén, 2013). In an in-depth study of local e-government implementation in

a Swedish municipality the analysis shows that e-government reforms contribute to new

practises, in which the development and application of IT is becoming increasingly central for

the local organisation and provision of public services that contributes to a reorganisation of

actor roles and relationships (Jansson, 2013). Another case study showed that the prefix “e” as

rhetoric has entered and settled within the organisation but not yet merged within the whole

municipality. Some parts of the concept of e-government have been adopted (Giritli Nygren,

2009a). In a case study of the implementation of a Swedish municipal contact centre, focusing

on the social aspects of the public administrators, the results show that there were some

negative attitudes from the public administrators at the back office of the municipality

(Grundén, 2010). A related study (Andréasson, 2011) – a case study of the implementation

process of a new ICT tool for health information within the e-governance context in a

Swedish county council – indicates that the new ICT tool contributes to blurring the line

between public and private. Another indication is that introduction of new IT systems has

broad importance for the organisation of public organisations (Andréasson, 2011). Research

focusing on policy entrepreneurs in the implementation of local e-government initiatives has

been analysed by a few case studies (von Bergmann-Winberg and Wihlborg, 2011; Wihlborg,

2011).

1.2 Research objective

The research objective of this thesis is to provide a deeper understanding of how e-

government policies are implemented in an e-governance context, through empirical case

studies in Sweden. The focus is on the local level which means that it is a bottom-up

perspective rather than a top-down perspective.

The overall research question and sub-research questions in this thesis are:

How is e-government policy put into practice when focusing on the local level?

followed by the three sub-research questions (SRQ):

1. What is the role of policy entrepreneurs in the implementation of local e-

government initiatives in Sweden?

2. How does the implementation of e-government and e-governance initiatives

affect trust in public service provision?

3. How does the implementation of local municipal contact centres (CCs) affect

the work of the public administrators in terms of their role as suppliers of public

service?

The aim and the research question’s relation to the four articles and the cover essay is

described in Table 1 on the following page.

11

Table 1: Research questions in relation to the articles and the cover essay.

SRQ Main conclusions of the articles Cover Essay

SRQ 2,3 Article 1: Trust in secure public e-services - translating policies into

use.

The cases studied indicate that there have been openings for local

construction of meanings promoting security and relating to citizens’ trust

in that context and the specific public e-services. The analysis indicates

that the local entrepreneurs within public administration use the

opportunities for local translation and adoption of public e-services into

the specific context in which they act. Further, the study indicates that the

organisational settings of multi-level governance are greater constraints

than new technology for implementation of public e-services. The

reformulation and localization of general policies are realized through the

praxis. The policy ideas are co-produced through networks of technology,

human actors, organisations and governmental structures.

Aim

To provide a

deeper

understanding of

how e-

government

policies are

implemented at

local level,

through empirical

studies in

Sweden.

The overall

research question

is:

How is e-

government

policy put into

practice when

focusing on the

local level?

SRQ 1 Article 2: Policy entrepreneurs in networks - implementation of two

Swedish municipal contact centres from an actor perspective.

Local policies are implemented in relation to local cultures, norms and

economic structures. The networked governance structure demands

entrepreneurial actors to combine resources and interests into a change. In

the article two types of such entrepreneurial actors, both theoretical and

practical, are identified.

SRQ 1,2 Article 3: Regional E-Governance: Promoting Entrepreneurial

Behaviour in Public Administration.

Public e-services bring about innovative organisational changes for the

new e-society and bridge formerly unseen digital divides. However, such

changes demand innovative behaviour among people in professional roles

which are usually strictly and formally defined. In the analysis it is found

that the professionals in public administration acted as entrepreneurs and

improved the intended benefits of the public e-service.

SRQ 2,3 Article 4: Local e-government in Sweden – municipal contact centre

implementation with focus on public administration and citizens.

The study implies that efficiency and citizen-centred approaches in the

redesign of information relationships between the public administration

and citizens to create some sort of added value are critical. Another result

is that the registering of all issues from the citizens in a common database

may in a sense be viewed as a citizen-centred aspect. This information

source implies knowledge about the citizens’ needs for municipal service.

It indicates that there is a potential for positive impact on the conditions

for local planning through the implementation of municipal contact

centres.

12

1.3 Delimitations

Although the thesis and analysis includes the implementation of a common ICT tool (e-

service) in two Swedish municipal regional associations, the focus is on the local level. This is

due to the fact that some Swedish municipalities - the empirics are limited to include five

municipalities – have recently implemented local e-government initiatives in the form of new

organisational units named contact centres (CCs). Although e-democracy tools are supposed

to have the advantage of being easily accessible and flexible to individual demands in order to

be used to increasingly engage the inhabitants, e-democracy is not in focus in this thesis.

However, e-democracy, here defined as the relationship between the electorate and the

elected, is discussed theoretically but not analysed empirically.

1.4 Thesis organisation

After this introduction, a discussion regarding context of the study will follow in section two.

Section three includes discussion of key concepts with a description of the Swedish settings.

The thesis will then proceed with the research design in section four. Section five discusses

the results and section six presents limitations of this thesis. Section seven demonstrates the

contribution of this thesis to research as well as to policy followed by directions for potential

future research.

2. Context of the study

2.1 From government to governance

Since the early 1990s, many researchers claim that a fundamental shift has taken place

regarding governing, organisation and working methods within public administration and that

there is a movement of the regulation and implementation of policies from the central

government to other levels and social spheres (e.g. Pierre and Peters, 2000). This change is

recognized in the international research and then described as a transition from “government

to governance” (Pierre and Peters, 2000; Cars and von Sydow 2001; Hajer and Wagenaar

2003; Kjaer, 2004; Sørensen and Torfing, 2007; Gjelstrup and Sørensen, 2007; Healey, 2007).

The phrase “from government to governance” emphasizes, among other things, that

government operations have become more comprehensive and differentiated, and that they

connect in increasingly complex ways, not just with each other but also with actors and

activities in the surrounding community or society (Sundström and Pierre, 2009). In certain

cases it is argued that this is the result of formal policy decisions, while in other cases it is

more the result of an organic and unpredictable development (Elias et al., 2011). A central

governmental type of control refers to the formal institutional process operating at the national

level to maintain public order and facilitate collective action. Ehn (2001) argues that a

traditional hierarchical governing and control will only work in exceptional cases today. As

already stressed above, it is argued by some researchers that governance has not replaced

government – rather, government provides the framework within which governance exists

(Pierre and Sundström, 2009; Jordan et al., 2005). In terms of gathering and processing

information Löfgren (2007) stresses that the government is still very much in a central

position “in its capacity of being the single actor holding legitimate authority to make and

enforce binding decisions across a wide range of societal actors, and equally hold a central

ability to gather and process information” (2007:338).

13

There is no single definition of the term “governance” that most researchers would agree on

(Jordan et al., 2005; Löfgren, 2007).The term contains a lot of meanings. Bekkers et al. (2007)

argue that governance is understood as that public administration is not one entity. It is made

up of several actors, that other actors apart from the public try to influence societal

development and that the public administration acts in policy networks where power,

resources and strategy are important components (Bekkers et al., 2007). von Bergmann-

Winberg and Wihlborg (2011:5) define governance as “steering in cooperation, and the

network governance that is characteristic of modern societies”. Governance opens up new

types of behaviour. According to Peters and Pierre, (2006:6) the idea of governance

emphasises decentralized processes and networks and is a concept capturing the institutional

change from “a government-centred model of governance to a market-based or network-based

governance model”. This means that the steering takes place in the interaction of many

different actors (Gjelstrup and Sørensen, 2007). Pierre and Sundström (2009) claim, however,

that the steering does not always take place within networks. From being a top-down activity

where government agents have had a clear role and responsibility, a dependency relationship

between the public and private has been strengthened. Thus there has been a shift from public

bodies to private (Cars, 1992; von Sydow, 2004).

Researchers claim that there are several explanations, which may be seen as macro theories,

for the development from government towards governance (Pierre and Sundström, 2009). The

current era of increasing globalization, economization, delegation, professionalization, etc.

has meant that the idea of hierarchical management ideals has increasingly been questioned.

Alternative governance ideals have gained ground. The market, with its strong idea of

competition, is one. Policy networks, which are based more on the idea of collaboration and

discussion, are another (Sundström, 2005).

Montin (2007) argues that neither the state nor the municipalities in Sweden have enough

resources or expertise to realize their goals on their own. This is one explanation of the

formation of networks and partnerships of various kinds within the internal and external

public sector and the transition from government to governance (Montin, 2007). It is argued

that EU structural funds have been particularly important for the impact of a partnership

model in Sweden (Ehn, 2001). This is mainly because the cornerstone of the system of EU

structural funds is work in partnership. Ehn (2001) claims that there are roughly the following

two sets of partnerships: partnerships that are primarily of economic/financial nature and

other types of partnerships. A common name for the former type is Public-Private Partnership

(PPP). PPPs are identified as a particular form of governance. In detailed planning and

development projects in Sweden, for example, public–private partnerships and market actors

have an active role (Mäntysalo et al., 2011).

Another theory explaining this development is that today’s society is said to be so complex

that no single actor manages to steer and coordinate on his own, and therefore governance

models that bring together a large number of players on both sides of the border between

private and public spheres are sought (Pierre and Sundström, 2009). At the same time trust in

politicians is low, which has resulted in a growing interest in forms of governing that are built

14

on participants acting from outside the sphere of politicians. Furthermore it is argued that the

turn to a neo-liberal society in many countries, particularly in Great Britain and the U.S., has

created a need to find solutions in order to give citizens the same public service as before but

with reduced costs for the public sector (Pierre and Sundström, 2009).

The Swedish government emphasized that coordination and cooperation between different

actors has become increasingly important and argued that globalization, increased

international competition and rapid technological change were factors that contributed to the

development from government to governance (Ehn, 2001). This was increasingly important

for regions, and according to the government, every region needed better opportunities to

stimulate its own economic and social, cultural and environmental conditions/characteristics.

Such a development had to be developed in close cooperation among the region's various

actors and must therefore primarily be based on the local and regional level (Regeringen,

1998). This changing regional policy, in addition to the economic crisis and unemployment,

should partly be seen as a result of and frustration over a failure of the traditional

governmental regional policy to achieve growth and growing political and administrative

power at the local and regional level.

2.2 Networks and policy networks in governance settings

Networks have become an important organisational form both for policy formation issues and

implementation practices (Ehn, 2001; Sørensen and Torfing, 2007). According to Hajer and

Wagenaar (2003) an important aspect is that network-based forms of governance do not have

codified rules and regulations that shape or define participation and identify the exact domain

or arenas of power, which is a difference from those associated with egalitarian, pluralist

democratic rules and codes. The concept of a network is an example of a term that is

interpreted, defined and used differently in different academic disciplines (Ehn, 2001). Some

disciplines see the network as only horizontal, while others argue that all organisational

structures are indeed a type of network, including vertical organisations (Westlund, 1999). For

example, the analyses in the business literature describe various types of the verb

“networking”, such as subcontracting, entrepreneurial networking, and network management

or governance (Fuller-Love and Kilkenny, 2012). Ehn (2001) argues that there are many

definitions of networks. A description, according to Ehn (2001), of what usually characterizes

a network is that the networks either can be spontaneously or consciously created. They are

characterized by the lack of a formal cohesive structure between the interacting participants,

which is perhaps the most important difference compared with traditional organisations.

Without a formal unifying structure they are tied together through networks of

interdependency. Further, networks are considered non-hierarchies with mutually dependent

actors and usually an open exit from a network. Actors participating in networks have to

exchange resources and negotiate shared purposes (Ehn, 2001). The networks, according to

this definition, are based on voluntary participation and a minimum of formal regulations.

The policy networks are forming new alliances and structures to promote policy or

organisational changes. Cooperation and coordination in networks are seen by actors sharing

the same policy interest as the best way to achieve common interests (Börzel, 1998). The view

15

of the Swedish government in this changing role of government, assumes that the state today

is an institution well woven into the surrounding community. The state is often one actor

among others, but one of the most important. An important task in this new role is to act in

networks and create venues where both public and private actors can meet (Ehn, 2001).

2.3 Implementation of policy in a governance context With regard to policy, implementation is the process of turning policy into practice, which

implies a processural view of implementation (Schofield, 2001; Barrett, 2004). Understanding

how (or why) policy is put into effect has been conceptualized as implementation theory

(O’Toole, 2000; Schofield, 2001; Barrett, 2004). However, recent research claims that in spite

of many years of research, there is no single theoretical approach that can capture all

dilemmas concerning implementation (Löfgren, 2012). The top-down model is one of the

common approaches (Buse et al., 2005; Hill and Hupe, 2009). Another approach is the

bottom-up model of policy implementation. Both of these emphasize the importance of actors

and groups of actors during implementation, although research on the bottom-up approach

tends to focus more closely on policy networks (Schofield, 2001). The top-down approach

emphasizes the separation of politics and administration and has been viewed as a normative

ideal for putting policy into effect (Barrett, 2004). A hallmark of top-down perspective is

primarily a prescriptive ambition that seeks to generate better knowledge for decision makers

to help them avoid the classic implementation mistakes and achieve greater control over

outcomes of a given policy (Barrett, 2004; Löfgren, 2012). In terms of this thesis it is more of

a bottom-up perspective since the focus is on the local level.

The concept of “translation” appears to be a growing approach to make meanings from

implementation, as it includes and problematizes the local context as well as it allows for

local actors’ interpretations of a policy (Herbert-Cheshire, 2003; Rövik, 2008). Research

claims examination of the process which takes place between decision and results may be

compared with opening the “black box” (Hill and Hupe, 2009). The black box is explained as

the process in the public administration after a policy has been created. Out of the box come

results in the form of action. The conditions of the policy process change within a governance

system. Although even in a “government system” it cannot be taken for granted that the

policy process follows neat “steps”, or that the policy is always created within the political

sphere (Hill and Hupe, 2009). But in a governance system, implications of that system

indicate that the whole policy process needs to be viewed in a different way. Research claims

that policy can begin to be formulated outside the walls of city hall, and can be implemented

by actors other than public ones (Bekkers et al., 2007). It is therefore argued that the study of

implementation needs to change (Andréasson, 2011). The author stresses that implementers

could nowadays be private firms, non-profit organisations or anything in between. The policy

network takes a central place both in formulating and carrying out public policy. As already

stated above, a shift from government towards governance is one sign of change in the current

era. An example of e-government policy implementation in a network governance context is

the implementation of CCs (see the articles in this thesis) that takes place in a networked

governance structure, formed through networks in an integrative and flexible way. As can be

16

read in article two, the actors forming and developing such networks are the policy

entrepreneurs.

2.4 Governance creates openings for policy entrepreneurs

The term entrepreneurship is considered to be multidimensional, although many of the

general definitions of the term are centred on the creation or discovery of business

opportunities and the gathering of resources to exploit them (Westlund, 2012). Consequently

entrepreneurial behaviour has been studied by scholars in a range of contexts across a range of

disciplines (Mintrom and Norman, 2009). Entrepreneurship within or connected to the public

sector is defined by some as political or policy entrepreneurship (Buchanan and Badham,

1999; Harris and Kinney, 2004; Pozen, 2008; Chatterjee and Lakshmanan, 2009). According

to Oborn et al. (2011) there is still a need to clarify the definition of the concept policy

entrepreneur. Mintrom (1997) defines policy entrepreneurship as entrepreneurship seeking to

initiate dynamic policy change by attempting to win support for ideas for policy innovation.

Policy entrepreneurs work in networks and they build networks (Mintrom, 1997). According

to Kingdon (1984/1995), policy entrepreneurs are distinguished by their focus on policies –

issues or structures – on a more aggregated level. They differ from traditional policymakers,

since they act in governance settings rather than government structures. As network builders

they are innovative and creative in finding new connections and opportunities. Thus,

according to Kingdon (1984/1995) they are neither driven solely by economic profit-making

nor individual career focus. When policy-making becomes characterized more by networked

governance than strictly governmental steering (Peters, 2007), there are new interfaces

between politics and markets, creating openings for policy entrepreneurs (von Bergmann-

Winberg and Wihlborg, 2011). However a policy entrepreneur may also act within a public

institution (Kingdon 1984/1995; Weissert 1991). Weissert defines a policy entrepreneur as a

person willing to use their own personal resources of expertise, persistence, and skill to

achieve certain policies they favour. The analysis of policy entrepreneurs is contemporary and

related to the shift from government focus to a governance perspective on public policy.

However, the role of policy entrepreneurs is becoming more crucial the more policy-making

becomes characterized by network governance (Wihlborg, 2000). Policy entrepreneurs can be

said to make governance work in practice. In other words, the more governance settings there

are the more space there is for policy entrepreneurs.

According to von Bergmann-Winberg and Wihlborg (2011), the networked governance of

New Public Management is formed and developed by entrepreneurial actors in a networked

governance context. The most germinal classification of policy networks is the ideal-typical

division of “issue networks” and “policy communities” by Rhodes and Marsh (1992). The

policy networks are thus neither entirely one type or the other, but it is a simple way to show

the typical differences. By combining the policy network literature to the policy

entrepreneurial approach there are two “ideal-typical” types of policy entrepreneurs – the

issue entrepreneur and the political entrepreneur (Wihlborg, 2011). Issue networks bring

together actors having a certain opinion on a question, a problem or an issue. The issue as

such is in focus for the actors joining the network (Rhodes and Marsh, 1992). Issue networks

normally dissolve when the issue is handled. The purpose of the network is no longer an

17

issue. Policy entrepreneurs in issue networks are thus driven by the subject matter – the issue.

It is the issue or policy that is the driving force for involvement in the network. They have

their own resources and can easily move in or out of the network. Thus they may be named

issue entrepreneurs. The other, tighter ideal type of policy network is called policy

community, in Rhodes and Marsh’s (1992) central theory. These networks build on long-term

collaboration among actors with similar basic value systems. They have common motives to

create and participate in the network, sustain it over time, and care for their common values

and norms on how policies develop in the political structure. These networks then become

denser, more closed and survive over different policy issues. In this type of network the

participants can rely on each other over longer periods of time, and they share resources and

develop common values. Thus there is also a settled power balance among the actors in the

policy community (Rhodes and Marsh, 1992). Values and norms are in focus in the policy

community and thus they continue to work together. For the same reason there are also

entrepreneurs in political structural change focusing on the politics rather than the particular

issue. These are named political entrepreneurs, as the other ideal form of policy entrepreneurs.

2.5 Swedish settings

In Sweden there are 290 municipalities. They are considered to be the closest to the citizens in

terms of public service as together with the regions and counties they account for about 70%

of all citizen contacts (Regeringskansliet, 2008; SALAR, 2011:3). This implies that the

development of e-government in Sweden is very much a municipal issue. Their condition may

be changed by decisions of the Swedish Parliament, although the multilevel governance

system with national, regional and local/municipal levels is meant to strengthen the local

autonomy of Swedish municipalities. It is often stressed that Sweden has a long tradition of

local autonomy (Gustafsson 1999; Petersson, 2001) although it is argued that there has been a

development from government to governance (Montin, 2007). Research on municipalities

today uses terms such as governance, network communities and network democracy to

describe the trends in municipal development. Other typical keywords within municipalities

in the 2000s are partnerships, networks and regionalization (Montin, 2007).

This thesis also includes case studies at the regional level. However, it is not within the

autonomous county council level, but instead at a regional level consisting of two networks of

municipal associations in two Swedish regions. The county councils are also called secondary

municipalities and their main obligations concern health care and regional development,

based on the strong constitutional local autonomy given to Swedish municipalities. In contrast

to these dominant regional actors, municipalities in most regions have formed alternative

regional organisations for collaboration and coordination. These alternative regional

associations constitute legal entities wherein the municipalities can form collaborative

arrangements and there are ongoing debates regarding their formalization. Both regional

settings studied are such self-governing collaborations organised from the bottom up.

3. Key concepts The process of implementing e-government policies has been widely studied within different

18

disciplines such as information systems, organisational behaviour and public administration

(Löfgren, 2007; Jansson, 2013). Research in e-government can be seen as being at the

crossroads between a number of other research domains (Heeks, 2007) and there is a lack of a

guiding theory or unifying theoretical framework for understanding the phenomenon

(Grönlund, 2005). One likely explanation for this is the lack of a common definition of e-

government. Garson (1999) claims that theories in e-government frameworks involve several

theoretical areas such as the potential of using IT in decentralization and democratization

processes, theories on two-way interaction of technology and the organisational/institutional

environment, as well as theories of global integration. In this study, the research domain e-

government overlaps to a great extent between governance, policy implementation, policy

entrepreneurs and New Public Management, but it also relates to other research fields such as

planning. Within the field of urban and regional planning theory, the focus is both between

“development” and on “governance processes” (Healey, 2012).

3.1 New Public Management in the digital era

The e-government development is often seen as a result of the emergence of an ideology in

the public sector called New Public Management (NPM), although this reform was already

implemented in the 1980s (Osborne, 2006; Bevir et al., 2003; Norén Bretzer, 2010).

According to Hedlund and Montin (2009), NPM is one trend in governance as the authors

conceptualize governance in Swedish settings by gathering its features in five trends towards

increased network governance, one of which is increased elements of market-based

governance within public institutions often called NPM. When introducing NPM there are

also possibilities for increasing partnerships and collaboration in different forms and the

implementation is also referred to as new modes for decision-making: partnerships in a

networked governance context (Hajer and Wagenaar, 2003). There is no single definition of

NPM, although NPM is frequently described “as an umbrella term of management ideas from

the business sector implemented in a public sector context” (Persson and Goldkuhl, 2010:52).

According to Peters and Pierre (1998) NPM is an organisational theory while Barzelay (2001)

refers to NPM as being both a practice and a theoretical conceptualisation rooted in different

research fields with diverse directions. In this paradigm, cost effectiveness and applying

market principles to enhance efficiency become the dominant considerations for how the

public sector is run (Pollit and Bouchaert, 2004). This leads towards a focus on more efficient

public services (Giritli Nygren and Wiklund, 2010; Worrall, 2011; Hall, 2011) and a trend in

which citizens get other roles as users and often will be viewed almost as customers of public

services in a market rather than as citizens with rights and duties (see e.g. Cordella, 2007;

Montin, 2007; Hedlund and Montin, 2009). Previous research demonstrates that NPM has

been challenged (Christensen and Lagreid, 2007) and that e-government mainly has been used

as a tool to enforce the economic values of market-oriented reforms in public administration

associated with NPM (Hood, 1991; Homburg and Bekkers, 2005; Heeks (2006); Giritli

Nygren, 2009a, Homburg, 2008; Hall, 2011). According to some researchers, it is argued that

NPM has been a transitory stage in the development from traditional public administration to

what is named New Public Governance (NPG) (Osborne, 2006; 2010; Osborne et al., 2012).

By referring to earlier research such as Haveri (2006) the authors argue that the increasingly

fragmented and inter-organisational context of public service delivery necessitated not just a

19

focus solely upon administrative processes or solely upon intra-organisational management

(NPM). Rather these foci must be integrated with a broader paradigm that embeds them in a

new context that emphasizes both the governance of relationships within the public

organisations as well as the efficacy of public service delivery systems rather than separate

public service organisations (Osborne et al., 2012). According to some researchers such as

Cordella (2007) and Jos and Tomkins (2009), this transformation of citizens into customers is

problematic due to that citizens have rights and duties. Cordella (2007) also criticizes NPM

for using a reduced set of values when limiting the scope of the agenda to business-like

measures of change. Gjelstrup and Sørensen (2007) describe NPM as market-based forms of

organisations that enhance competition between producers of public services that contribute to

increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of public governance. To explain the need for

increased citizen perspective by using the metaphor of customer orientation, in line with the

New Public Management paradigm, is to mix two perspectives and may therefore be

criticised. There is a difference between being a customer and a citizen. Referring to

Minzberg (1996), customers buy products but citizens have rights, and the priority for them is

more than a customer in the government sector. Therefore, in this thesis the view of the

citizen is based on citizens having rights and duties rather than being customers interested in

obtaining as much service as possible for the lowest costs achievable.

3.2 E-government and E-governance

Putting an “e” as a prefix to both the concepts of government and governance refers to

governing with the help of electronic tools. The development in using ICT to provide e-

services on the Internet and using other forms of information and communication

technologies are basic components of e-government. However, an analysis and comparison of

e-government definitions shows that the term e-government is defined in different ways and

there is no universally accepted definition of the concept (Yildiz, 2007). According to Giritli

Nygren, (2009b), the concept e-government is moving at the boundaries between the public

sector, new technology and changed administrative forms (Giritli Nygren, 2009b). Heeks

(2006:1) defines e-government as “all use of information technology in the public sector”.

Heeks’ definition is used here to encompass all use of digital information technology in the

public sector, which means that it consists of technology, information and human beings who

give the system purpose and meaning, and the work processes that are undertaken.

According to DeBenedictis et al. (2002), e-government can be defined as the use of primarily

Internet-based information technology to enhance the accountability and performance of

government activities. These activities include a government’s execution of activities,

especially service delivery; access to government information and processes; and the

participation of citizens and organisations in government. E-government is also expected to

have a potential to reduce costs and improve services. Moreover, an important stimulus for e-

government is to bridge the gap between government and citizens (Homburg, 2008). There is

also a strong emphasis on internal administrative efficiency in the development of e-

government (Homburg, 2008). In this perspective Grant and Chau (2006:80) identify three

core activities of e-government:

20

(1) to develop and deliver high quality, seamless, and integrated public services; (2) to enable effective

constituent relationship management; and (3) to support the economic and social development goals of

citizens, businesses, and civil society at local, state, national, and international levels.

E-government in this context is further referred to as the redesign of information relationships

between the administration and citizens, in order to create some sort of added value. Based on

this discussion three core types of relationship in e-government among different actors can be

identified (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Three relationships in e-government Source: Bernhard, 2013. Adapted from Wihlborg (2005:7)

The three cores are composed of (1) e-democracy (relationships between the electorate and

the elected, i.e., the political interplay of citizens and elected politicians), (2) e-services (the

relationship between the public administration and citizens), and finally (3) e-administration

for the internal usage of information technology tools within governmental organisations to

provide reports and support for decision making (Wihlborg, 2005). This relationship is in line

with Grönlund (2005) and Giritli Nygren and Wiklund (2010), who argue that it is possible to

distinguish these three dimensions of the term e-government. However, in many definitions e-

democracy is excluded from e-government (Jansson, 2011). The main driving force behind e-

services is often explained by efficiency, an ambition to decrease costs in public

administration and making services more readily available and accessible. E-services are

similar to e-commerce in many ways and the same consultants often work in both fields. The

supply of private e-services can constantly be adapted to the demands expressed on the

market. But public services, with or without the e-, lack such market information structures at

the same time as they lack visible prices for the “consumer” (citizen). The supply and mix of

public services are instead limited by the public resources available (taxes and fees),

democratic decisions (prioritization) and legitimate implementation. Thus digital divides

regarding public e-services are the result of divides other than that of economic resources. In

Sweden, welfare services are usually provided locally according to the subsidiary principle.

E-administration can either be used as an added layer on the ordinary administration or to

bring about a radical restructuring of the administration (Vintar et al., 2003:133). This

e-Government (State, regional, local

administrations)

e-democracy e-service

Citizens

Politicians Public

administrators

e-administration

21

indicates that e-administration could facilitate new relationships within bureaucracy. The

technical systems are given power in their relationships with others through the way they are

designed and the accessibility of the information they provide. There is potential to make the

administration more effective, since there are incentives to save on personnel resources in

administration in favour of computerized resources. E-government is often considered to

build on principles of de-bureaucratization, decentralization and marketization which are quite

similar to NPM (Cordella, 2007). Thus, by providing a solution to what has been regarded as

the inefficient, bureaucratic structures of public administration, e-government is considered to

follow in the footsteps of NPM. According to Norén Bretzer, (2010) this is also the fact in

Sweden as the goal of the Swedish e-government policy initiatives is not only to bring about

increased IT use in the public sector but also to promote change in the administration and

realization of NPM-type reforms.

Figure 2: Three dimensions of e-governance

Source: Bernhard, 2013. Adapted from Wihlborg, (2005:7)

As mentioned above, the terms e-government and e-governance are often treated as

synonymous and used interchangeably in most of the literature (Rossel and Finger, 2007; As-

Saber and Hossein, 2008). They provide definitions for e-government that encompass almost

the same elements as those argued to be in the realm of e-governance. However, some

researchers argue that there is a difference in the perspectives between the two (Saxena, 2005;

Michel, 2005; Rossel and Finger, 2007; Collins, 2009; Misuraca and Viscusi, (2013); Larsson

and Grönlund, 2014). According to scholars such as Grönlund and Horan (2005), Rossel and

Finger (2007), As-Saber and Hossein (2008), Collins (2009) and Jayashree and Martandan

(2010) and Larsson and Grönlund (2014), e-governance is a broader, more encompassing

concept that involves not only public institutions but private ones as well. E-government is

then more limited than e-governance and focuses on resource coordination and distribution in

the public sector alone. Following Gjelstrup and Sørensen (2007), this means that the steering

takes place in the interaction of many different actors although with the help of ICT.

e-governance (governmental

administrations and/or

networks/organizations or

other stakeholders)

e-democracy e-service

Citizens

Politicians Public

administrators

e-administration

22

Following these discussions three key dimensions of relationship in e-governance among

different actors may be identified (Figure 2).

In a very simplified form, but useful for this thesis, some characteristics of e-government and

e-governance can be shown as in Table 2:

Table 2: Some characteristics of e-government and e-governance settings.

E-government E-governance

Type of organisation Hierarchic Network

Key actors Formal policymakers Policy entrepreneurs

The main view of the

individual

Citizen Customer

E-government is here explained in terms of hierarchic organisations with formal policymakers

as key actors and the individual as citizen. In e-governance settings, characterised by

networked governance, the key actors here are policy entrepreneurs and the main view of the

citizens is as customers. E-governance may then be viewed as different from e-government.

The governance of NPM is formed and developed by entrepreneurial actors in the networked

governance context (von Bergmann-Winberg and Wihlborg, 2011). This means that e-

governance is related to theories of NPM as it takes place in NPM governance settings.

Researchers in e-government show different views of the individual citizen. Scholars, e.g.

Bartot, Jaeger and McClure (2008), Axelsson, Melin and Lindgren (2010) and Alsaghier et al.

(2009) view the individual citizen more as a user in e-government contexts. Michel

(2005:216) stresses that e-government reflects “a vision of a relatively passive citizen-agent,

who responds to his duties”. In this perspective, electronic voting is the most appropriate tool,

she claims. In the e-governance settings, the citizen is considered an active agent of local

democracy. The citizen is here considered a source of ideas and initiatives that provides

mutual enrichment (Michel, 2005). On the contrary, as explained earlier, it is argued by some

scholars that there is a trend in viewing the citizen in e-government context as a customer

which is in line with NPM (Cordella, 2007; Montin, 2007; Hedlund and Montin, 2009; Hall,

2011; Rövik, 2008). Thus, according to these scholars, the view of the citizen in both e-

governance and e-government settings is more related to customers rather than citizens having

rights and duties. In terms of this, I suggest sorting the concepts as follows in this thesis:

E-government is considered to follow in the footsteps of NPM and refers to the governmental

bodies´ use of tools and systems made possible by ICT that affect the organisation of public

administration. It aims to provide improved internal efficiency as well as better public

services to citizens and businesses.

E-governance refers to the ICT-based networks of services and administration in NPM

settings including both public and private actors.

23

3.3 Municipal contact centre

The main function of a Swedish municipal CC is to supply services to citizens more

efficiently, primarily by using the telephone and ICT (e.g. e-services) to handle citizen

contacts (Figure 3).

Figure 3: Conceptual model of a Contact Centre in relation to citizens and businesses, and public administrators at the back office

When CCs are implemented in municipalities, the work of the public administrators in the

municipality is supposed to become more efficient, as they will not be disturbed by phone

calls involving “simple questions” from citizens. The different organisational units (back

office) are also supposed to cooperate in resolving citizens’ matters, in order to simplify the

citizens’ contacts with the municipality. The CCs aim to contribute to increased citizen access

to municipal services through multi-channel service like ICT in the form of telephone,

Internet (municipal websites) and Web-based applications (e-services), and generally they are

also open for personal visits. The municipal website is a main electronic resource for

information to citizens and organisations within the municipality and the municipal e-services

are published on the website. The CCs function as a gateway to local government, as front

offices with extended opening hours and staff with broad competencies to answer, supervise

and re-direct citizens to the right section of public administration and/or on the Internet. They

also have the competence to reach into back-office functions to resolve standard questions

(Bernhard, 2011; 2014). All issues are registered in an information system for internal

handling of matters. Public administrators at the CC also initiate issues, when needed, which

are transferred to public administrators at the back office using the IT tool for handling of

matters.

The introduction of a municipal contact centre – a new organisational form, new tasks and

new technical practices – can be seen as a new phenomenon within the Swedish local e-

government context. Public e-services as such may be seen as non-commercial innovations in

each new context – even if the service itself existed before – as they are a new way of

producing and organising the service (Potnis, 2010). The term innovation is inherently

ambiguous and has been defined differently by a number of research studies (Potnis, 2010).

The concept of innovation has developed mainly around private business and is often

measured in terms of the number of patents filed. For Schumpeter (1934), an innovation could

be a new product, a new production method, a new technology, the opening of a new market

or a new organisation of existing production factors. The innovation could take many forms.

The premise was that there were one or more contractors who could push the idea forward.

24

Entrepreneurship is thus a prerequisite for innovation, according to Schumpeter. Other

scholars argue that innovation in public services is harder to define but may be linked to

institutional renewal, new forms of governance, organisational improvements or to

digitisation (Koch and Hauknes, 2005; Cunningham and Karikasidou, 2009; Potnis, 2010).

Thus, I define new public e-services in this context as innovation. They may be referred to not

only in the relationships between public administration and citizens but also to e-

administration for the internal usage of ICT to provide reports and support for decision

making.

Referring to my definition of e-government (Table 2), this study indicates that the

implementation of municipal contact centres may be seen as an example of local e-

government. They are hierarchic organisations with formal policymakers as key actors and the

implementation of more public e-services in the relationship between the public

administration and the citizens refers to the e-government context. However, in the

dimensions of e-services, it may be argued that the implementation of CCs may also refer to

the e-governance settings. This is because public e-services are developed in an NPM

governance setting. The public e-services are similar to e-commerce in many ways, and the

same consultants often work in both fields (both public and private). Besides, referring to

research arguing that the main view of the citizen as a “customer” within the NPM

governance settings (Cordella, 2007; Montin, 2007; Hedlund and Montin, 2009) it may also

refer to the e-governance settings. Thus, according to the definitions of e-government and e-

governance, the implementation of Swedish CCs may be referred to as an example of a mix of

both e-government and e-governance.

4. Research design This chapter summarizes the research design and the research strategy used to answer the

research questions and describes the research methods of each of the four articles. The last

part of the chapter provides a summary of the articles including specific aims, arguments and

conclusions. The articles are appended after the references.

4.1 Case study methodology

Yanow (2003) claims that how the researcher acts in order to achieve results is an important

methodological issue. She argues that it is about how to come close to the studied object and

let the context-specific social reality speak for itself. Case study methodologies are preferred

when you want to come close to the studied object and study an actual phenomenon in its real

context. Case study is used as a research method in social science disciplines like public

administration, political science, business and marketing and evaluation (Yin, 2009). Case

studies are based on direct observations of the phenomenon and on interviews with people

who have experience in the actual case. The case study methodology’s particular strength is

that it allows handling of many different kinds of empirical data such as documents, artefacts,

interviews and observations. According to Yin (2009) case studies are classified as a meta-

methodology as when studying a phenomenon in its context different methods or techniques

are required in order to get various types of data. In comparison to quantitative studies,

25

qualitative methods are an alternative way of looking at knowledge, meaning, reality and truth

in social sciences. According to Kvale (1996), focus is on understanding important

relationships in their specific context. Examples of what a case can be is a single organisation

or a single location (Bryman and Bell, 2011). The criteria for all authorities included in this

study is that they should be forerunners in the development of e-government implementation.

In addition, the criteria for the CCs chosen in this study was also that the municipalities were

members of Sambruk2. When designing my study the choice of case study methodology was

connected to the aim of the thesis. In the process of gathering empirical case data, I used a

qualitative research method approach with interviews, focus group studies, document studies,

and some participatory observations. The analysis is partly based on an inductive

methodological approach (Article 1), since this is a new, emerging field of innovative policy

and practice. This means that theory may be developed on the basis of the cases (Eisenhardt,

1989; Gilham, 2000; Stake 1995; Yin, 2009; Alvesson and Kärreman, 2011). In this article

the approach focused on the translations in multi-level settings of safety, technically and

organisationally. The theoretical framework of policy and technology translation allows

inclusion of this broad process of change. Furthermore, the analysis is partly based on (Article

2) an abductive research approach (Alvesson and Sköldberg, 2000/2009). Abduction, as

explained here, alternately moves between theory and the collection of empirical data and

thus allows the understanding of the study area to gradually emerge. In this article the analysis

took off from field work of two case studies of CCs where the initial research focus was the

implementation process of the two CCs in general (Bernhard, 2011). However, the key actors

stood out as critical aspects of both processes. Thus I went back to the cases focusing on the

policy entrepreneurs by adding the extended meanings of policy entrepreneurs.

Table 3. Overview of phases and the methods used in the case studies included in the different articles in this thesis.

Date/phase Method Data used in article(s) Done by

2006 East Sweden study: Interviews, focus groups interviews and document studies.

Article 3 Co-author

2009 West Sweden study (follow-up study): Interviews, focus groups interviews and document studies.

Articles 1,3 Author

2009 Telephone interviews with citizens Article 4 Author

2009/2011 Interviews, direct observations and document studies.

Article 2 Author (mainly), and a researcher within Innoveta project

2009/2010/2011

Interviews, direct observations and document studies.

Articles 1,2,3,4 Author (mainly), and researchers within Innoveta project

2 In 2009-2011 the author studied the implementation of CCs in Swedish municipalities in a research project. Swedish

Association of municipalities for joint development of e-services (Sambruk) was one of three parts. At the time of the study

80 municipalities were members of Sambruk although just a few of them had implemented CCs (however, more and more

municipal CCs are now being implemented or are planned).

26

All studies except one were done from 2009 to 2011 with partly different perspectives due to

their aims. The interviews for studying the implementation of the Common Application e-

service to the upper secondary schools in the regional municipal association of ÖSTSAM

were done in 2006. For an overview, see Table 3 above.

4.1.1 Document studies

Referring to Yin (2009) and the case study methodology’s particular strength in handling

many different kinds of empirical data, a number of public documents have been studied such

as policy documents from regional and local levels, pilot report studies, revision reports and

results of municipal customer surveys. These analyses served to give an overall understanding

before doing the interviews. The documents have been used both as a background study of e-

government practice and to get an overview of the background of the implementation of the e-

government process. Some of the documents such as results of customer surveys were made

by private organisations. When critically examining these documents I had in mind who had

written them and for what purpose.

4.1.2 Interviews

One of the main sources of data related to the case study methodology consists of the

qualitative research interview (Yin, 2009). Through the interview, construction of knowledge

and negotiations of meanings take place between two partners about a topic of mutual interest

(Kvale, 1996:42). The questions have more of an open character, e.g. the interviewer can ask

key actors about facts as well as about their opinions regarding these facts (Yin, 2009), and an

interview is a conversation that has a structure and a purpose (Kvale, 1996; Kvale and

Brinkmann, 2009). In some situations, the researcher may ask the respondents to formulate

their own opinions and ideas about a particular phenomenon and then use this as a basis for

the continued interview. This is in line with using qualitative interviews as they always

include some degree of flexibility and thus I used semi-structured interviews as format3 – one

of mainly three different types of interview methods (Bryman, 2008:436). The respondent

may also suggest other people to be interviewed and also indicate where additional

information, e.g. regarding a particular matter can be found (Yin, 2009). In terms of this study

some of the interviewees were selected throughout the documentation of the process and

through recommendations – a so-called “snowball” selection. The interviews were planned in

accordance with Kvale (1996:88) who highlights seven steps of an interview study –

thematizing, designing, interviewing, transcribing, analysing, verifying and reporting – as

these are important to bring up to achieve scientific quality.

Altogether 64 semi-structured interviews within the municipalities, and the two municipal

regional associations including an interview with 1 employee at a computer firm, as well as

five focus group interviews with 12 students and eight guidance councillors and 21 telephone

interviews with citizens were conducted. In addition three semi structured interviews were

made with an ICT manager and top managers at the Swedish Transport Agency4.

3 The questionnaires are available in Swedish from the author. 4 These were carried out by co-author and are also described in Wihlborg et al., 2010.

27

The case study in West Sweden was introduced in January 2009 during a key interview in the

central administration as a follow-up to the case study in East Sweden (Article 3). Except for

three focus group interviews (see 4.1.3), two additional interviews were conducted, one with a

guidance councillor at a secondary independent school and another with the head of the e-

service unit at the Upper Secondary School Admissions Office.

The interviewed personnel categories within the municipalities were employees from contact

centres (“front offices”) and from different divisions within the municipalities, what is called

the “back office” of the municipal local administration as well as from the top management of

the five municipalities. All interviews focused on the consequences of the e-government

policy that resulted in the implementation of the contact centres seen from different

perspectives. The respondents were e.g. asked to describe their experiences and their views

regarding the development of the contact centre and change in the work of the public

administrators, how they had participated in the development process, their opinions

regarding the results of the implementation of more e-services, the re-organisation of the

work, and the municipalities and their opinions regarding the organisation of the process and

methods used (for cons from different perspectives). In order to cover the changing working

conditions and reorganisation within the municipalities, representatives from the unions were

also interviewed. It was important not only to include different personnel categories but the

number of respondents in qualitative studies must be large enough to assure that most if not

all of the perceptions that might be important are uncovered. However, if the sample is too

large, data becomes repetitive (Mason, 2010). According to Glaser & Strauss (1967), the

sample size in the majority of qualitative studies should generally follow the concept of

saturation but many researchers do not suggest what constitutes a sufficient sample size

(Mason, 2010). According to Ritchie et al. (2003) qualitative samples often are below 50

while Green and Thorogood (2009) state that the experience of most qualitative researchers is

that very little “new” in interviews comes out after interviewing 20 people or so. That this

thesis consists of a total of 57 interviews within the five municipalities was a result mostly

due to saturation. Each interview with personnel from the municipalities took about an hour

and was tape-recorded and transcribed.

The 21 interviews with citizens were based on semi-structured telephone interviews, primarily

using open-ended questions with predefined alternatives, to which some open-ended questions

were added. These interviews were held about four weeks after the contact centre was

implemented in late 2009. When citizens (14 female and 7 male) who had been in contact

with the public administrators at the contact centre ended their phone calls, they were asked if

another person (a researcher) could call them back and conduct an interview asking about

their attitudes to the newly established contact centre, their knowledge about this

implementation, their opinions of the service delivered by the new municipal contact centre, if

they had access to or used the Internet and public e-services and about how this

implementation has affected their access to local municipal service in general.

4.1.3 Focus group interviews

The focus group as a research method is a group interview that usually involves at least four

interviewees and typically emphasizes a specific theme or topic that is explored in depth

28

(Bryman and Bell, 2011). The focus group method is based on open-ended group discussions

that examine a particular set of relevant issues with an emphasis on the questioning of a

particular topic. In some respects they are expected to have characteristics that are similar to

spontaneous and informal discussions (Marková et al., 2007). A focus group is effective if

there is not much obtainable information concerning a specific phenomenon, so that the

interpretations and meanings of the issue come into focus. Focus groups can be combined

with other methods, such as interviews, direct observations and document studies (Wibeck,

2000), which are used in this thesis. The focus groups’ discussions often take place in cafés,

pubs or on the street, as stringent methodological criteria stress the importance of finding a

suitable context for the discussion in order for the focus group to become as “natural” as

possible (Kitzinger et al., 2004). In my case we met at their local and regional offices and in

schools. The groups were free to decide the location of the meeting. At the case study in East

Sweden one focus group was arranged among the guidance councillors in the two main

municipalities of the region and four students were selected for a focus group based on

recommendations from the guidance councillors. The councillors were selected and invited

through the regional network of guidance councillors. In the West Sweden study there were

three focus group interviews – two with students and one with a group of guidance councillors

from different secondary schools within the main municipality. Eight students (four male and

four female) participated in the focus group interviews. They were selected by the guidance

councillors from schools that differed in size and profiles. All focus group interviews focused

on the interpretations and usage of the common application system that had been

implemented. Each interview took about an hour and was tape-recorded and transcribed.

4.1.4 Direct observations

A case study should take place in the natural setting of the “case” (Yin, 2009) and some direct

observations, e.g. field studies were made in my study. I observed the work of the public

administrators at the contact centres in four of the five municipalities although I spent more

time directly observing the work of the public administrators, social setting and activity in one

of the contact centres. The observations gave a more direct and unmediated access to local

practices and improved the coherency of the ambitions and organisation promoted by policies

and described in the interviews (Alvesson and Kärreman, 2011).

4.2 Paper summaries

Article 1: Trust in secure public e-services: translating polices into use

Article 1 stresses that the emerging information society challenges relations between public

agencies and citizens in many ways. E-services as such may be viewed as innovations as they

are a new way of producing and organising the service. For secure use and successful

implementation of innovations in public contexts, the innovation must be considered

legitimate and related to policies. The European Union and all other levels of government

form policies, which are then translated among the various levels to manage the useful, secure

praxis of e-services. Translation in organisational terms takes place across governmental

levels in the multi-level governance chain and secondarily from technical to administrative

settings. Since Swedish public administration relies on a dual steering approach, with strong,

constitutionally mandated regional and local autonomy, such policies cannot be forced onto

29

regional and local public agencies. Instead, European and national policy statements become

soft policy instruments in the local context, and their implications rely on local uptake in the

specific setting and on the competencies of the professionals in local public administration.

In order to visualize the relation to praxis, three strategic case studies in entrepreneurial public

administrative settings were selected and conducted. These organizations were all forerunners

with high uptake of the new policies on e-services. The cases were selected to illustrate the

different levels of government. The Swedish Transport Agency - a national authority - formed

to meet several different actors through e-government arrangements. The regional level was

illustrated by collaborative student counselling for secondary high schools in West Sweden.

Finally, the local level was represented by a municipal contact centre. The case studies

include interviews with key actors, text analysis and some participatory observations.

The cases studied indicate that there have been openings for local construction of meanings

promoting security and relating to citizens’ trust in that context and the specific public e-

services. One short example was the indication of trust that appeared from both parents and

students in the public e-service admission process to upper secondary schools in the West

Sweden case. Before the implementation of the e-application the parents had to sign the

application since the students were under age. The analysis indicates that the local

entrepreneurs within public administration use the opportunities for local translation and

adoption of public e-services into the specific context in which they act. Further, the study

indicates that the organisational settings of multi-level governance are greater constraints than

new technology for implementation of public e-services. The reformulation and localization

of general policies are realized through the praxis. The policy ideas are co-produced through

networks of technology, human actors, organisations and governmental structures.

Article 2: Policy entrepreneurs in networks – implementation of two Swedish municipal

contact centres from an actor perspective

The emerging networked governance structure calls for improved knowledge of policy

entrepreneurship both for analytical and practical improvements. The purpose of Article 2 is

to elaborate on the meanings of policy entrepreneurs and through the conceptualisation

analyse implementation of local municipal contact centres (CCs). The analysis took off from a

field work of two case studies of CCs in two suburban municipalities in the capital region of

Sweden. The selected cases were both forerunners in the implementation of CCs and since the

municipalities were similar in size, structure and their sub-urban location the potential for

comparing the processes were good. The article builds on qualitative case studies including

interviews, observations and document analysis, all analysed through the perspective of policy

entrepreneurs.

The result indicates that local policies are implemented in relation to local cultures, norms and

economic structures. This is exemplified through the implementation of two contact centres

(CCs). The contact centres are organizational innovations developing the practices and

management in public administration. However, they do not simply appear. The CCs have to

be locally formed and anchored in policy-making before being implemented. They were

implemented in different ways adhering to the local cultures, norms and economic structure in

30

the different municipalities. The networked governance structure requires entrepreneurial

actors to combine resources and interests into a change. Here two types of such

entrepreneurial actors are identified both theoretically and practically. The outcome of the

processes differs depending on what type of policy actor was driving the process of change.

The issue entrepreneur focuses on the issue as such and on the solution to a single problem.

The political entrepreneur, on the other hand, focuses on core values and long-term structural

changes. The findings may provide useful information for municipal e-government planning

specifically when planning for implementing contact centres. The study enriches the existing

literature on policy entrepreneurs in networks expanding the roles to include also local e-

government contexts.

Article 3: Regional e-governance: promoting entrepreneurial behaviour in public

administration

Article 3 demonstrates public e-services as technical innovations which enable organisational

changes. The basic pre-conditions for e-services in the public sector differ in several respects

from e-commerce in the private sector. When the “customers” are citizens, the distribution of,

access to, and use of the services are not based on an open market distribution. Public e-

services bring about innovative organisational changes for the new e-society and bridge

formerly unseen digital divides. However, such changes demand innovative behaviour among

people in professional roles which are usually strictly and formally defined. The case studies

in this article focus on the development of the service from an organizational perspective

based on interviews with staff in public administration and firms, document studies and the

use of IT based on focus group interviews with users of the systems in different phases of the

process. Two such cases are the e-governance of the common application systems for upper

secondary schools in the county of Östergötland and the county of Fyrbodal in West Sweden.

The conceptual e-governance model developed in this article discussed the differences of e-

services, e-administration and e-democracy. Following this model, the common application

systems as an illustrative case of a public e-service on the Internet, was presented and

analysed. The systems were developed in collaboration between the municipalities and the

county and have been in use for a few years. They are both administrative and are used as a

service for potential students when gathering information and filing applications. This

complex e-service was used to illustrate the conceptual discussion on e-governance and the

entrepreneurial behaviour that occurs when such innovations are implemented in public

administration.

The study showed how actors in public organisations act entrepreneurially in different

relationships and how they promoted changes, such as the implementation of an e-service also

functioning as an e-administrative tool and improved the intended benefits of the e-service.

This is exemplified through the guidance counsellors taking on slightly different

entrepreneurial roles over the academic year. They adapted their actions in relation to the

situation in order to achieve maximum outcome in the process and also to maximize the use

of available resources. At the information and application stage, the guidance counsellors

became real guides, both for the e-service and for the students. They used the same e-

governance as an e-administration tool for coordinating the schools. They had the ability to

31

use the common application systems as an information system, an e-service and an

administrative tool in order to fulfil their different duties during the academic year.

Article 4: Local e-government in Sweden – municipal contact centre implementation with

focus on public administrators and citizens

In Article 4, I analyse the implementation of municipal contact centres (CCs) which is a new

phenomenon within the Swedish local e-government context and which may be seen as a

practical result of the Swedish e-government policy. The study is a study of the

implementation of four Swedish municipal CCs, as well as of an interview study with citizens

from one of the municipalities. The focus is on internal organisation as well as on citizens. A

criterion for being chosen was that the municipality should be a forerunner in the

development of e-Government and the implementing of a CC.

Based on a theoretical discussion of e-government and New Public Management (NPM) in

the digital era, this study indicates that the implementation of CCs may be viewed as a result

of the theories of NPM in the keywords of efficient public services, introducing market

mechanisms and customer orientation. An example of this is the implementation of more e-

services. Critical aspects related to efficiency are, however, work approaches and competence

development possibilities for the public administrators at the CCs, internal anchoring and a

need for increased focus on the work of public administration at the back office. The study

indicates that there are two main implications of CCs: they localize public services and they

combine different services into a one-stop practice striving to provide a “holistic” approach to

the individual citizen in her local context. The study implies that efficiency and citizen-

centred approaches in this redesign of information relationships between the public

administration and citizens to create some sort of added value are critical. The redesign

appears e.g. in an ambition to bridge the silos of local public administration and shows that

there is a need for a process organisation as design of technology and organisation are

interrelated. Another result is that the registering of all issues from the citizens in a common

database may in a sense be viewed as a citizen-centred aspect. This information source

implies knowledge about the citizens’ needs for municipal service and can be used for

planning purposes.

5. Discussion This section relates the findings back to the research aim. This is done through organising

each subsection in accordance with the research questions. The purpose of the present study is

to provide a deeper understanding of how e-government policies are implemented in an e-

governance context, through empirical case studies in Sweden with focus at the local level.

The overall objective is to describe and analyse how is e-government policy put into practice

when focusing at the local level in Sweden with the three following sub-research questions:

5.1 What is the role of policy entrepreneurs in the implementation of local e-

Government initiatives in Sweden?

The second article’s results indicated that local entrepreneurs within public administration

used the opportunities for local translation and adoption of public e-services into the specific

32

context in which they act. This is possible since Swedish public administration relies on a

dual steering approach, with strong, constitutionally mandated regional and local autonomy,

national or supranational policies cannot be forced onto regional and local public agencies.

Instead, European and national policy statements become soft policy instruments in the local

context, and their implications rely on local uptake in the specific setting and on the

competencies of the professionals in local public administration. Building on the classification

of policy networks by Rhodes and Marsh (1992)5 to the policy entrepreneurial approach the

results indicate that the actors identified as policy entrepreneurs in two of the cases of

implementing municipal contact centres were active in these processes by implementing new

ideas and forming networks.

However, the policy entrepreneurs promoted the implementation of the CCs from different

perspectives and with varying ambitions. In one of the studied cases - case A - the core values

of inclusion and participation grounded the design of the contact centre, while in the other

case the issue as such was key – a new organisational approach. This is explained as two

illustrations of different approaches of policy networks and entrepreneurial behaviour. The

issue entrepreneur focused on the problem to transform policies relating to the practical issues

and problems of daily administrative routines which dominated the processes. It was here

mainly one person who took on the role of being an issue entrepreneur and settling the

changes. In the other case, on the other hand, there were several people together acting as

political entrepreneurs to formulate and anchor the idea on the political agenda and using the

more stable and dense policy communities. They took off from the municipal core value when

opening the policy window for changes. The outcome of the processes differs depending on

what type of policy actor that was driving the process of change. When the issue of the CC

was in focus, the externally recruited issue entrepreneur had good knowledge about CCs and

competence to help implementing it, but was not integrated into the organisation and

municipal values. The issue entrepreneur in case A had a network of actors with interests in

CCs in general.

On the other hand in case B the core values of the policy community were in focus. The

political entrepreneurs took on the role of implementing and realising the CC in line with the

organisational tradition and models of their municipality. The political entrepreneur had a

dense local network within the municipal administration and among local policy makers. This

indicates that if changes are supposed to carry on core values and integrate the organisation

there is a need for political entrepreneurs. But if the objective of change is a limited issue that

quickly has to be implemented there is a need for an issue entrepreneur. By focusing on the

actors in their context there are also opportunities to understand their setting and how they co-

create the contextual setting that makes up a pre-condition for all other actors there and then,

even within public administration. Policy entrepreneurs can expand the range of options for

other actors by providing changes and opening for extended networks. The result indicates

that policies are implemented in relation to local cultures, norms and economic structures.

5 See section 2.4

33

The analysis of Article 3 found that the professionals in public administration acted as

entrepreneurs and improved the intended benefits of an e-service. Besides networking, the

guidance councillors in both regions – consisting of associations of municipalities –

functioned as entrepreneurs, promoting and using the common application systems. The

emphasis was put on the demands expressed by the students and that this was in the students’

interest. They found ways in the process to make the system work and build trust both in the

e-service and the regional collaboration. According to the definition of policy entrepreneur by

Mintrom (1997), the student councillors were taking on the roles of implementing and

integrating the technical application. This may be explained in terms that as a consequence of

the e-governance context there was room for policy entrepreneurs. In these cases the guidance

councillors functioned as policy entrepreneurs. They promoted the application and adapted it

to the organisational setting. As entrepreneurs, they had the ability to use the common

application systems as an information system, an e-service and an e-administrative tool in

order to fulfil the different aims of their duties during the academic year. They acted in a local

context where policy-making takes place and integrated ideas in the specific phase of the

process.

This complex e-service illustrated the conceptual discussion of e-governance and the

entrepreneurial behaviour which occurs when such innovations are implemented in public

administration. The systems were developed locally in the region based on Swedish local

autonomy, so even if they have exactly the same approach, the systems as well as their use

differed between the two regions. This indicates that the policy entrepreneur has to consider

the different local conditions within the specific part of the society when implementing

successful e-governance.

To conclude, results imply that, in practice, when e-government policy is implemented at the

local level, it tends to happen in e-governance settings that are conducted by policy

entrepreneurs or promoted by entrepreneurial behaviour in public administration.

5.2 How does the implementation of e-government and e-governance initiatives affect trust in public service provision? The result of Article 1 indicated that there have been openings for local construction of

meanings promoting security and relating to citizens’ trust in that context and the specific

public e-services. This is related to the Swedish so-called “dualist model” of civil service

where the local and regional authorities hold a considerable high level of autonomy vis-à-vis

the national government and where supranational or national policies cannot be forced onto

regional and local public agencies. In more general terms the cases studied in this article

indicate that policies are translated and given contextual meaning in the situations in which

they become praxis. The local knowledge is critical for the creation of what is seen as security

in the specific context.

Further, the results of the e-governance implementation of the common application systems to

upper secondary schools (Article 3) showed that the public e-service required a high level of

trust among all users although there were different grounds for trust for the administration

34

personnel at the admissions office, the schools and the students. In the focus group interviews,

the students were the only group that expressed a high level of trust in the application system.

One of the students formulated it clearly when making this comparison of e-services: “This is

the municipality and you sort of have to trust them. It is not like buying something from

‘cheap Charlie’ or something, if I say”. Maybe this expression of trust was a little too positive,

but it works as long as his trust relies on the satisfaction with using the system. However it is

not the design of the e-service that inspired trust but the municipality as a trustworthy

organisation. However, this may affect trust in service provision even for the actors using the

system in terms of e-administration although they base their trust on security, management by

the rules and their own professional competence, and they were more sceptical toward the

system. Some of them still saw the system as a beta version they had come into contact with

when it had first been launched.

When the e-service application was implemented in the West Sweden case (Article 3), the

Fyrbodal municipal association decided to cancel the identification part of the application

process – “signature of the guardian (parent)” – for underage students. The administration

here acted entrepreneurially as they saw it to improve trust. They were of the opinion that it

was legal and not necessary. Their interpretation of security in the process was that by

providing the necessary log-in codes to parents or guardians, this at least guaranteed (to some

extent) that parents would take part in the application process of their child.

The implementation of municipal CCs (Article 4) which in this thesis is an example of a mix

of both e-government and e-governance initiatives, with a single telephone number to all

municipal services and more public e-services (self-service and more specific information on

the municipal websites) indicates increased accessibility for citizens to municipal service

which should affect trust even if it does not necessarily mean that there is increased citizen

trust in public service provision. However the findings indicating that a simple touch-tone

technique (a digital tool for telephones that may be referred to as a kind of e-service)

contributed to access to municipal services for citizens may be seen as an indication of trust,

especially for certain groups of citizens. The touch-tone technique can affect trust in the

public service provision as it can be problematic for the elderly, and contribute to less access

and less trust in the public municipal service provision. A simplified touch-tone technology

contributed to more citizens (for example those who are unwilling or unable to deal with

touch-tone technology) being able to easily contact the CC and gain access to municipal

services which should affect trust in public service provision positively. A similar positive

aspect affecting trust to include more citizens by increasing their access to municipal services

was the implementing of a special CC for issues regarding care of the elderly as shown in

Article 4. These groups of citizens did not have to use the touch-tone technology in order to

contact specialists in elderly issues.

5.3 How does the implementation of local municipal contact centres affect the

work of the public administrators in terms of their role as suppliers of public

service?

The results of the third sub-research question regarding how the implementation of local

35

municipal contact centres affects the work of the public administrators in terms of their role as

suppliers of public service is that their work conditions in some ways have changed (Article

4). They can provide different services, combine them and even bridge different

administrative domains from a citizen-centred perspective. However, the result implies that

the work of the public administrators within the front office as well as in the back office will

be more efficient if more work processes are transferred to the front office (CC) provided that

the public administrators at the CCs have mandate and knowledge to respond to the issues.

Critical aspects related to efficiency are, however, work approaches and competence

development possibilities for the public administrators at the CCs. The results also imply that

there is a need for increased focus on the work of public administrators at the back office.

Thus this implementation is a process that benefits from being grounded in values of inclusion

and meeting the needs of citizens that includes facilitating a reorganisation of back-office

procedures in order to optimize the efficiency aspects.

Further, the results point out that it is vital to anchor the CCs in policy making and within the

municipalities before implementation. The CC implementation, including e-services and e-

administration, cannot be seen as a separate part of the organisation. Although the use of ICT

is essential for the organisational transformation, the results thus indicate that the

organisational settings and internal anchoring are greater constraints than new technology for

implementation of local e-government and e-governance. The result implies that efficiency

and citizen-centred approaches in this redesign of information relationships between the

public administration and citizens to create some sort of added value are critical. The redesign

appears e.g. in an ambition to bridge the silos of local public administration and shows that

there is a need for a process organisation as design of technology and organisation are

interrelated.

Another result of the implementation of the contact centres is the new source of issues from

the citizens gathered in one common database (Article 4). This may affect their role as

suppliers of public service more citizen-oriented due to the fact that planners and decision-

makers within the municipality may use this information as a potential source for planning

purposes and to get knowledge about the citizens' needs for municipal service. The municipal

services could then be localized and adjusted to the citizens' needs (and to different

communities of citizens), and hence the production of municipal services would become more

citizen-governed than before the implementation of the CCs. According to recent literature

within planning theories it is important to involve different citizen groups in order to plan for

a sustainable municipality (Sandercock, 1998; Friedmann, 2011; Healey, 2012). The idea of

planning has a normative dimension and the core of planning is to be seen as a form of

collective action or governance and emphasizes e.g. the attribute of liveability for the many,

not the few (Healey, 2012). Furthermore, Clifton and Díaz-Fuentes (2010) argue that citizens’

perceptions are important because they constitute the infrastructure necessary for economic

and social development.

36

6. Limitations As in any research project, there are limitations in this thesis. Some are theoretical, while

others are related to the fit between the study cases and my research questions.

6.1 Theoretical limitations

As mentioned above research in e-government can be seen as being at the crossroads between

a number of other research domains (Heeks, 2007) and there is a lack of a guiding theory or

unifying theoretical framework for understanding the e-government phenomenon (Grönlund,

2005). This research takes place between several different fields such as municipality

research, management, e-government and e-governance, informatics, planning and regional

issues. Although I have knowledge about these research fields, theories in this thesis are

limited to theories on policy implementation, e-government and e-governance, multi-level

governance, policy entrepreneurs, policy networks and organizations. Related theories are

limited to planning and translation theories.

As this thesis takes place in a Swedish context and concerns e-government and e-government

initiatives on the local level (Swedish municipalities), the analysis and conclusions are limited

to Swedish contexts.

6.2 Data limitations

In article one the selected cases appeared in different policy fields due to the fact that the

cases selected should be innovative organizations and forerunners in the implementation of e-

government initiatives. This limited the analysis and an explicit comparison across the levels

in a specific policy field could thus not be done. This problem could probably have been

solved by doing this study a few years later as more municipal contact centres have been

implemented.

The focus groups (Article 3) in the follow-up case study of West Sweden were limited to two

focus group interviews with students at different schools due to timing limitations. An ideal

situation would have been to do more focus group studies with students. However, the timing

of the empirical sampling mattered. The study had to be done within a short time period

(about a month) after deadline for application when students recently had used the e-service in

order to get an actual discussion regarding the application process.

The case study with citizens (Article 4) was limited to an explorative study to investigate the

citizens' attitudes to the newly established contact centre in one municipality. This limitation

was due to time and financial limitations within the research project. If the conditions had

been ideal a broader follow-up citizen study could have been done in the same municipality as

well as another citizen-study in at least one of the other municipalities that had implemented

contact centres if the time conditions were more favourable.

7. Contribution The research results contribute to the general knowledge of e-government and e-governance

in the perspective of implementation of e-government policies that benefit policymakers and

37

public administrators. The results are also of value for researchers interested in areas that

relate theories on entrepreneurship to policy implementation. The final part of this section

presents potential further research directions.

7.1 Relevance for research

The results help bridging the research gap on how e-government policies are implemented in

Swedish local governance context in practice. The results also enriches the research by

conceptualizing the terms e-government and e-governance.

Further the results enrich the existing literature on policy entrepreneurs in networks

expanding the roles to also include local e-government contexts. This research demonstrate

the relevance of using the concept of policy entrepreneurs in Swedish context as well as to

increase the understanding of the concept.

Findings also have relevance for research within public administration management as the

results from this thesis indicate that what is described as New Public Management has

developed into what is named New Public Governance (Osborne et al., 2012).

Further this research has relevance for local and regional planning or “development” as the

concept of planning implies a mode of governance articulated by policies (Healey, 2004).

7.2 Relevance for policy

The research results are valuable to policy makers at the national, regional and local level

although especially for those at the local level. The results are also valuable for planners and

decision-makers in municipalities when planning to implement contact centres including more

e-services, e.g. to learn about different approaches to implementing CCs.

The results illustrates and make sense of the many complexities involved when implementing

an e-service in a local and regional context, where many actors and users are concerned and

different values compete, which has relevance for policy. Results contribute to the knowledge

that implementation of e-government and e-governance initiatives in the public sector places

great demands on their implementers. Implementing professionals must act in highly creative

ways. Although the use of IT is essential for the organisational transformation, the results

indicate that the organisational settings and internal anchoring are greater constraints than

new technology for implementation of local e-government and e-governances initiatives in

form of contact centres.

Results from this thesis implies that, in practice, when e-government policy is implemented at

the local level, it tends to happen in an e-governance settings that are conducted by policy

entrepreneurs or promoted by entrepreneurial behaviour in public administration.

These results could be valuable and exert a positive influence on local/regional development

as Sweden has such a big public sector, especially on the local level – this could exert a

positive influence on local/regional development (cf. Westlund, 2012).

7.3 Potential further research directions

This research has resulted in several potential further research directions. One future

38

interesting area of research is to study the hypothesis launched in this essay indicating that to

implement local e-government policies, the policy entrepreneurs or public administrators with

entrepreneurial behaviour in public administration have to navigate in e-governance settings.

The findings also indicate that there may be a possible source for planning and a basis for

decision-making as well as for citizen impact on the conditions for local planning through the

implementation of municipal contact centres. This could lead to a possibility for planners to

have valuable input from citizens on decisions e.g. regarding the outdoor environment. This

refers to the concepts and norms of Swedish welfare and democracy as well as to the concept

of spatial planning that includes urban and regional planning.

Potential research questions would then be:

Does the implementation of municipal CCs affect local planning in terms of better

serving the interest of citizens? If yes, in what way?

How may the implementation of CCs contribute to processes used in deliberative

attempts to influence spatial planning?

Also future interesting research questions to analyse are:

What are the barriers for e-governance at the local level?

Is there a gender dimension of e-governance/e-government?

How does the implementation of municipal contact centres affect citizens?

39

8. References Alvesson, M. and Kärreman, D. (2011). Qualitative Research and Theory Development. Mystery as

Method, London: SAGE Publications.

Alvesson, M. and Sköldberg, K. (2000/2009). Reflexive Methodology: New Vistas for Qualitative

Research, London: SAGE Publications.

Alsaghier, H., Ford, M., Nguyen, A. and Hexel, R. (2009). Conceptualizing Citizens’ Trust in e-

Government: Application of Q Methodology, Electronic Journal of e-Government, Vol. 7 Issue 4,

99 295-310, www.ejeg.com Accessed 2013-08-29.

Andréasson, E. (2011). “Det är väldigt mycket datoriserat är det.” – en studie om IT-utveckling i ett

landsting: policy, implementering och praktik. Linköping University, Faculty of Arts and Science,

Institutionen för ekonomisk och industriell utveckling. Thesis No. FiF-a 012. Linköping.

As-Saber, S. N. & Hossain, K. (2008). Call Centres and Their Role in E-governance: A Developing

Country Perspective, The Journal of Community Informatics, Vol. 4, No 3.

Audretsch, D. B. & Thurik, A. R. (2000). Capitalism and democracy in the 21st century: from the

managed to the entrepreneurial economy, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Vol. 10 (1), 17-34.

Axelsson, K, Melin, U. and Lindgren, I. (2010). Exploring the importance of citizen participation and

involvement in e-government projects, Transforming Government: People, Process and Policy,

Vol. 4, No. 4, 299-321. www.emeraldinsight.com/1750-6166.htm. Accessed 2013-09-29.

Bannister, F. (2001). Dismantling the silos: extracting new value from IT investments in public

administration, Information Systems Journal, Vol. 11, No. 1, 65-84.

Barrett, S. M. (2004). Implementation Studies: Time for a Revival? Personal Reflections on 20 Years

of Implementation Studies, Public Administration, Vol. 82 (2), 249-262.

Barzelay, M. (2001). The New Public Management. Improving Research and Policy Dialogue.

Wildavsky Forum Series, Berkeley: University of California Press.

Bekkers, V., Dijkstra, G.; Edwards, A. and Fenger, M. (eds.) (2007). Governance and the Democratic

Deficit: Assessing the Democratic Legitimacy of Governance Practices, Hants: Ashgate Publishing.

von Bergmann-Winberg, M-L. and Wihlborg, E. (2011). Entreprenörer i politikens gränsland och

nätverk in: M-L von Bergmann-Winberg and E. Wihlborg (eds.) Politikens entreprenörskap –

kreativ problemlösning och förändring, Malmö: Liber, 5-15.

Bernhard, I. (2011). Planning for municipal e-government – A tentative framework towards citizen

centric public e-services. Paper presented at the Western Regional Science Association, 50th

Annual Meeting, Monterey, California, USA, February 27 – March 2. Bernhard, I. (2013). E-government and E-governance – Swedish case studies with focus on the local

level. Licentiate thesis, Stockholm: KTH. Bernhard, I. (2014). Local e-Government in Sweden – Municipal Contact Center Implementation with

Focus on Public Administrators and Citizens. Journal of Community Informatics, Vol. 10, No.1.

http://ci-journal.net/index.php/ciej/article/view/860/1044. Bernhard, I. and Grundén, K. (2013). Challenging Organizational Issues When Municipal Contact

Centers Are Implemented, Electronic Journal of e-Government, Vol. 11, Issue 1, 198-209.

Available online at http://www.ejeg.com/volume11/issue1. Bernhard, I. and Wihlborg, E. (2014). Municipal Contact Centres: A Slower Approach Towards

Sustainable Local Development by E-government, European Planning Studies, DOI: 10.1080/09654313.2014.942599

Bevir, M., Rhodes, R.A.W. and Weller, P. (2003). Traditions of governance: interpreting the changing

role of the public sector, Public Administration, Vol. 18, No. 1, 1-17. Beynon-Davies, P. and Williams, M.D. (2003). Evaluating electronic local government in the UK,

Journal of Information Technology, Vol. 18, No. 2, 137-149.

Bryman, A. (2008). Social Research Methods, 3rd edition, New York: Oxford University Press.

Bryman, A. and Bell, E. (2011). Business Research Methods, 3rd edition, New York: Oxford

University Press.

Buchanan, D and Badham, R. (1999) Power, Politics and Organizational Change: Winning the Turf

Game. London: SAGE Publications.

Buse, K, Mays N. and Walt, G (2005). Making Health Policy. Understanding Public Health Series

Open University Press.

40

Börzel, T.A. (1998). Organizing Babylon – On the different conceptions of policy network. Public

Administration, 76 (2), 253–273.

Cars, G. (1992). Förhandlingar mellan privata och offentliga aktörer i samverkan. KTH. Stockholm

Cars, G. and von Sydow, Å. (2001). Governance and Partnerships in Sweden. In Christoferson, I.

(ed.): Swedish Planning – In Times of Diversity. Gävle: Föreningen för Samhällsplanering.

Cars, G., Healey, P., Madanipour, A. and De Magalhaes, C. (2002). Urban Governance, Institutional

Capacity and Social Milieux. Aldershot: Ashgate.

Castells, M. (1996). The Information Age. Economy, Society and Culture. Volume I: The Rise of the

Network Society, Oxford, UK: Blackwell.

Castells, M. (2002). The Internet Galaxy, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Castells, M. (2010). The Rise of the Network Society, 2nd ed. Chichester, West Sussex; Malden, MA:

Wiley-Blackwell.

Chatterjee, L. and Lakshmanan T.R. (2009). The Fashioning of Competitive Dynamic Advantage of

Entrepreneurial Cities: Role of Social and Political Entrepreneurship. In Karlsson, C., Andersson,

Å.E., Cheshire, P.C. and Stough, R.R. (Eds.) New Directions in Regional Economic Development.

Berlin, Heidelberg, New York: Springer, 107-120.

Christensen, T. and Lagreid, P. (Eds.) (2007). Transcending New Public Management: The

Transformation of Public Sector Reforms, Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Publishing.

Clifton J. and Díaz-Fuentes, D. (2010). Evaluating EU Policies on Public Services: A citizens’

perspective, Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Vol. 18, Issue 2, 281-311.

Collins, R. (2009). e-Governance and the Governance of the Global Internet. In: Budd, L. and Harris,

L. (eds.). e-Governance: Managing or Governing? New York: Routledge, 53–70.

Cordella, A. (2007). E-government: Towards the e-Bureaucratic Form? Journal of Information

Technology, 22, 265-274, http://personal.lse.ac.uk/cordella/egovjit.pdf accessed 2014-04-04.

Cunningham, P. and Karakasidou, A. (2009). Innovation in the Public Sector. Policy Brief No. 2. Pro

Inno Europe.

Deakins, S.D., Al Namani, H. and Zhang, C. (2010). Local e-government impact in China, New

Zealand, Oman, and in the United Kingdom, International Journal of Public Sector Management,

23(6), 520-534.

DeBenedictis, A., Howell, W., Figueroa, R., and Boggs, R. A. (2002). E-government defined: an

overview of the next big information technology challenge. Issues in Information Systems, 3, 130-

136.

Dunleavy, P., Margetts, H., Bastow, S. and Tinkler, J. (2005). New Public Management Is Dead –

Long Live Digital-Era Governance, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory,

September 8, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 467-494.

http://jpart.oxfordjournals.org/content/16/3/467.full, accessed 2014-05-15.

Ehn, P., (2001). Mycket väsen för lite ull – en ESO-rapport om partnerskapen i de regionala

tillväxtavtalen. (Much Ado about Nothing – An Analysis of the Partnership Model and the Growth

Agreements). Regeringskansliet: Ds 2001:59 http://eso.expertgrupp.se/rapporter/20011-mycket-

vasen-for-lite-ull-en-eso-rapport-om-partnerskapen-i-de-regionala-tillvaxtavtalel/ accessed 2014-

05-15.

Eisenhardt, K. M. (1989). Building Theories from Case Study Research, Academy of Management

Review, Vol. 14, No. 4, 532-550.

Elias, K. Forsemalm, J. Gustafsson, J. Johnsson, E. Johansson, M. Montin, S. Lilled, L. and Löf. Y.

(2011). Governance: att styra med insikt snarare än avsikt. En studie om flernivå styrning och

sektorsamverkan i Göteborg och Malmö. Göteborg: Mistra-Urban Futures.

Findahl, O. (2011). Svenskarna och Internet 2011.Stockholm: .SE.

Findahl, O. (2012). Svenskarna och Internet 2012.Stockholm: .SE.

Friedmann, J. (2011). Insurgencies: Essays in Planning Theory. Oxon: Routledge (selection).

Fuller-Love, N. and Kilkenny, M. (2012). Network Analysis and Business Network, in I. Bernhard

(ed.): Uddevalla Symposium 2012. Entrepreneurship and Innovation Networks, Revised papers

presented at the 15th Uddevalla Symposium, 14-16 June, Faro, Portugal. Research reports 2012:02,

Trollhättan: University West. 345-357.

41

Garson, G. D. (1999). Information systems, politics and government: Leading theoretical perspectives.

In G. D. Garson (ed.) Handbook of Public Information Systems. New York: Marcel Dekker, 591-

605. Gilham, B. (2000). Case Study Research Methods. London: Continuum.

Gil-Garcia, R.J. and Pardo, T.A. (2005). E-Government success factors: mapping practical tools to

theoretical Foundations, Government Information Quarterly, 22 (2): 187-216.

Giritli Nygren, K. (2009a).“e” i retorik och praktik. Elektronisk förvaltning i översättning [“e” as

rhetoric and practice. eGovernment in transition.] Doctoral thesis, Mid Sweden University.

Sundsvall, Sweden.

Giritli Nygren, K. (2009b). e-Governmentality: on Electronic Administration in Local Government.

Electronic Journal of e-Government Vol. 7. Issue 1, 55-64, available online at www.ejeg.com

accessed 2014-07-06.

Giritli Nygren, K. and Wiklund, H.G. (2010). En IT-styrd förvaltning – en fjärde förvaltningsdoktrin?

In K. Lindblad-Gidlund, E.Ekelin, S. Eriksén & A. Ranerup (eds.), Förvaltning och

medborgarskap i förändring (Ongoing change in public administration and citizenship –

Established practice and critical perspectives), Lund: Studentlitteraur.

Gjelstrup, G. and Sørensen, E. (eds.) (2007). Public Administration in Transition. Theory, Practice,

Methodology. Copenhagen: DFØF Publishing.

Glaser, B. & Strauss, A. (1967). The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative

Research. New York: Aldine Publishing.

Government Bill (1999/2000). Ett informationssamhälle för alla [An Information Society for all],

Regeringen, Näringsdepartementet: Prop. 1999/2000:86.

http://www.regeringen.se/content/1/c4/21/80/bf3285d6.pdf Accessed 2014-04-30.

Grant, G. and Chau, D. (2006). Developing a generic framework for e-Government. In G. Hunter and

F. Tan (eds.), Advanced Topics in Global Information Management, Vol. 5, London: Idea Group,

72-101.

Grundén, K. (2010). Evaluation of contact centre implementation in a Swedish municipality with

focus on social aspects. In D. O’Donnell. (ed.) Proceedings of the 10th European Conference on e-

Government, National Centre for Taxation Studies, University of Limerick, Ireland, 17-18 June,

Intellectual Capital Research, Limerick, Ireland: Academic Publishing International, 199-206.

Grönlund, Å. (2005). “What’s in a Field – Exploring the Egovernment Domain,” Social Science

Computer Review (21:1), 55-72.

Grönlund, Å. and Horan, T. A. (2005). Introducing e-Gov: History, Definitions, and Issues.

Communications of the Association for Information Systems, Vol. 15, 713-719.

Gustafsson, A. (1999) Kommunalt självstyre. Stockholm: SNS förlag.

Hajer, M.A. and Wagenaar, H. (eds.) (2003). Deliberative Policy Analysis. Understanding

Governance in the Network Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Hall, P. (2011). Managementbyråkrati – organisationspolitisk makt i svensk offentlig förvaltning.

Malmö: Liber.

Harris, M. and Kinney, R. (2004). Innovation and Entrepreneurship in State and Local Government.

Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.

Haveri, A. (2006). Complexity in Local government change: Limits to Rational Reforming, Public

Management Review. 8 (10), 31-46.

Healey, P. (2004). The Treatment of Space and Place in the New Strategic Spatial Planning in Europe.

International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Vol. 28 (1), 45-67.

Healey, P. (2007). Urban Complexity and Spatial Strategies –Towards a Relational Planning for Our

Times. Routledge. London.

Healey, P. (2012). The universal and the contingent: Some reflections on the transnational flow of

planning ideas practices. Planning Theory, Vol. 11 (2), 188-207.

Hedlund, G. and Montin, S. (eds.) (2009). Governance på svenska. Stockholm: Santérus Academic

Press Sweden.

Heeks, R. (1999). Reinventing Government in the Information Age – International Practice in IT-

enabled Public Sector Reform, London: Routledge.

Heeks, R. (2006). Implementing and Managing eGovernment. An International Text. London: SAGE

Publications.

42

Heeks, R., (2007). Analyzing e-government research: Perspectives, philosophies, theories, methods,

and practice, Government Information Quarterly, Vol. 24, Issue 2, 243–265.

Herbert-Cheshire, L. (2003). Translating Policy: Power and Action in Australia’s Country Towns,

Sociologia Ruralis, 43, 4, 454-73.

Hill, M. & Hupe, P. (2009). Implementing Public Policy, An Introduction to the Study of Operational

Governance, 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE Publications.

Ho, A. (2002). Reinventing local Governments and the E-Government Initiative. Public

Administration Review, Vol. 62, No. 4.

Homburg, V. and Bekkers, V. (2005). E-government and NPM: A Perfect Marriage? in Bekkers and

Homburg (eds.), The Information Ecology of E-government – E-government as Institutional and

Technological Innovation in Public Administration, Amsterdam: IOS Press, 155-170.

Homburg, V. (2008). Understanding E-government. Information Systems in Public Administration.

London and New York: Routledge.

Hood, C. (1991). A Public Management for all Seasons? Public Administration 69 (1): 3-19.

Jansson, G. (2011). Local Values and e-Government – Continuity and Change in Public

Administration: Implementing Public e-Services in Two Swedish Municipalities. Linköping:

Linköping University Press.

Jansson, G. (2013). A Legitimate (Electronic) Government? On IT-Development in Local Government.

Academic dissertation, Linköping University, Sweden. Linköping: Sweden

Jayashree, S. and Marthandan, G. (2010). Government to E-government to E-society. Journal of

Applied Sciences, 10: 2205-2210. DOI: 10.3923/jas.2010.2205.2210

Jordan, A., Wurzel, R. K.W. and Zito, A. (2005). The Rise of ‘New’ Policy Instruments in

Comparative Perspective: Has Governance Eclipsed Government?, Political Studies, 53: 477-496.

Jos, P. H. and Tomkins, M. E. (2009). Keeping It Public: Defending Public Service Values in a

Customer Service Age, Public Administration Review, Vol. 69, (6), 1077–1086.

Kingdon, J. W. (1984/1995). Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies, 2nd ed. New York:

HarperCollins.

Kitzinger, J., I. Marková and Kalampalikis, N. (2004). Qu´est-ce que les focus groups? [What are

focus groups?], Bullentin de Psychologie, 57, 237–243.

Kjaer A.M. (2004). Governance. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Koch, P. and Hauknes, J. (2005). Innovation in the public sector, DUBLIN Report No. 20, NIFU

STEP, Oslo.

Kvale S. (1996). Interviews: An Introduction to Qualitative Research Interviewing. Thousands Oaks,

California: SAGE Publications.

Kvale, S. and Brinkmann, S. (2009). Interviews: Learning the Craft of Qualitative Research

Interviewing, 2nd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE Publications.

Larsson, H. and Grönlund, Å. (2014). Future-oriented eGovernance: The sustainability concept in

eGov research, and forward, Government Information Quarterly, 31, 137-149.

Lee, C., Chang, K. and Berry, F.S. (2011). Testing the Development and Diffusion of E-Government

and E-Democracy: A Global Perspective, Public Administration Review, May/June.

Lindblad-Gidlund, K, Ekelin, A., Eriksén S. and Ranerup, A. (2010). Förvaltning och medborgarskap

i förändring – etablerad praxis och kritiska perspektiv [Ongoing change in public administration

and citizenship – established practice and critical perspectives], Lund: Studentlitteratur.

Löfgren, K. (2007). The Governance of E-Government. A Governance Perspective on the Swedish E-

Government Strategy, Public Policy and Administration, 22(3), 335-352.

Löfgren, K. (2012). Implementeringsforskning – En kunskapsöversikt. Framtagen för Kommission för

ett socialt hållbart Malmö. www.malmo.se/kommission. Accessed 2014-04-15.

Marková, I., P. Linell, M. Grossen and Salazar Orvig, A. (2007). Dialogue in focus groups: Exploring

socially shared knowledge, London: Equinox Publishing.

Mason, M. (2010). Sample Size and Saturation in PhD Studies Using Qualitative Interviews. Forum:

Qualitative Social Research, 11(3), Art. 8-September http://www.qualitative-

research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1428/3027. Accessed 2014-08-04.

Meijer, A. and Bannister, F. (2011). The coming of age of e-government studies, Information Policy,

Vol. 16, No. 1, 1–3.

43

Michel, H. (2005). e-Administration, e-Government, e-Governance and the Learning City: A typology

of citizenship management using ICTs, The Electronic Journal of e-Government Vol. 3 Issue 4,

213-218, www.ejeg.com. Accessed 2013-05-10.

Mintrom, M. (1997). Policy Entrepreneurs and the Diffusion of Innovation, American Journal of

Political Science, Vol. 41, No. 3, 738-770.

Mintrom, M. and Norman, P. (2009). Policy entrepreneurship and policy Change, The Policy Studies

Journal, Vol. 37, No. 4, 99. 649-667.

Misuraca, G. and Viscusi, G. (2013). Managing E-Governance: A Framework for Analysis and

Planning. In Z. Mahmood (ed.) Developing E-Government Projects: Frameworks and

Methodologies, Advances in Electronic Government, Digital Divide, and Regional Development

Series, Hershey, PA, USA: IGI-Global, 204-224.

Montin, S. (2007). Moderna kommuner. 3rd edition. Malmö: Liber.

Montin, S. and Hedlund, G. (2009). Governance som interaktiv samhällsstyrning – Gammalt eller nytt

i forskning och politik?, in Hedlund, G. and Montin, S. (eds.) Governance på svenska, Stockholm:

Santérus Förlag.

Mäntysalo, R., Saglie, I-L. and Cars, G. (2011). Between Input Legitimacy and Output Efficiency:

Defensive Routines and Agonistic Reflectivity in Nordic Land-Use Planning, European Planning

Studies, Vol. 19, (12), 2109-2126.

Norén Bretzer, Y. (2010). Sveriges Politiska System. Lund: Studentlitteratur.

Norris, D, F & Reddick, C. G. (2012). Local E-government in the United States: Transforming or

Incremental Change?, Public Administration Review, 73 (1), 165-175

O’Toole, L. Jr. (2000). Research on Policy Implementation: Assessment and Prospects, Journal of

Public Administration Research and Theory, 10 (2), 263-288.

Oborn, E., Barrett, M. and Exworthy, M. (2011). Policy entrepreneurship in the development of public

sector strategy: The case of London Health Reform, Public Administration, 89(2), 325-344.

Osborne, S. P. (2006). The New Public Governance?, Public Management Review, 8, (3), 377-387,

DOI: 10.1080/14719030600853022

Osborne, S. P. (2010). The New Public Governance?, London: Routledge.

Osborne, S. P.; Radnor, Z. & Nasi, G. (2012). A New Theory for Public Service Management?

Toward a (Public) Service-Dominant Approach, American Review of Public Administration, 43,

(2), 135-158, DOI: 10.1177/0275074012466935

Paroski, M., Konjovic´, Z. & Surla, D. (2013). Implementation of e-Government at the local level in

underdeveloped countries. The case study of AP Vojvodina, The Electronic Library, Vol. 31 No. 1,

99-118, DOI 10.1108/02640471311299164.

Persson, A. and Goldkuhl, G. (2010). Government Value Paradigms – Bureaucracy, New Public

Management, and E-Government, Communications of the Association for Information Systems:

27(1). Article 4, 45-62, Available at: http//aisle.aisnet.org/cias/vol27/iss1/4. Accessed: 2012-06-27

Peters, G.B. (2007). Institutions and Governance in: Sørensen, E. and G. Gjelstrup (ed.). Public

administration in transition: Theory, practice, methodology. Copenhagen: DJØF.

Peters, B. G. and Pierre. J. (1998). Governance Without Government? Rethinking Public

Administration. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 8(2), 223-243.

Peters, G.B. and Pierre, J. (eds.) (2006). Handbook of Public Policy, London: SAGE Publications.

Petersson, O. (2001). Kommunalpolitik. Fjärde upplagan. Stockholm: Norstedts juridik.

Pierre, J. and Peters, G. B. (2000). Governance, Politics and the State, Basingstoke: Macmillan.

Pierre, J. and Sundström, G. (eds.) (2009). Samhällsstyrning i förändring, Malmö: Liber.

Pollit, C. and Bouchaert, G. (2004). Public Management Reform, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Potnis, D.D. (2010). Measuring e-Governance as an innovation in the public sector. Government

Information Quarterly, Vol. 27, 41-48.

Pozen, D. E. (2008). We are all entrepreneurs now, SSRN, Social Science Research Network, New

York: USA, Assecced 20130825 at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1044021

Rabiaiah, A. and Vandijck, E. (2011). A Strategic Framework of e-government: Generic and Best

Practice. In Worrall (ed.) Leading Issues in e-Government Research, Reading: Academic

Publishing Internationals.

Regeringen (1998). Proposition 1997/98:62. Regional tillväxt – för arbete och välfärd. Stockholm:

Närings- och handelsdepartementet.

44

Regeringskansliet (2008). Handlingsplan för eFörvaltning. Nya grunder för IT-baserad

verksamhetsutveckling i offentlig förvaltning. Available 2013-08-23:

http://www.regeringen.se/content/1/c6/09/65/12/4ffd1319.pdf.

Rhodes, R. A. W. and Marsh,D. (1992). New directions in the study of policy networks, European

Journal of Political Research, Vol. 21, Nos. 1–2, pp.181–205.

Ritchie, J., Lewis, J. & Elam, G. (2003). Designing and selecting samples. In J. Ritchie & J. Lewis

(eds.), Qualitative Research Practice. A Guide for Social Science Students and

Researchers. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 77-108.

Rose, W. R. and Grant, G. G (2010). Critical issues pertaining to the planning and implementation of

E-Government initiatives, Government Information Quarterly, Vol. 27, Issue 1, 26–33.

Rossel, P. and Finger, M. (2007). Conceptualizing e-governance. New York: ACM Digital Library,

399-407 accessed 2014-05-15 at: http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1328141

Rövik, K A (2008). Managementsamhället: Trender och idéer på 2000-talet. Malmö: Liber.

Sager, T. (2009). Planners’ role: Torn between dialogical ideals and neo-liberal realities, European

Planning Studies, 17(1), 65–84.

SALAR (2011). E-förvaltning och e-tjänster i Sveriges kommuner 2011. accessed 2014-04-30 at:

http://webbutik.skl.se/sv/artiklar/e-forvaltning-och-e-tjanster-i-sveriges-kommuner-2011.html [The

Swedish Association of Municipalities and Regions]

Sandercock, L. (1998). Framing Insurgent Historiographies for Planning in: Sandercock, L (ed.)

Making the Invisible Visible: A Multicultural Planning History. Berkeley/L.A.: University of

California Press, 2-33.

Saxena, K.B.C. (2005). Towards excellence in e-governance, International Journal of Public Sector

Management, 18(6), 498-513.

Schofield, J. (2001). Time for Revival? Public policy implementation: a review of the literature and an

agenda for future research, International Journal of Management Reviews, Vol. 3. (3), 245-263.

Schumpeter, J.A. (1934). The Theory of Economic Development, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press.

SOU (2010). Statens offentliga utredningar 2010:20, Så enkelt som möjligt för så många som möjligt –

från strategi till handling för e-förvaltning. (As simple as possible for as many as possible – from

strategy to action for eGovernment.). Betänkande av E-delegationen (report by the Swedish

eGovernment Delegation), Stockholm: Fritzes.

Stake, R. (1995). The Art of Case Study Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Stough, R. R. (2006). Origin and development of the knowledge economy in functional regions. In: C.

Karlsson, B. Johansson, R. R. Stough, (eds.), Entrepreneurship and Dynamics in the Knowledge

Economy, New York and London: Routledge.

von Sydow, Å. (2004). Exploring local governance in urban planning and development: the case of

Lindholmen, Göteborg. Stockholm: KTH.

Sørensen, E. and Torfing, J. (eds.) (2007). Theories of Democratic Network Governance. Basingstoke:

Palgrave Macmillan.

Sundström. G. (2005). Målstyrningen drar åt skogen. Om guvernement och governance i svensk

skogspolitik, Rapportserie 2005:6, Stockholm: SCORE (Stockholms centrum för forskning om

offentlig sektor).

Sundström, G. and Pierre, J. (2009). Samhällsstyrning i förändring in: J. Pierre, and G. Sundström,

(introduction) (eds.). Samhällsstyrning i förändring, Malmö: Liber.

Torfing, J. and P. Triantafillou (eds.) (2011). Interactive Policy Making, Meta-governance and

Democracy. Colchester: ECPR Press.

United Nations (2012). United Nations e-Government survey 2012. e-Government for the people, New

York: United Nations http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/un/unpan048065.pdf

accessed 2014-02-13.

Vintar, M.; Mateja K., Mitja D. and B. Bercic (2003). Development of e-government in Slovenia,

Information Polity 8:133-149.

Weissert, C. (1991). Policy Entrepreneurs, Policy opportunities, and Legislative Effectiveness,

American Politics Research, 19(2), 262-274.

Westlund, H. (1999). An Interaction-Cost Perspective on Networks and Territory, Annals of Regional

Science Vol. 33, No 2, 93-121.

45

Westlund, H. (2006). Social Capital in the Knowledge Economy; Theory and Empirics, Berlin-

Heidelberg: Springer.

Westlund, H. (2012). A Multidimensional Perspective on Entrepreneurship. In Karlsson, C. Johansson,

B. and Stough, R.R (eds.) Entrepreneurship, Social Capital and Governance, Directions for the

Sustainable Development and Competitiveness of Regions, Cheltenham, UK: and Northampton,

MA, USA: Edward Elgar, 192-220

Westlund, H. (2013). A brief history of time, space and growth: Waldo Tobler’s first law of geography

revisited: WRSA presidential address 2013, The Annals of Regional Science, 51(3) .917-924

Wibeck, V. (2000). Fokusgrupper. Om fokuserade gruppintervjuer som undersökningsmetod [Focus

groups: About focused group interviews as method], Lund: Studentlitteratur.

Wihlborg, E. (2000). En lösning som söker problem [A solution looking for problems], Doctoral

Thesis, Linköping: Linköping University Press.

Wihlborg, E. (2005). Offentliga e-tjänster i medborgarens tjänst [Public e-services serving the

citizen], Stockholm: Finansdepartementet, Delegationen för 24timmarsmyndigheten.

Wihlborg, E. (2011). Entreprenörer på plats i policy och politik, I von Bergmann-Winberg, M-L &

Wihlborg, E. (red.) Politikens entreprenörskap – kreativ problemlösning och förändring, Malmö:

Liber, 110-129.

Wihlborg, E. & Palm, J. (2008). Who is Governing What? Governing Local Technical Systems-an

Issue of Accountability, Local Government Studies, (34), 3, 349-362. available online at

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03003930802044544

Wihlborg, E., Melin, U. & Krafve, L.J. (2010).Technology in policy: An explorative case study of

information systems in merging authorities. WEBIST 2010 - Proceedings of the 6th International

Conference on Web Information Systems and Technology, 2, pp. 353-360.

Worrall, L. (2011). Introduction to Leading Issues in e-government Research e-Government – Where

Is It Taking Us and Our Governments? In: L. Worrall (ed.) Leading Issues in e-Government

Research, Reading, UK: Academic Publishing International, iii-xii.

Yanow, D. (2003). Assessing local knowledge, in: Hajer, M. A and Wagenaar, H. (eds.) Deliberative

Policy Analysis. Understanding Governance in the Network Society, Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

Yildiz, M. (2007). E-Government Research: Reviewing the literature, limitations, and ways forward.

Government Information Quarterly, 24 (3), 646-665.

Yin, R.K (2009). Case Study Research. Design and Methods. 4th ed., Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE

Publications.