Does External Environment Affect E-Government? A Cross- Country Analysis - Information and Communication Technologies in Public Administration - page 71

and interact. However, democracy was not found to be a key factor in deciding a
country's Internet usage level. Hypothesis 3 is not supported by the results.
Hypotheses 4, 5, and 6 are all supported by the study. Higher levels of educa-
tion lead to higher levels of e-government, democracy, and Internet usage. Singh
et al. (2007) argued that human capital can impact e-government development.
Countries with better education are more likely to have qualified leaders and employ-
ees for governments who are also more innovative and of open enough mindsets to
recognize the importance of e-government. Better education makes more citizens
able to seek information, demand services, and participate in e-governance.
In addition, education plays an important role in the socialization and cultiva-
tion of a citizen's sense of public participation. With better education, citizens have
more desire and ability to know the mechanisms of the government, to supervise
the government, and to participate in the policy-making process. Thus, the desire
to develop a better e-government with improved services and more opportunities
to participate will be stronger among such citizens. Lastly, better education enables
more citizens to use computers and the Internet.
The results also support Hypothesis 7 in that higher levels of economy lead to
higher levels of Internet usage. In countries with higher levels of economy, citizens
have more money to buy computers and use the Internet. In addition, the state-
ment of Hypothesis 8 that countries with higher levels of economy would have
higher levels of democracy is also supported. The results also support Hypothesis 9:
Economy is positively associated with education at the country level. Countries
with more wealth are more likely to spend money on education, employ better
teachers, and provide better facilities for education. Education can also positively
affect the economy by providing more qualified employees, a higher level of tech-
nology, and more innovative leaders.
The results do not support the idea in Hypothesis 10, that peer pressure has a
significant impact on e-government at the country level. This indicates that coun-
tries are relatively independent in developing e-government and are not strongly
impacted by the progress of neighboring countries.
3.6 Conclusion
The study had limitations. First, the sample included data only from 2010 and the
sample size was 129, which is not very large. More data and a larger sample size
would have made for more conclusive results. In addition, because the data used in
this analysis were secondhand, the validity of their measurement and data collec-
tion impacted the results of this study. For example, the survey conducted by the
Economist Intelligence Unit surveyed 167 countries, using 60 questions to mea-
sure the state of democracy within them. The questions involved five components:
electoral process and pluralism, functioning of government, political participation,