Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

The advent of smartphones, or mobile phones with PC-like operating systems, has revolutionized the way people interact with each other. Many local governments have created and adopted smartphone applications as a portal through which to provide municipal services, such as public transportation information, and as a new channel through which citizens can interact with the municipal government by submitting questions, concerns, or service requests. While scholars have devoted attention to earlier advances of e-government, including web portals, 311 call centers, and social media, little work has examined the factors that lead to smartphone app adoption by local governments and the impact of these apps on service delivery and citizen satisfaction. The goal of e-government is to increase the quality of services, by increased speed, completeness and process efficiency; and to provide citizens with the opportunity to participate in different kinds of democratic processes.  Have local governments been successful in achieving these goals with the creation of smartphone applications? Using data from two surveys – one of local government elected officials and city managers and one of Florida citizens on their opinions of these smartphone apps, we seek to understand whether these apps are facilitating positive outcomes with regard to the way local governments interact with their constituents and meet constituent service delivery needs.