The Status of E-Government Adoption: A Bibliometric Analysis

Abstract

A notable shift away from conventional governance to the concept of electronic government (e-government) has reaped significant interest and popularity. However, the issue of inadequate levels of user adoption of e-government services is widely acknowledged, and governmental expenditures in implementing e-government services remain unworthy and fail to yield satisfying returns on investment. Thus, the objectives of the study are (1) to reflect the contemporary state of the e-government adoption research field and (2) to identify the knowledge gaps that require more attention to promote e-government adoption. The study employed Bibliometrics, performance analysis, and science mapping analysis, followed by preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA). Biblioshiny and VOSviewer were used in the study to visualize data, and the analysis is based on the Scopus database, which has 862 research articles from 324 journals published between 2001 and 2022. The study finds the most pertinent sources, the country-wise distribution in single-country publications and multiple-country publications, and the most prominent academics whose contribution is the most productive in time. Moreover, the underlying factors for adopting e-government, the driving of information and communication technologies, the established research models, and the access pathways for e-services have been identified as the areas of high activity in the field. Furthermore, the results indicate that further investigations are required concerning factors affecting e-government adoption, digital divide, social media, mobile government, cloud computing, and developing nations in terms of the adoption of e-government. The findings help to improve academic knowledge of e-government adoption research and to understand the trends in the field better and can be used to conduct empirical research, such as content analysis, to fully understand what factors accelerated the growth of e-government adoption research.