Accessibility and web practitioners : A study of factors influencing web development for the public sector

For the past few years, Sweden has worked towards digitalisation of the public sector, however without any legislated requirements for accessibility. In order to make public sector body websites and applications accessible to all users a new Swedish law, based on the Web Accessibility Directive, has been implemented. This new law dictates that public sector websites and applications need to comply with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) in September of 2020. This study explores factors influencing web practitioners when developing accessible websites, applications and services for the public sector. This is done through a survey and semi-structured interviews, using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The new law does not provide guidance on methods or evaluations to develop products and services accessible for all users. Instead it has a main focus on compliance with WCAG 2.1. The result show that the close connection between the law and the guidelines removes the focus from the users in evaluations. Instead the focus is on measurable compliance with the law through the use of static checklists or automatic testing tools. As long as the method of using a checklist or automatic tool is presented as equally sufficient as user testing in terms of reaching compliance with the law, clients requesting accessible solutions will not change their priorities or allocate resources towards user testing. The findings are presented in a model representing the factors influencing web development and accessibility evaluation and how these factors are connected and dependent on each other