Capacity Building and IT Diffusion A Comparative Assessment of E-Government Environment in Africa

The “digital divide ” in the utilization of e-government between the industrialized and devel-oping countries stands to spell serious consequences for the latter’s political and economic development. Because African countries rank very low on the global measure of e-government readiness, critical variables were studied to find out which policy and programmatic areas should become priority in bridging the gap. Findings from a multiple regression analysis indi-cate that the low ranking of African countries on the global e-government readiness index indicates that the countries would need to develop, first, the internal utilization capacity as well as an enhanced public access to information, communication, and technology (ICT) infra-structures. These would, in turn, generate the demand necessary to spur increased government investment in ICT infrastructural development. What is mostly required is public sector leadership that creates the enabling environment for increased public and private sector participation in e-government interactions