Citizen-Initiated Contacts with Government

Most of the existing literature on e-government or electronic government has been examined from what governments offer online. This study, by contrast, examines citizen-initiated contacts with e-government, which is a relatively unexplored area of research. I compare differences in citizen-initiated contacts with government using phones and Websites. My findings indicate when citizens have a problem they actually contact government by phone. However, when asked what method they prefer for solving problems they would prefer to use the Web. For information and transactions, citizens prefer using the Web. Evidence is also found of a digital divide in e-government. The results indicate that e-government is currently not able to solve urgent and complicated problems, and this limits its future development. Since over one third of the United States population does not have Internet access, governments should maintain both communication mediums in the near future.