Co-production of Public Service and Information Technology

Recent years have witnessed growing public administration practitioners’ and researchers’ interests in the involvement of citizens as co-producers of public service design and delivery. With advanced information and communication technologies (ICT) favoring multilateral interactivity and ubiquitous communication, governments are able to expand new opportunities for public service co-production. This literature review contributes to our understanding of current knowledge about the use of ICTs in co-production and the potential outcomes. The results of the review show three models of ICT-enabled co-production: (1) Citizen-sourcing; (2) Automatic Co-production; (3) Government as an Open Platform, each with its unique features in terms of citizens’ contributions, citizens’ capacities, and government openness. This review highlights future developments in electronic sensors and the use of data could lead to new approaches to co-production. ICT-enabled coproduction is promising to bring positive outcomes on public service provision and citizen engagement, yet the effectiveness of those practices is conditioned on factors both inside and outside government organizations. The review also indicates that ICT-enabled co-production is not a panacea and potential dark sides need to be acknowledged. Future research needs to address critical drivers and barriers for governments to utilize different models of ICT-enabled coproduction as well as to evaluate the outcomes of those practices in multiple contexts.