Digital literacy and the uptake of e-government services

Moving towards e-government services is of high priority for policy makers around the globe. Information and communication technologies offer governments many opportunities, and increase effectiveness and efficiency. The use of ICTs is more and more often considered a precondition for public sector performance. As a result, the use of ICTs is spreading to all parts of the public sector. This process has already entered a next phase. It’s not only about efficiency gains through mirroring offline services online, but also about the use of ICTs as an opportunity for re-thinking government services.

However, dissemination of ICTs requires appropriate competences. More government services online can exclude people with low digital skills. Skills related to information, media, network literacy, and digital citizenship play an important role in a person’s ability to perform tasks related to education, work, culture, and life. Technology “everywhere” means that people with insufficient skills may become socially excluded. Thus, it becomes increasingly important to have the appropriate skills. Unfortunately, studies indeed indicate that many people are at a disadvantage across these skills, and thus it makes it an important policy issue. ICT competencies are essential for participation in an increasingly digitalized society.

Governments need to consider the level of their population’s skills when developing e-government services. It requires a in-depth knowledge of digital skills, especially identification of groups with lack of skills. These groups need to be carefully assisted. Naturally, putting more services online can encourage more people to gain necessary ICT skills, though it would be naive to expect people to be doing this to interact with public administration, when the reasons for their digital exclusion may be more complicated and related to other factors limiting their abilities. Public administrations cannot risk excluding certain subgroups of the population because of their low literacy, numeracy or ICT skills.

This study tries to identify and measure the relationship between digital literacy and the uptake of e-government services. Data on the usage of computer and Internet activities is used as a proxy for digital skills or digital literacy. The dataset used comes from European Union (EU) information society statistics, and covers all EU member countries, though special emphasis is put on Poland’s case.