Challenges En-Route Towards E-Governance in Small Developing Island Nations of the South Pacific

Abstract

Papua New Guinea is hampered by many factors pertaining to institutions, socio-economic, technological, legal-political factors amongst others. E-governance though is seen as a new mantra having the potential of solving immense problems from service delivery, is still many a times constrained in its capacity to yield benefits. So, what are the hurdles that Papua New Guinea faces given its contextual setting is the main research objective of this paper. This objective is achieved through a quantitative methodological framework using structured questionnaires in which a sample of 189 respondents was interviewed. The findings of this research highlight that in PNG the following barriers were cited: lack of project management, inadequate technological/data and legal infrastructure, difficulty in change management, insufficient time and money, lack of requisite competencies, improper communication environment, lack of internal will and finally the dominance of external pressure.