The Impact Of An Unstable Environment On Intention To Continue Using M-Government Of Developing Countries: The Case Of Iraq

Abstract

With the advent of wireless and mobile technologies, more governments in developing countries are putting in the effort to introduce m-government services to their citizens, businesses, and other government agencies. These governments spend a large number of investments to succeed in the m-government project. Although m-government is spreading rapidly in most of the developing counties including Iraq, using m-government by citizens is still at a low level comparing with developed countries. On the other hand, many countries suffer from civil conflicts or wars caused by Political instability, especially in developing countries such as Iraq. Few studies investigated the m-government under an unstable environment, which involves a great deal of uncertainty and risks that may hinder the success of MG services. This study aims to identify the contributing factors on intention to continue using the m-government services in a different context such as an unstable environment. The data were collected through a questionnaire survey from 384 citizens who used m-government services of the southern region of Iraq. Data were analyzed using the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling. The Results indicated that information quality (?= 0.404, p < 0.01), civil conflicts (?= 0.250, p < 0.01), system quality (?= 0.124, p < 0.01) and service quality (?= 0.120, p < 0.01) were positively relation to intention to continue use, indicating total variance of 52%. In terms of predictive power, information quality has the biggest effecting followed by civil conflicts, system quality, and service quality, sequentially. Implications from these results to m-government system developers and organizers are further detailed.