A scoping review for proposing an eParticipation framework for South African local municipalities

Abstract

Governments globally are making notable efforts to facilitate conversations with citizens to improve their participation in government decisionmaking by using various digital technologies in what could be coined as electronic participation approaches (e-Participation). It is even more critical for local governments as they want to apply feedback from citizens through e-participation to improve service delivery and inform policies. Both e-participation and local government have unique issues, challenges and important aspects to consider. This paper aims to identify these concepts through a scoping review to build a conceptual framework for local South African municipalities to implement e-participation for improved service delivery. The scoping review analysed 19 papers after applying the exclusion criteria used to conceptualise the framework. Both e-participation and local government need to consider value, content for access, skills, transparency, trust and funding to make e-participation a reality. The concepts that emanated from the scoping review under e-participation and local government considerations allowed for a list of requirements to consider when implementing e-participation. Key findings are that a conducive environment that allows for both online and offline participation platforms is needed to be of value to citizens and where they feel safe to participate otherwise, they will not engage in e-participation.