Scalability and sustainability of M-Government projects implementation in developing countries

Abstract

Mobile technology has played a crucial role in facilitating democratic change in many of the developing countries. Many countries have attempted to implement Mobile Government (M-government) which is a subset of E-government as the most fundamental infrastructure for such changes. However, M-government projects scalability and sustainability in the context of developing countries are key issues relating to ICT, yet, they have not been extensively explored. This chapter attempts to discuss the scalability and sustainability of M-government projects in the context of developing countries. The aim of this chapter is to provide a broad understanding of the issues around scalability and sustainability of M-government projects in general and mobile phones based projects for service deliveries in particular. In order to understand these issues, definitions of these two concepts will be provided; these definitions are followed by an overview of the challenges of scaling up and sustaining M-government projects in developing countries and lastly an elaboration of how sustainability and scalability can be achieved are also provided.