Exploring the role of social media in the G2C relationship

Justification for citizen participation

The notion of participation comprises of a variety definitions and understandings (Kotus, 2013). It may be viewed as the “the practice of consulting and involving members of the public in the agenda-setting, decision-making, and policy-forming activities of organizations or institutions responsible for policy development” (Rowe and Frewer, 2004: 512).

Public participation has been studied within different disciplines including health services reform (Tritter and McCallum, 2006), public administration (Yang, 2005; Coursey et al., 2012), environmental projects (Luyet et al., 2012), planning for development (Cornwall, 2003; Saxena, 1998), and city planning (Kotus, 2013). Additionally, the participation of citizens in policy discourse and implementation has been an on-going issue of concern worldwide (Collins and Ison, 2006). The reasons cited for the elevation of citizen participation includes the reduction in public confidence in the processes that formulate policy decisions and drive the implementation of public services (Rowe and Frewer, 2004). It has been noted that citizens have less trust in the officials that have been entrusted with the process of policy decision making. It is also suggested that where citizens are not consulted they are often hostile towards the government (Rowe and Frewer, 2004) therefore steps need to be taken to ensure citizens are involved and engaged in such processes.

Towards electronic participation in the public sector

Globally, the public sector is recognizing the significance of e-participation (Tambouris et al., 2007) and searching for ways to further engage with their constituents towards a “strengthening of the relationship known as G2C (Government to Citizen)” (Maciel et al., 2011: 3). E-participation programmes have various purposes including: informing citizens, generating support among citizens, utilizing citizens’ feedback in decision making, and exploring citizens’ needs from government. E-participation processes should have as an overriding goal the improvement of citizen access to information and public services. This will assist in public decision making and influence the well-being of citizens and society (United-Nations, 2013).

Electronic participation in the South African context

The services offered by public administration are complex and require a high service quality orientation. Accordingly, the South African government has made a commitment to Batho Pele (“People First” in the Sesotho language) principles, which aim at transforming the public sector through putting the citizens first in all aspects of service delivery (Department of Public Service and Administration, 2009). The principles include: Consultation, Service Standards, Access, Courtesy, Information, Openness and Transparency, Redress and Value for Money. Thus, in support of Batho Pele this paper argued that there is a need for the engagement with and e-participation of citizens. The United Nations highlights that powerful and innovative technologies can be used to progress sustainable development efforts for all people across the world while including them in the process (United Nations Public Administration Network, 2012). This brings to the fore the issue of e-participation. It is also suggested that e-participation is a critical element in the betterment of people’s development and socio-economic circumstances, where government becomes a facilitator of information and services and not a controller thereof (United Nations Public Administration Network, 2012). South Africa, similar to other developing countries, has, since the inception of democracy, developed a range of strategic initiatives aimed at benefiting the entire population and defeating poverty, illiteracy and unemployment. Verdegem (2011) highlights the need to eradicate digital inequalities whilst promoting the participation of all citizens in the information society, particularly those that are currently socially disadvantaged (Verdegem, 2011). This is relevant in developing countries such as South Africa, where approximately 45.5% of the population is categorized as poor (Statistics South Africa, 2014a), coupled with an unemployment rate of 25.5% (Statistics South Africa, 2014b).

Furthermore, focusing on e-participation may encourage social cohesion (Verdegem, 2011) through the empowerment and participation of citizens in the economy and provide “the possibility to individuals to involve and organize themselves in the information society” (Gatautis, 2010: 483). Therefore, the view held in this study is that the call for participatory governance supported by e-participation is timely, particularly in the South African context.

Proliferation of mobile technologies

A parallel trend that is cited in the literature is the diffusion of mobile phones and the Internet in the developing world. These innovations are changing the everyday lives of citizens (Bailard, 2009). In South Africa it is quoted that there are more active Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) cards, than there are citizens (Bidwell et al., 2011). The International Telecommunication Union reports that for South Africa, the numder of mobile cellular subscriptions per 100 inhabitants was 91.2 in 2008, grew to 100.5 in 2010 and was over 150 in 2013 (International Telecommunication Union, 2011, 2014). Thus the area of e-participation is linked to the increasing access that citizens have to mobile phones and associated applications such as social media.

Mobile technologies and social media

The proliferation of mobile phones came with various applications to support the use of these phones. Recently we have seen an upsurge in web based social media applications, which hold the potential for enhanced online interactions (Bonsón et al., 2014a). Bertot et al. (2010) highlight that social media may be viewed as both the content generated by users and the web-based technologies that allow the user to produce the content (Bertot et al., 2010). The social media allow for the sharing, alteration and creation of content (Verdegem, 2011) including easy to use applications such as blogs, wikis, Flickr, Twitter and Facebook. The International Telecommunication Union (2011) highlights that social media are fast becoming the main activity that the youth are engaging with in the online environment and that young people constitute the majority of the population in developing countries. It is argued that in the near future most of our social and work activities will have an online component (International Telecommunication Union, 2011). Since information and communication technology has become entrenched in our daily lives, governments are seeking new ways of exploiting the opportunities offered by information and communication technology (Verdegem, 2011). It is claimed that these mobile technologies hold opportunities to engage citizens (Wimmer, 2007) and this paper supports that this idea be explored within the African context.

There are a variety of social media platforms available such as blogs, wikis and social networks. This study focused on the social networking level and included a review of Facebook and Twitter. Social networking media are becoming a fact of life worldwide (Hawn, 2009; Kaisara and Pather, 2011). In South Africa examples of such technologies that have been found to be popular are MXit, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. MXit is an instant messaging tool that enables users to send one-on-one text messages for free. It is reported to have about 6 million users in South Africa (World Wide Worx, 2014). LinkedIn is referred to as a professional social networking site (Skeels and Grudin, 2009). It is estimated that there are 3.8 million South African users on LinkedIn (World Wide Worx, 2014). LinkedIn has found popularity with business owners and experienced professionals such as consultants, academics, recruiters and corporate employees since it focuses on career information and encourages users to add résumés (Skeels and Grudin, 2009).

Twitter is a micro blogging social networking media service. Twitter users broadcast messages (tweets) about any topic within the 140-character limit and follow others to receive their tweets (Kwak et al., 2010; Snead, 2013). A study of Twitter highlighted that when it was less than 3 years old in 2009 it already had more than 41 million users globally (Kwak et al., 2010) and is continuing to grow rapidly. It was reported in 2014 that Twitter had accumulated 271 million users worldwide and about 77% of users access Twitter on their mobile devices (Twitter, 2014). The Kwak et al. (2010) study also highlighted Twitter’s ability to diffuse information quite quickly through the “retweet” functionality since it allows users to spread information of their choice beyond the reach of the original tweet’s followers (Kwak et al., 2010). In South Africa it is reported that there are 5.5 million Twitter users (World Wide Worx, 2014). Facebook is described as a “social utility intended to help people communicate more efficiently with friends, family and co-workers” (McClard and Anderson, 2008: 10). For many who are pressed for time, Facebook represents a lightweight way to maintain relationships and keep in touch with people (McClard and Anderson, 2008). Facebook reported that as of June 2014 it had 1.32 billion monthly active users (Facebook, 2014). South Africa had 9.4 million users accessing Facebook, mostly via their mobile phones (World Wide Worx, 2014). Both Facebook and Twitter have crossed the age and urban versus rural divides in South Africa and the country is seeing an increase in users over the ages of 60 and rural citizens are rapidly catching up with the urban users (World Wide Worx, 2014).

Social media in the public sector

There has been an upsurge in e-government research on the use of social media by the public sector (Andersen et al., 2012; Criado et al., 2013; Khan et al., 2014; Zheng and Zheng, 2014). The drivers of social media uptake in government are related to the pervasiveness of information and communication technologies, the rising interests of ordinary citizens in the affairs of the state and lastly increasing popularity of these tools internationally (Zheng, 2013). Social media is purported to hold manifold opportunities for governments. A number of benefits are cited for governments who may consider incorporating social media tools within their citizen engagement tool box. These include increased transparency and trust in government (Bertot et al., 2010, 2012). It may also improve communication between governments and their stakeholders (Papaloi et al., 2012). This may lead to new forms of participation and better citizen engagement (Bonsón et al., 2012). Social media may allow the government-citizen relationship to be elevated such that citizens become co-producers and active participants in service delivery (Linders, 2012). Social media enables the empowerment of citizens (Andersen et al., 2012). It may support problem solving and allow government to solicit new ideas (Bertot et al., 2012; Ferro et al., 2013). There is also the potential for improved service delivery through the innovative tools that social media bring (Bonsón et al., 2012).

Methodology overview

The study was exploratory and qualitative in nature. The objective of the study was to understand how mobile technology and social media are manifested within South African government. The study assessed provincial and municipal websites for references to social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter. MXit was excluded since it requires a one-on-one relationship, and LinkedIn was also excluded due to its focus mainly on networking for professionals and businesses. The researcher searched for Twitter and Facebook accounts that might be linked to municipalities and provincial government during the period June 2013-December 2014. The Facebook and Twitter accounts of the researcher were utilized to access both applications and conduct the searches.

Theoretical foundation

E-participation is a growing area of research (Sæbø et al., 2008). A number of e-participation models and frameworks have been offered (for example see (Macintosh, 2004; Macintosh and Whyte, 2006; Tambouris et al., 2007; Wimmer, 2007). This study used the Kalampokis et al. (2008) domain model of e-participation in exploring how social media is used by government for e-participation. The model was selected since it collates several important aspects that characterize e-participation from the extant literature (Kalampokis et al., 2008). It was believed that the model was holistic and would sufficiently support the exploratory nature of the study.

The domain model identifies three sub domains namely:

public participation processes;

The different types of stakeholders include: elected representatives, government, political parties, non-governmental organizations, civil organizations, citizens, industry, media and academia (Kalampokis et al., 2008).

Participation processes comprise activities that stakeholders engage in at various stages of the democratic process. These include agenda setting, analysis, creating the policy, implementing the policy and monitoring the policy. Further to this the participation activities may belong to a participation area including: information provision, community building/ collaborative environments, consultation, campaigning, electioneering, deliberation, discourse, mediation, spatial planning, polling and voting. The participation activity may also have participation techniques to engage citizens. It will have an outcome with an associated level of participation (e-informing, e-consulting, e-involving, e-collaborating, and e-empowering) (Kalampokis et al., 2008).

Lastly, in the domain model, there are information and communication technology tools to enable e-participation. Certain categories of tools exist and Wimmer (2007) considered them to be of three types:

core e-participation tools

These tools may range from basic blogs to highly sophisticated consultation platforms (Kalampokis et al., 2008).

In alignment with the exploratory objectives of the study, the paper focussed on the following areas of the domain model:

Context for data collection and research population

South Africa currently operates as a constitutional democracy and has three tiers of government, namely national, provincial and local. This study was positioned at the provincial and local government level and the data was sampled from these levels of government only. South Africa has nine provinces: Eastern Cape, Free State, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape, North West and Western Cape. All the provinces of South Africa were considered and included for data collection and analysis. At the local government level there are three types of municipalities - Category A, Category B or Category C municipality (Education and Training Unit, 2012). Category A includes metropolitan municipalities that exist in the large urbanized cities in South Africa and typically organize delivery of services to over 500,000 voters. Category B municipalities fall outside the metropolitan areas and are organized into smaller local municipalities. These are broken up into wards led by elected ward councillors. Category C municipalities comprise of a number of local municipalities that fall into one district council.

The study decided to focus on metropolitan municipalities (Category A) for the exploratory purposes of this research. The municipalities are mostly urbanized and have citizens with access to the Internet and thus more likely to utilize social media services. However, rural areas are rapidly gaining access to these technologies and the next phase of the study may be extended to include local and district municipalities that may be rural or semi-urban, since access in these areas is increasing. South Africa has eight metropolitan municipalities and all were included in the study: Buffalo City (East London), City of Cape Town, City of eThekwini (Durban), City of Johannesburg, City of Tshwane (Pretoria), Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality (East Rand), Mangaung Municipality (Bloemfontein), and Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Municipality (Port Elizabeth).

Data collection and analysis

The data that was collected from government websites and social media accounts was textual and was analysed qualitatively. A deductive, thematic analysis was selected due to the objective of the study, which was to understand South African government’s e-participation orientation. The thematic analysis was guided by the approach offered by Braun and Clarke (2006). A thematic analysis was employed due to its flexibility and applicability in different theoretical contexts. The e-participation areas offered in the model by the Kalampokis et al. (2008) formed the basis for identifying key themes and interpreting the data as outlined in Table 1. The e-participation model was used as a lens to help understand the data obtained from the research sample. The themes were structured around the types of stakeholders, the participation processes and the tools utilized.

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Table 1.

Assessing electronic participation in government.

Sub Domain	Focus	Type
Stakeholders	Is there evidence of citizen groups and government undertaking participation activities?	Individual/ groups of citizens
		Provincial and Local Government
Participation Process	Is there evidence of activities supporting the participation areas within the municipal or provincial social media accounts?	Participation areas including: information provision, service delivery, community building/ collaborative environments, consultation, campaigning, electioneering, deliberation, discourse, mediation, spatial planning, polling and voting
ICT Tools	Basic supportive tools that may not be necessarily designed for e-participation but that may support e-participation.	Social Media applications available to users on mobile platforms:
		Twitter
		Facebook

Provincial government social media landscape

It was found that all provincial governments have operational websites. Six of the nine provinces have direct links to their social media accounts on their websites. In the data collection, the researcher searched for official social media accounts that could be associated with each province. There was a review of the information provided on the Twitter or Facebook account to verify if it supported the details found on the website, for example, the contact phone number, logo and address. Six of the nine provinces have Twitter accounts, whereas seven provinces have Facebook accounts. It was noted that the links provided to the Free State’s Twitter and Facebook accounts led to the premier’s personal profile. The Eastern Cape has no formal government Twitter or Facebook accounts. However, the province does have a page linked to the former premier on Facebook. The Eastern Cape premier appears to have a personal Facebook account that predates his joining the premier’s office.

The province with the longest history on Twitter is Mpumalanga, having joined in January 2010. Gauteng province is the most popular and the most active with the highest number of followers (37,500) and tweets (11,500). North West province has the most under-utilized Twitter account, with only one tweet, posted on the day of joining in August 2012. Mpumalanga also has the longest history on Facebook, which it joined in June 2009. Gauteng province remains the most popular with the majority of fans at 6639 likes. It is followed closely by the North West Province in the popularity ranks with 5390 likes. Surprisingly the North West posts regularly on Facebook, in contrast with their neglected Twitter account that has only posted once in its existence. The average numbers of Twitter followers and tweets across the provinces are 5980 and 2078 respectively. The average for Facebook fans is 2497.

Municipality social media landscape

It was found that all municipalities have websites and four of the eight municipalities have specific links on their website to social media tools. Seven of the eight municipalities have official Twitter accounts, while all have active Facebook pages. The municipality with the longest history on Twitter is Ekurhuleni Municipality, whose initial Twitter account seemed to be focused on the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) 2010 Soccer World Cup (@Ekurhuleni2010). Ekurhuleni then set up an additional Twitter account in April 2013 (@EMMInfo). Mangaung Municipality is the youngest member of Twitter among all the metros, having joined in September 2012. The City of Cape Town has highest number of Twitter followers at 65,300. The City of Johannesburg was most active in Twitter, posting 23,400 tweets with Mangaung being the least active, with no tweets since signing up for Twitter. On Facebook, the researcher found that the City of Cape Town has popularity, having the most “fans or likes” at 24,878 and Buffalo City has the least at 20. The municipalities with Facebook pages have been active for at least one year, however, some had as much as 4 years of exposure on Facebook. The average numbers of Twitter followers and tweets across the municipalities are 16,915 and 5936 respectively. The average for Facebook fans is 8035.

Connecting with citizens on social media

The data sourced from both Twitter (tweets) and Facebook (posts) was reviewed to obtain an initial understanding of how the tools were being used. Data at a provincial level indicates that social media tools are utilized in all provinces except the Eastern Cape and Limpopo. These two provinces lack social media presence on both Twitter and Facebook. At a local government level all municipalities had representation on at least one of the platforms.

This study found that the deployment of the social media tools varies widely across the government. While some departments have taken to the social media movement and assimilated it as part of their toolbox of citizen engagement, others are lagging behind. Some government organizations make efforts to update the social media accounts on a daily basis, while others do so intermittently. Cases such as Mangaung and Buffalo City municipalities are examples of laggards who have accounts but seem to have forgotten about them, with no updates in years. Similarly, Eastern Cape and Limpopo provinces are failing, with no presence at all. A prior study argued that larger government departments are more likely to utilize electronic applications than smaller departments (Ahn, 2011). This is due to their access to greater budgets, and more resources. It is interesting to note that the Eastern Cape and Limpopo provinces are in the bottom half of provinces contributing to the GDP of the country.

The variability noted in this study aligns to the literature. Prior research found that even though there were overall indicators of usage there still exists extensive inconsistency in the public sector’s use of social media (Oliveira and Welch, 2013; Meijer and Thaens, 2013; Ellison and Hardey, 2014; Zavattaro and Sementelli, 2014). This inconsistency in application was argued as dependent on the type of department or agency (Oliveira and Welch, 2013).

Within this study the organizations used the social media to disseminate a variety of information ranging from updates on service delivery matters, motivating citizens, to information that supports political and democratic processes and information aimed at marketing and branding efforts. One municipality even used the social media to increasingly raise the visibility of local entrepreneurs and businesses. Similarly, a study in Turkey showed that public officials shared basic information on social media and used the accounts to promote their profiles and political parties. However, there was still a gap in the adoption of social media for actual transparent, participatory and citizen-oriented public service delivery (Sobaci and Karkin, 2013). By comparison, a research project in the United States of America showed that local government was using social media for one way communication only (Reddick and Norris, 2013), which further indicates a gap between the potential of social media and the actual practice of governments.

In contrast, our assessment showed that citizens are open to the use of social media to connect with government organizations. This finding aligns to the literature, which showed that, from the citizens’ perspective, constituents were willing to interact with public officials on social media (Magro, 2012; Warren et al., 2014; Rommele, 2014). The data in this study found that citizens utilized the social media to report issues regarding service delivery failures (e.g. blocked drains and power outages), obtain information to assist in their daily lives (e.g. latest bus service timetable, enquire about vacancies) and connect with other citizens in their area (e.g. share upcoming community events). It was found that numerous citizens openly express their frustrations, particularly regarding service delivery through the social media. This may be attributed to the sense of immediacy of the mobile phone being ‘in hand’, thus not requiring them to travel to a service centre or contact a call centre, which both represent a higher cost to the citizen. Some citizens used social media to compliment government organizations. It was also noted that citizens viewed these platforms as an opportunity to promote their own services, products and increase their social capital. Citizens are aware that they have a captive audience, consisting of other members of their community that frequent those particular social media accounts. The literature indicates that social media and other online platforms may be used to engage citizens, foster social capital (Warren et al., 2014) and encourage forms of participation that may bridge the divide between citizen groups (Ellison and Hardey, 2014).

Alignment to e-participation areas

The study reflected on the data sourced from Twitter and Facebook to understand how e-participation unfolded on these platforms. The Kalampokis et al. (2008) framework outlines several participation areas that an organization may be engaged in. These may include: information provision, community building, collaborative environments, consultation, campaigning, electioneering, deliberation, discourse, mediation, spatial planning, polling and voting. The study also included an area for service delivery, which was deemed relevant for the context of developing countries such as South Africa. Table 2 provides a sample of the participation areas that were demonstrated in the provincial and municipal social media accounts. They indicate the government processes that citizens were engaged in by their public officials.

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Table 2.

Alignment to participation areas – sample data.

Participation area	Sample data quoted from Twitter and Facebook
Information provision	“Just a reminder: As from 1 July 2011, the City of Tshwane will no longer accept personal or business cheque payments for any of its services. Only bank guaranteed cheques will be accepted. All payments to the Municipality should be done with cash, credit or debit cards, bank guaranteed cheques or via electronic transfers (internet banking)”
Community building/collaborative environments	“The Year Beyond programme will be rolled out at 24 schools at the start of 2015 and will provide English literacy and numeracy support in primary schools as well as English, maths and homework support in high schools. Find out how you can get involved.”
	“Department of Community Safety, Security and Liaison seeks volunteers for Victim Empowerment Programme”
Service delivery	“Please don’t forget to report the pothole in your area. Report them to pothole@tshwane.gov.za. Please indicate the street name and number where the pothole is located, the nearest intersection, the name of the suburb, and your name and email address or contact number.”
	“Premier Mahumapelo launch R 300 million water treatment plant at Moletsamongwe village as part of Setsokotsane project”
Consultation/ mediation	“Gauteng Advisory Panel on socio-economic Impact of E-tolls begins consultations today. The panel is embarking on a month long process of consultation with organisations and individuals. The panel also intends to expand the public discourse on the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project and E-tolls. All the hearings will take place at the Gautrain Offices, 44 Grand Central Boulevard, Grand Central Extension 1, Midrand, from 08h30 – 16h00”
	“Have your say on the 27 proposed new street names”
Campaigning/ electioneering	None
Deliberation/discourse	“The Northern Cape province is hosting the provincial public hearing session on the National Integrated ICT Policy Green Paper, convened by the Department of Communications. This session was addressed by the Honourable Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, Deputy Minister of Communications. This public hearing was attended by key role players in the sector, unions, business, civil society and government officials.
Spatial planning	None
Polling/voting	“Government encourages all South Africans, especially young and first-time voters, to exercise their democratic right by taking the first step of registering to vote this coming weekend. Take along your green, bar-coded ID book, ID smartcard or temporary identity certificate (TIC). The registration stations will be open between 8 am and 5 pm on Saturday and Sunday”

Variability in citizen participation

The study aimed to understand the extent to which the content and activities on social media of government are aligned to e-participation. The findings paint an uneven picture of the scenario in South Africa’s local and provincial government. Within the provincial government, examples that support alignment to the areas of information provision, community building, service delivery, consultation, discourse and voting were found. For instance, the Western Cape Government publicized projects that aim at community building, while from the Northern Cape the delivery of a new bridge for a community attracted attention in the area of service delivery. It is also highlighted that most of the content on provincial social media accounts focuses on providing citizens with information regarding the government organization. For example, Gauteng Provincial Government publishes their weekly activities in the form of a daily diary update. KwaZulu Natal focuses on publishing the premier’s recent activities, events he attended and speeches that he has delivered. Within the provinces there was a gap in the areas of campaigning, electioneering, and spatial planning.

For the local government, there was evidence that supports alignment to the areas of information provision, community building, service delivery, consultation and voting, that were detected through the thematic analysis. For example, City of Tshwane posted information regarding payment options available to citizens on Facebook. They also tweeted a link for updated bus timetables on Twitter. Both these align to basic information provision. Ekurhuleni Metropolitan, on the other hand, warned residents of a lack of water due to scheduled maintenance and delay to road upgrades, both via Twitter. These were aligned to service delivery. There was a gap in the areas of campaigning, electioneering, deliberation, discourse and spatial planning.

It was noted that at the provincial level there is a focus on providing information regarding plans for service delivery projects, while at the local government level the data posted is about specific service delivery matters, e.g. a pothole in a particular street or a power outage for a specific suburb. The content at municipal government level was very localized and unique to the communities being serviced. This aligns to the view that local government is the ‘face and hands’ of government. It is the main interface for citizens with their elected officials. Local government thus has an important role in understanding and enabling citizen participation.

When reflecting on citizens’ activities on the social media platforms, what became apparent was that citizens have a need for engagement with their government, particularly in the area of service delivery. It was interesting to note that some citizens would post queries regarding service delivery to their provincial and municipal governments as a response to posts that government had made that were not associated with service delivery at all. Citizens highlighted a variety issues via social media as quoted below:

“Electricity outages in Protea Heights and Protea Valley Brackenfell, no notices received, what’s the problem, when will it be restored, please?”

“Excellent service. Two problems I have reported in the past year have been resolved by the City in under 6 hours. One: a leaking water meter - the other: a blocked neighbourhood sewerage pipe. I am so proud of my city”.

“I have waited nearly 3 years for rates and water to be transferred to my name. Please help I have reference number.”

“Thanks for the prompt response to a blocked drain today. Great service.”

“I don’t even qualify for a loan at the bank. This means that I cannot proceed with my studies next year….What does the department say about me? HELP ME PLEASE, I don’t want to drop-out of my studies as a result of POVERTY”.

“The National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) does not work. I applied in January in the Johannesburg Central Business District, even today; they are still telling me that they are processing my application. I even called their head office in Midrand and spoke with their boss … who shouted at me and threatened to hang up on me. Who can I contact?”

“I would like to know do you provide in service training to Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) students and where can I submit my CV”?

Social media readiness

Government departments need to critically ask themselves “are we ready for social media”? As Feeney and Welch (2012) caution, new technologies “on the one hand, give government a potentially powerful means to access, acknowledge and address citizen and other stakeholder needs” but “on the other hand, these technologies may excessively complicate tasks, creating perceptions that the new participation technologies make management more difficult” (Feeney and Welch, 2012: 816). The present study showed that some government agencies set up social media accounts and then failed to use them. For example, North West province has published only one tweet since the setting up of its Twitter account in 2012.

An initial understanding of how social media can support the government department’s broader mandate and its e-participation efforts is paramount (Mergel, 2013a). It is also suggested that they assess their resources, skills, technology, people and supporting policies and processes for readiness. There needs to be a clear leadership commitment to the social media agenda. Well defined roles and responsibilities across the organization are important (Ide-Smith, 2010).

Twitter or Facebook?

Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) advise companies to be selective when choosing a social media platform. There are numerous social media applications available. In the government sphere it is also necessary to choose carefully the tools to be used to connect with citizens. Government departments need to be strategic in their choice. This may be supported by an understanding of where their target citizens are most active and engaging with them through their preferred tool.

Participation protocol

Social media platforms are easily accessible and therefore could be open to abuse. Government departments are encouraged to compile a participation protocol or guideline for citizens interacting with government social media accounts (Picazo-Vela et al., 2012). This may promote the use of the tools in a fair, transparent and respectful manner for the attainment of the societal objectives. The protocol should outline how the social media relationship between citizen and government will be managed. What is expected of the government department as opposed to citizens? For instance, it was interesting to see in the data that Tshwane’s Facebook page outlined a ‘terms of participation’ statement, which highlighted the objective of the page and the types of comments that would not be tolerated on the page and would be subsequently removed. For example: profane language or content, solicitations of commerce and conduct of illegal activity were discouraged on the Tshwane Facebook page.

Multi-channel alignment

Government departments need to ensure integration across social media platforms and also with the various contact channels (such as websites or face-to-face) within their employ. The messages posted on social media should not contradict other channels. As Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) highlight, an essential objective of communication is the lessening of uncertainty, and if there are conflicting messages across channels it will lead to confusion and frustration among citizens. Also, the social media tools should support and not replace other channels currently utilized. There may still be citizens that choose to use face-to-face engagement (Ide-Smith, 2010). Furthermore, in a country such as South Africa, which is plagued by the digital divide, the application of many different channels is a necessity. As Zheng (2013) highlights, some scholars are concerned that social media users, although increasing rapidly, are still a small percentage of the population. Thus, this digital divide on the social media landscape may result in a scenario where the “voice of non-microbloggers may be ignored and their interests will be marginalized” (Zheng, 2013: 372).

Trust and confidence

In conducting the data searches it was noted that the names of the municipalities and the provinces were being used in various ways on the social media and there were accounts that could be mistaken for official Facebook or Twitter pages. Government departments are encouraged to ensure that it is clear to their constituents which social media account is valid and thus trustworthy. This can be done, for example, by applying for the verification of a Twitter account, linking the accounts to official websites and making the correct social media account information easily available. As Karunasena et al. (2011) explain, building citizen trust is an essential pillar of creating public value through e-government.

Continuous monitoring

The reason social media have mass appeal and the source of their strength as a government tool is due to their ability to create an immediate and interactive dialogue (Bertot et al., 2012). Once government departments have set up their social media accounts, they need to ensure there are resources and people available to monitor the accounts and respond promptly (Ide-Smith, 2010) with open and clear feedback encouraging citizen engagement. It is essential to keep the dialogue on-going. As seen in the data, some departments expend great effort to respond to citizen’s comments and queries, even the negative ones, while others do not endeavour to do the same. This impacts negatively on citizens’ expectations of government, and they might choose not to engage with the department in future. Citizens may feel that the government organization is not listening to them. As one resident highlighted on Ekurhuleni’s Facebook page:

“Does anyone at Ekurhuleni actually ever make comment on posts? If so, why the all too regular power cuts in Germiston?”

Security concerns

Governments need to revisit the security concerns that may arise from citizens sharing personal information on social media (Picazo-Vela et al., 2012). This information may be required for query resolution or service delivery. They will have to provide policies that guide citizens with regard to the type of information that may be shared on the different platforms. For example, it may be safer in some instances to send sensitive information to government via email rather than publicly posting it on social media, or use the ‘direct messaging’ options that are available on Twitter or Facebook. This may require governments to find means of ensuring that social media technology providers adhere to government privacy, security, and accuracy policies and requirements (Bertot et al., 2012).

Relevant content

Governments need to ensure that they use the social media platforms to post relevant content that aligns to the e-participation areas and encourages citizens to engage in issues that directly impact their lives. The literature indicates that the social reputation of the organization influences citizens’ engagement with social media (McNutt, 2014). Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) encourage corporates to “give customers a reason to engage”. A similar requirement exists for government on their social media accounts, otherwise they may suffer criticisms from their constituents as seen in this study, when Buffalo city municipality was requested to: “Please bring some life - this page is dead” on their Facebook page. Additionally, content that is relevant to the government’s constituents and entices them to engage on community issues that affect them may address the challenge of ‘lurkers’, who read posts but remain silent and do not respond (Ide-Smith, 2010).

Language and accessibility issues

In a country such as South Africa, which promotes the equality of languages and recognizes 11 official languages (South Africa.Info, 2012), some citizens post messages on Twitter and Facebook in their mother tongue. This was evidenced in this study, which found that citizens posted in multiple languages. Those responsible for Twitter or Facebook updates in government departments have to be sensitive to this and ensure that responses are offered in the language selected by the citizens, to promote understanding and access to relevant information and services. Bertot et al. (2012) support this thinking and highlight that governments should also ensure that the information provided through social media is available in different formats for citizens that may have limited access because of language, skills, literacy or infrastructure constraints (Bertot et al., 2012).

Information sharing versus electronic participation

A European study found that local government’s use of social media to promote e-participation was still in an embryonic stage and not being exploited much (Bonsón et al., 2012). Additionally municipalities in Western Europe were reviewed and it was found that although the audiences for social media were high, actual citizen engagement was low (Bonsón et al., 2014b). Similarly, in this study, the government departments that were reviewed utilized the social media applications mostly as information sharing platforms. There are various opportunities not yet being used in additional participation areas beyond simple information provision. As governments gain experience and confidence in using social media, they should consider how they can use the tools to drive additional e-participation areas such as community building, collaborative environments, consultation, campaigning, electioneering, deliberation, discourse, mediation, spatial planning, polling and voting, which were seriously lacking in the data.

Research implications

Social media may play an important role in a paradigm shift from e-government to we-government, where citizens are central stakeholders in governmental processes (Linders, 2012). Social media can also enable the public sector to gather data on citizens’ behaviours and sentiments towards policies and public service delivery (Kavanaugh et al., 2012; Sobkowicz et al., 2012). Scholars are, however, cautioned that social media may not yield all the expected benefits (Bryer and Zavattaro, 2011).

It is argued that “digital technologies especially in the form of internet and social media can greatly facilitate communication, since they are used by a large proportion of the population” (Papaloi et al., 2012) and this was seen in some of the data of this study. Some researchers believe that social media can be a transformational tool in government-citizen relations, particularly at grass-roots levels (Chun and Luna Reyes, 2012; Magro, 2012). The government organizations included in this study utilized the social media as an additional channel of communication with citizens, and citizens who are currently using social media appear to be open to this mode of engagement. Based on the data from this study, the use of social media appears to be a “natural choice” (Papaloi et al., 2012) for the citizen-government relationship. People in government and as citizens use information to enable their daily practices and achieve certain objectives. The social media are tools that enable this information gathering and exchange in the environment of an information society underpinned by societal values and public sector ideals such as ‘Batho Pele’. This implies that these tools should be considered by governments for e-participation endeavours. Another implication is that it is essential to understand how the use of social media applications as acceptable channels for interaction between government and its constituents may influence the perceptions and sentiments of citizens toward the public sector (Mergel, 2013a).

Ide-Smith (2010) highlighted that government employees and citizens felt that social media would “increase transparency of information and, in turn, trust in government and participation”. This South African study indicates that citizen-government relations can benefit from these social media applications, which can contribute to improving e-participation. Social media are increasingly accessed by citizens, who are willing to use them in government-to-citizen relations. Similar sentiments are echoed in the literature (e.g. Magro, 2012). However, the public sector organizations included in this study were inconsistent in their application of social media. Thus an opportunity exists for them to assess how they may take advantage of citizens’ willingness to engage with government via social media.

A recent report found that the voice of the citizens appears to have been lost due to government’s focus on centralized planning and meeting targets without considering how citizens would like services to be delivered (World Bank, 2011). Yet, the area of citizen participation is important for improving and institutionalizing the political accountability of the public sector towards its citizens (World Bank, 2011). Thus, a further implication, particularly for developing countries, is the need to understand how technology may support participatory governance. This study aimed to understand how government utilizes social media to support e-participation efforts in South Africa. It supports the argument that social media are an untapped tool for government since they are inexpensive, widely available to citizens on their mobile phones, and appear to be relatively simple technologies that citizens do not require excessive training to use (Papaloi et al., 2012).

Contribution, limitations and opportunities for future research

Participatory governance and e-participation are increasingly important subjects in developing countries. This study endeavoured to add to the literature on e-participation, particularly in a developing country context. It heeded the call for additional knowledge about the extent to which governments apply e-participation technology (Feeney and Welch, 2012). Social media are becoming a widespread innovation in the government-citizen relationship. Thus, the paper provided a preliminary understanding of the manifestation of social media use for electronic participation by citizens. The findings provide lessons on the inconsistent application of social media by government in contrast to citizens’ enthusiasm for the same tools. The paper contributes to the argument for participation of citizens beyond information provision. An extension towards the participation areas of community building, service delivery, mediation, deliberation and spatial planning for citizens is required.

As high mobile phone penetration rates show, the mobile phone has become an essential part of the lives of many citizens. The mobile phone supports the day-to-day practices of citizens and social media are enriching communication (Hawn, 2009) and participation of citizens. This paper provided a reflection on how government interacts with citizens digitally. It explored the extent to which mobile social media tools may be used by governments for e-participation. It showed that there is an opportunity to create a government-citizen relationship that is purposeful and dialogic (Brainard and McNutt, 2010), thus improving the citizen’s service experience.

Additionally, through a theoretical application, this paper offers an example of how a domain model such as the Kalampokis et al. (2008) may be used to support a deductive thematic analysis. Several guiding principles are offered for government practitioners who may be considering employing social media within the G2C. These principles may be considered by government officials and decision makers involved in e-participation projects.

All research studies have their limitations. This study was an assessment of government social media content at a particular point in time. It is acknowledged that the web-based social media are constantly changing and this study represents a snapshot of the phenomena. Thus, future research may focus on updating the findings by reviewing the latest data. Additionally this study focused only on large metropolitan municipalities and provincial governments in South Africa. There is an opportunity to increase the sample size and understand social media use at a national government level, but also not overlooking smaller rural municipalities that may yield interesting findings. This study was qualitative and future research may also consider the topic from the perspective of quantitative research methodologies. Moreover, interviews with government and citizens’ groups may be pursued for a deeper understanding of the enablers and constraints toward utilizing social media for interaction and e-participation.