Chapter 1: Introduction
Background
Social media has rapidly penetrated in peoples' routine, distracting a big part of their time and simultaneously contributing to their social interaction. Through social media the users have the opportunity to consist part of communities with the view to socialising, sharing information or reaching some of their goals (Magro, 2012). However, after the beginning of the 20th century, social media such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube, constitutes a way of communication for citizens with public administrations and governmental institutions. Twitter is in the first position of the list with 100% use by people and then Facebook follows with 90% (A review of social media usage in UK local government, 2015).
In this way, the relationship between citizens and public sector has been reinforced, as citizens have the opportunity to participate in public life and in society's decision-making in a more frequent and effective way and subsequently, to deliberate governments' actions so as to alleviate the problem of corruption. Moreover, the use of social media by public sector has a significant impact on citizens' everyday life through the digitalized public services which save time for residents and money for government (Lovari and Parisi, 2015). Consequently, the application of social media in public sector has started being adopted by many countries globally, through the Web 2.0 technologies which provide to public sector different kind of datasets. Citizens are responsible for the collaborative information included in these datasets, with their participation. The significance of Web 2.0, which is a result of different datasets collected so as to create the common one for public use, is that it is considered valuable due to its capability of being updated and reused (Karakiza, 2015). Despite the benefits emerged by using social media in public sector, there are also concerns regarding citizens' privacy and security as well as the management of collected data and its accessibility. Additionally, social integration and governance constitute subjects of great significance and have to be taken into account as barriers (Khan, Swar and Lee, 2014).
Problem statement
The main concern of public sector, regarding implementation of social media in its strategy, is to develop a two-way interaction relationship with its citizens, in order to correspond to their demands and develop more efficient government management and effective services (Karakiza, 2015). Nevertheless, there are difficulties in the development of social media and other digital channels in public sector regarding the available resources in terms of money, time, trained staff as well as political obstacles and contradictory organizational priorities. Moreover, due to the fact that the progress of social media cannot be measured, there is difficulty in estimating the investment needed to be done (Sitten, 2012). Consequently, a further investigation based on qualitative method needs to be conducted so as public sectors to find the best ways on how to adapt social media and overcome difficulties and gaps existed.
Literature Review
The utilization of social media in public sector has rapidly increased, especially the last few years, as more than two-thirds of councils use social media for communicating with their citizens (Denham, 2013). However, over 82% of the councils, according to BDO 2013 Social Media survey, support that the way social media can be applied to public sector and how this can be achieved is considered complicated (From housing and litter to Facebook and Twitter, 2013).
Moreover, in the attempt of local authorities to implement social media for communicating with their citizens, there are some barriers have been noticed, In some cases, councils do not develop sufficient and complete strategies regarding social media policies they need to follow. According to the survey of 2013 about social media in public sector, 63% of the participants, who represent governmental organizations, declared there is a strategy in their council, although 5% of them ensure its existence (Goss Interactive, 2013). The absence of strategy in some of these cases can be imputed to different reason. For instance, it has been noticed that there is difficulty in recruiting of public sector due to money need to be invested. The need of digital skilled staff, with knowledge of technology, data and IT, who can decisively contribute to data management and analysis, constitutes an important expense for councils (The digital skills gap in government: Survey findings – National Audit Office (NAO), 2015). Especially in UK, councils are forced to spend less money after austerity program imposed by the government. However, councils spend more than ���3 million since 2010-2011, with Newcastle council be the first spender (Gye, 2014).
it can be safely concluded that decisions regarding the amount of money public sectors can invest on social media is considered crucial. This investment depends on the way that data are extracted from citizens' response to social media and how, after collection, these data can be analysed. The analysis methods and tools used for the optimal outcome constitute an area of more investigation by the councils, in order to apply their strategies and estimate if the investment in development of social media is worthwhile.
Research Questions
I. Where the research will be based on, so as to prove citizens' interaction with social media of public sector as well as their perception for social media's utility?
II. What kind of analytical tools can be used for extracting and analysing data given by citizens through social media?
III. How information given by citizens can be exploited with the view to affecting their insights and informing them regarding the different services provided by public sector?
Research Objectives
The aim of this survey is to:
I. present and analyse residents' perceptions of public sector
II. identify potential applications for findings to influence and inform residents' perceptions and awareness of public services
III. set recommendations for developing a sustainable approach to mining and analysing social media data.
Research methodology
Aiming to accomplish the above objectives, both quantitative and qualitative methods will be implemented. More precisely, this specific survey will be based on social media of Medway Council. Citizens' perceptions are going to be collected by interviewing employees of Communication department of the council, who are responsible for social media management. The interviews will constitute the primary qualitative data which afterwards will be analysed by SPSS software, through Chi-square analysis, checking for citizens' primary preferences and needs so as their demands to be satisfied.
Structure of Dissertation
With the view to accomplish what described in Chapter 1, the structure of dissertation will be as follows. In second Chapter, gaps of previous researches conducted are going to be presented so as to have a complete overview of social media in public sector. In third Chapter, the research methodology which will be based on data of Medway council it is going to be presented. In forth Chapter, after findings of the survey being found, they are going to be discussed and analysed so as the main potential implementations of the research to be mentioned. Finally, in fifth Chapter, comments and additional recommendations for possible future investigation will be discussed.
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