Big data analytics and public service delivery. Analyzing governmental social media strategies

Big data analytics has become a new trend in public sector, opening new ways to analyze the activities of public administrations. This paper uses these new research techniques to understand the adoption strategies of Digital... [ view full abstract ]

Big data analytics has become a new trend in public sector, opening new ways to analyze the activities of public administrations. This paper uses these new research techniques to understand the adoption strategies of Digital Social Media (DSM) within local public administrations. The paper attempts to answer the following research question: RQ. What kind of strategies are adopting public administrations when using DSM? This paper will present big data from Twitter accounts for the selected municipalities within the #SocialGovNet[1] project. This project is oriented to analyse the adoption, use and dissemination of more generalised DSM in local governments of four European countries (Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and United Kingdom). For this study, two Spanish city councils have been selected as relevant cases on social media adoption: Alcobendas and Seville. For analysing the social media strategies of those city councils, our study employs the semantic LynGuo tool. In particular, this tool has facilitated the analysis of large big data sets of Twitter messages and mentions in local government profiles. Then, the purpose of this research is discussing the strategies of social media adoption by local governments and the emerging dynamics of public service delivery, from information (pull strategy), networking and interaction (push and networking strategy) to public service delivery (public service strategy) using social media. Finally, the study discusses about the methodological risks, pitfall and challenges of this big data analysis, as well as the implications for future research.

[1] This study was supported by the BBVA Foundation research project “Smart Governance of Digital Social Media in Local Governments within the European Union. Strategies of Implementation, Success Factors and Public Service Models in Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and United Kingdom (#SocialGovNet)” (IN[16]_CJS_CCP_0190).