Major Obstacles of Informatization in Korean Local Governments: An Organizational Perspective

In addition to current budgetary and legal constraints which make local governments in Korea too dependent on central government, Korean local governments have fundamental man-power and organizational problems regarding the application of information technology (IT). In most local governments, no formal process have been established in clarifying main players and participants in IT application. This paper deals with major obstacles to informatization of Korean local governments from an organizational perspective. It is concluded that current practices of public employees doing by intuition rather than by rules and routines, traditional perception of technical staff as low class, poorly specialized IT work-forces, lack of formal processes established regarding IT planning and implementation, and short-sighted vision of elected officials are the major factors hindering Korean local governments in realizing information technology benefits.