The influence of culture on e-leadership in developing countries: Assessing Zimbabwe´s capacity gap in the context of e-government

The introduction of e-government in developing countries has often been believed to be inhibited by technological competence and access barriers among other issues. While other soft inhibitors are gaining recognition, few studies have considered the influence of culture on e-leadership in spite of its apparent impact on e-strategies like e-government. The transfer and diffusion of Western e-government models and the conviviality of ICTs will inevitably disrupt the information and knowledge monopolies of traditional leadership by flattening the hierarchical organisational power structures in a manner that presents cultural clashes with the status quo in developing countries and inhibit e-government convergence in collectivist cultural settings. There is therefore a need to unpack the challenges of fostering e-leadership in developing countries where the status quo is entrenched by both socio-political and cultural imperatives. Using Tornatzky and Fleischer´s [1] Technology-Organisation-Environment theory and aspects of Banerjee and Chau´s [2] e-governance convergence framework for analysing empirical evidence from Zimbabwe, we investigate the capacity of senior civil servants to adopt e-leadership over e-government projects in developing countries. We conclude that culture has an impact on leadership in e-government and we suggest that an evolutionary approach to e-government can foster e-leadership in a culturally compliant manner.