Improving Open Government Data Performance of Local Governments: A Configurational Analysis Based on TOE Framework

Open Government Data (OGD) is leading the way towards digitization, intelligence, and transparency of public services and government decision-making. Aiming at elucidating the configurational path of OGD performance of local governments, this paper employs the technology-organization-environment (TOE) framework and the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to explore the key factors and configuration paths of OGD performance from the cases of 31 provincial OGD practice in China. Results indicate that OGD performance depends on the combination of technical, organizational, and external environment conditions, and that there exist substitution relationships among the various preconditions for the improvement of OGD performance, including information infrastructure, technology application capability, data resources, economic strength, policy regulations, and inter-government competition, as discussed in previous TOE based research. Specifically, seven configuration paths are identified to achieve high-level OGD performance, namely, Technology-Organization-Environment combined driven, Economy-Talent-Demand driven, Institution-Data-Policies driven, Institution-Economy-Demand driven, Organization-Policies-Competition driven, Data-Economy-Demand driven, and Data-Policies-Competition driven. This research is of particular significance to achieve high-level OGD performance for local governments with different resources and environments.