EXPLORING THE NATIONAL CONTEXT IN ELECTRONIC COMMERCE ADOPTION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

In this era of globalisation, Electronic Commerce (EC) has been promoted as a tool for bridging the gap between the developed and developing countries. However, despite the promises made by various international organisations, the developing countries are encountering difficulties in realising the EC benefits. To address this issue, numerous studies have been carried out in various developing countries in an attempt to identify the keys to EC's successful adoption and diffusion in the developing countries. However, despite the significant differences between developed and developing nations, most studies carried out in developing countries employed the same study frameworks used in developed nations. This paper recognises the unique national context of the developing countries and argues that the national context factors can have significant impact upon EC adoption by organisations in developing countries. As a result, we modified the well tested Technology-Organisation-Environment framework to focus on the national context. By examining the national context together with the technological, organisational and industrial context of an organisation, it is expected that the extended framework will be able to provide a more complete picture of EC adoption in developing countries.