Public Value In The Age OF AI : How Swedish Municipalities Navigate a Transformative Digital Landscape

Sammanfattning

Public value in e-government is an interesting area of research, but also a challenging one. The concept of public value, and the activities it involves are highly complex, contextual, and multifaceted, which in turn is reflected in how public sector organizations are structured, managed, and how they deal with digital technologies. This study investigates how Swedish municipalities frame AI implementation and thus conceptualizes and follow-up on public value creation. Through semi-structured interviews, empirical insights were gathered and analyzed in relation to existing research on public value and e-government. The findings demonstrate that the way municipalities frame AI and incorporate it into their organizational structures can both facilitate and hinder public value processes. This affects especially the conceptualization and follow-up of public value in AI implementation. The findings indicate that organizational culture, leadership, degree of digital transformation and digital maturity, ability to integrate AI into broader processes, distribution of responsibilities and mandates, and the intrinsic silo structuring of municipalities are, in combination, critical components in how public value is identified and framed with regards to AI. The study illustrates the complexity and dynamic nature of today’s technological environment that municipal organizations need to conform to if they are to continue to generate public value. In this study, we provide valuable insights into what municipalities can do to become better equipped to navigate these new demands. Digital transformation is a condition for successful AI use which leaders in the public sector must address.