Tension between the safe flow of government data across organizational boundaries and fragmentations in secure collaboration: the Chinese e-government

Purpose The study focuses on influential factors of collaboration on government data security by the Chinese government. Design/methodology/approach The article explores the case of e-government in the Chinese centralized unitary state system context, using a structured–pragmatic–situational (SPS) approach and the boundary theory as an analytical lens. Findings The findings indicate that e-government operates in highly interconnected environments where the safe flow of government data requires collaborative and cross-boundary strategies. Any organization is a potential “weakest link”. In addition, collaboration is fragmented by ambiguous accountability and organizational inertia across government departments, resources differences and limited visibility and measurability of security efforts across government levels and conflicts and uncertainties in principal–agent relationships. The solutions for those obstacles are also discussed from the multi-function, multi-level and multi-actor dimensions, respectively. A multi-dimensional overarching security model for the flow of government data is proposed. Originality/value The study advances the technology-oriented micro-analysis of previous studies on government data security to cross-organizational revealing at the macrolevel by connecting streams of research in information systems and public administration. These findings will contribute to making the safe flow of government data more resilient in the transformation of e-government.