2006, Vol.13, No.3

Informatization Policy 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 4.08

pISSN : 1598-3498
https://journal.kci.go.kr/nia

For the impact of knowledge management in terms of performance improvement and related benefits is so clear and massive, there is an increasing emphasis on the importance of knowledge management in both the private and public sectors. This study compares the knowledge management activities in public and private organizations. To achieve the objectives of this study, a comprehensive review of the literature was conducted, including the epistemology of knowledge, organizational culture, structure and information technology references. Also, a quantitative approach was utilized. This study surveyed public and private employees in order to investigate the sectoral differences in practices of knowledge management. The general question addressed in this article is whether there is a difference in activities related to knowledge management - knowledge acquisition, accumulation, sharing, and application - between public and private organizations. Results address the research questions concerning the differences in knowledge management activities between the public and private organizations. Lessons and implications of this study for public organizations are presented. The findings also suggested several strategies for consideration by government agencies interested in enhancing employee’s capabilities of knowledge management.

It is necessary to evaluate usability and improve the design of e-government Web sites for the successful operation, based on the customer’s view point. The objective of this research is to find factors and their variables for affecting e-government portals, focusing on usability. We performed a user test to evaluate the usability of the Korean e-government portal site and its linked sites. After users performed some tasks in which they could find a solution through navigation, they evaluated the usability by answering a questionnaire. Factors significantly affecting the usability were derived through factor analyses - including contents, page design, learnability, graphic design, interaction to user, navigation, system usability, and Web functionality. Usability variables for each factor were also derived through multiple regression. They include understanding of information, density of contents, additional explanation of help menus, embodiment of menu icons, multiple communication channels, consistent site maps, speedy response time, and personalized Web sites. The revised Web site score of usability was computed by applying the significant variables. As a result, the score of Web sies with higher usability increased a little, while the score of Web sites with lower usability rather decreased.

In major elections of the 2000s, Korea’s civil society has experimented with cyberactivism, a new form of social movement. In the case of Korea, elections of the 2000s were held amid a new structure characterized by democratization and informatization that facilitated the big bang of civil society. The structure of political opportunities can function as a pre-condition or a momentum that vitalizes social movements. The two macro changes of democratization and informatization have nurtured new methods and strategies for social movements in Korea. A remarkable form of social movement that has emerged in the new structure of political opportunities is cyberactivism. Strategies of the civil society that are based on the effective use of the cyberspace are generating great waves of transformation in the organization, goals, and effects of social movements. In particular, the cases analyzed in this study show that the political effects of cyberactivism are greatly increased during the times of elections. Furthermore, the implications of cyberactivism, which are essentially based on voluntary online organization and political mobilization, will greatly affect our understanding of participatory democracy. It is from such perspective that this study will carry out a comparative analysis of the characteristics of cyberactivism using the cases of Civil General Election Solidarity(CGES) and Nosamo. In particular, this study will focus on the contents of political opportunity structure that improves resources mobilization capability of the civil society and characteristics, effects, and implications of cyberactivism.