Digital Divides in Local Democracy: Size, Resources, and Facebook Adoption in Czech Municipalities

Michael Haman, Milan Školník and Michal Lošták
Additional contact information
Michael Haman: Department of Humanities, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Czech Republic
Milan Školník: Department of Humanities, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Czech Republic
Michal Lošták: Department of Humanities, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Czech Republic

Media and Communication, 2025, vol. 13

Abstract: This study examines how organizational capacity and environmental pressures shape social media adoption in local government. Using a mixed‐methods approach, we analyze Facebook adoption patterns across 6,254 Czech municipalities by scanning their official websites for Facebook links, a questionnaire survey (? = 330), and thematic analysis of posts from municipalities with extended powers. Results reveal a strong relationship between municipal size and Facebook adoption, with rates ranging from 14.1% in the smallest municipalities (fewer than 200 inhabitants) to 88.6% in the largest (10,000+). Primary adoption motivations include communication speed, ensuring citizen awareness, and meeting public expectations for a modern online presence, while resource constraints and fear of negativity constitute major barriers. Thematic analysis reveals dominance of practical information and community event promotion over dialogic engagement. The findings demonstrate how resource limitations create a digital divide in local government communication, with smaller municipalities facing structural barriers to social media adoption. This research contributes to understanding technology diffusion dynamics in fragmented administrative systems and the gap between social media’s dialogic potential and actual government communication practices.

Keywords: citizen engagement; communication barriers; Czech Republic; Facebook; government communication; local government; small municipalities; social media; technology adoption (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cogitatiopress.com/mediaandcommunication/article/view/10464 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cog:meanco:v13:y:2025:a:10464

DOI: 10.17645/mac.10464

Access Statistics for this article

Media and Communication is currently edited by Raquel Silva

More articles in Media and Communication from Cogitatio Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by António Vieira () and IT Department ().