The social media adoption of public sector in the Kingdom of Bahrain

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to identify the contemporary implementation of social media within the public sector in the Kingdom of Bahrain by reviewing each of the ministry’s presence in the social media especially on specific social media websites (Twitter, Facebook and YouTube). This study also attempts to identify the types of information that the public is interested to receive from various government social media accounts. Design/methodology/approach - A descriptive analysis with frequency distribution and weighted mean was used to analyze the demographic profile of the respondents, internet preferences and government information sources. The study has employed two types of survey methods in collecting data, namely, checklist and questionnaire surveys. A snowball sampling technique was employed for the sampling selection. Among the selected respondents of 500, 384 (76.8 percent) respondents completely responded to the questionnaires. Findings - The study has confirmed the fact that most of the Bahrain Government’s ministries have social media platforms with a minimum of at least one official account to reach out to the various segments of the society. It also reveals that the respondents are active internet users who are looking for information in different platforms, i.e. search engines, social media, and have interests in different media forms like blogs, forums, official websites as well as multimedia images and videos. Meanwhile, the respondents are found to be interested in various types of information from the government that ranges from serious topics like emergency alerts, citizens’ rights and healthcare, to lighter topics like ways to protect the environment, science and technology and job seeking advice. Originality/value - This clearly declares the inevitability of an increase in the dissemination of information by the Government of Bahrain through social media. The recommendations in this research could be highly beneficial for the Government of Bahrain if implemented as it could improve the cyber relationship between the government and the public.