Mediated values in Swedish municipality Website design

Abstract

Not only in Sweden are governments designing and maintaining web sites, this to be able to improve interaction with their citizens. It is therefore important to choose the best suiting website design, communicating the intended values. In this paper two Swedish municipality front pages are compared with respect to mediated user roles, user groups, action space (action possibilities and restrictions), and communicated producer intent. This highlights how values can be mediated in website design. One increasingly important arena for citizen-government interaction in Sweden is Swedish municipality websites. These websites are often designed based on experiences from existing designs, other types of media, and face-to-face communication. Designs are created in a social context where expectations and experiences are important influences. Values are therefore present in the design as well as during the evaluation of the effects of using websites (for a discussion on values in IT see e.g. (Mumford, 1981; Hedström, 2004)). These values are studied by a genre analysis, and named mediated values as they are created when actors interact with a media such as websites. The purpose with this paper is to exemplify how values are mediated through a design, and highlight the importance of value awareness in the design of government websites. Focus is on how a website as a communication medium can be used to mediate values, for example what roles that are established between for example a municipality and the citizen, through the used design elements. Thereby how different designs promote e.g. certain user roles and suppress others. First of all a theoretical framework will be presented where mediated values and the term genre is presented. The research method will thereafter be described, how the comparison between two municipality website designs has been conducted. The comparison will then be presented and finally we will present some conclusions.

Full text

Mediated values in Swedish municipality Website design
By Emma Eliason and Karin Hedström
Dept. of Informatics (ESI), Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden
Abstract.
Not only in Sweden are governments designing and maintaining web sites, this to be able to
improve interaction with their citizens. It is therefore important to choose the best suiting
website design, communicating the intended values. In this paper two Swedish municipality
front pages are compared with respect to mediated user roles, user groups, action space
(action possibilities and restrictions), and communicated producer intent. This highlights how
values can be mediated in website design.
Introduction
The Internet, as communication medium, is being increasingly used by citizens and
governments in most advanced democracies [Gibson et.al, 2003]. ICT has changed the way
government and citizen can communicate and offers a new action space for politicians and
citizens to act within [Åström, 2004] and is thus used as a medium for communication [Kuuti,
1996]. This arena is dependent on the possibilities and restrictions the citizens are offered to
communicate upon. But it is also dependent on how these possibilities are presented, e.g. how
the arena is designed and what values it mediates.
One increasingly important arena for citizen-government interaction in Sweden is Swedish
municipality websites. These websites are often designed based on experiences from existing
designs, other types of media, and face-to-face communication. Designs are created in a social
context where expectations and experiences are important influences. Values are therefore
present in the design as well as during the evaluation of the effects of using websites (for a
discussion on values in IT see e.g. [Mumford, 1981; Hedström, 2004]). These values are
studied by a genre analysis, and named mediated values as they are created when actors
interact with a media such as websites.
The purpose with this paper is to exemplify how values are mediated through a design, and
highlight the importance of value awareness in the design of government websites. Focus is
on how a website as a communication medium can be used to mediate values, for example
what roles that are established between for example a municipality and the citizen, through
the used design elements. Thereby how different designs promote e.g. certain user roles and
suppress others.
First of all a theoretical framework will be presented where mediated values and the term
genre is presented. The research method will thereafter be described, how the comparison
between two municipality website designs has been conducted. The comparison will then be
presented and finally we will present some conclusions.
Theoretical framework

2.1 Mediated values
The question of what makes an ICT successful and for whom has been discussed in different
research areas (see e.g. ‘technological frames’ [Orlikowski & Gash, 1994] and ‘task-
technology fit’ [Goodhue & Thompson, 1995]. One research area that highlights the social
impact on success is social informatics [e.g. Kling, 1999], where a technological design alone
is not considered sufficient to ensure a successful ICT. The interplay of social assumptions,
values and practices are reflected in technological design features, and by studying both the
technical and social can we better understand ICTs success [Kling, 1999]. Kling argues that
differences in values rest upon not only differences in technical architectures (for example
more informational value through crosslinks) but also social values (for example how the
reviewing processes of an electronic journal is conducted).
Values guide our actions, as the values we hold influence selection from available means and
prioritization [Kluckhohn, 1951; Rescher, 1969]. In a design process choices are made
between competing design ideals, where designers’ preferences point to an underlying set of
values [Klein & Hirschheim, 2001]. Values are also used to express feelings and attitudes
[e.g. Bergström, 1992] and in design of ICTs these can for example concern what constitutes
a good/successful design. The design of an ICT, its content elements (form and position), and
mediated action space (what I can and can not do) communicates underlying values. These
values are experienced in use, and exist in a genre and in a specific social context.
2.2 Genre
Genre is a term that has been used in diverse areas with roots in the study of text and rhetoric.
Genre can be referred to as the common sense notion, shared by producer and audience, used
to find or produce more generic products, thus creating expectations what elements to expect
in the design [Lundberg, 2001]. Lacey [2000] describes genre products as having a common
repertoire of elements. In movies, the elements are setting, characters, iconography and style.
Using the repertoire of elements of a genre will guarantee that the experienced audience gets
what they expect. This causes predictability, which helps understanding the media product
[Lundberg, 2001].
There are different ways and views of what characterises a genre. For example you can
characterise genres using a semantic, syntactic, or pragmatic definition [Jensen, 2002]. The
semantic definition focuses on the content, the signified and what the text is about. Semantics
can be used to describe the relation between user and producer, the producer works with signs
that the user perceives, and the producer communicates through the product’s signs
[Krippendorff, 1995]. A syntactic definition of a genre focuses on the structure of the text, the
composition. The focus in a pragmatic definition is the intention governing the production of
the texts. What is their purpose? One important issue is the way in which the text addresses its
audience, its mode of address. A reason for focusing on genres is that the mode of address, in
addition to their form and content, anticipates particular uses of media in social contexts.
Information on a website can be designed to support different user roles where the user is seen
as a receiver of information, knowledge seeker or as a participator where the user becomes a
knowledge creator. In the study we will compare semantic (form, communicated producer
intent), syntactic (content elements position) and pragmatic aspects (user roles and action
space) of two Swedish municipalities’ front pages.

Research Method
In the paper we present parts from a genre analysis that we have conducted on Sweden’s
municipality websites (290). The genres identified were; brochure, promotion, commercial,
newspaper, notice-board, portal and filter. This paper exemplifies how values are mediated
through two different municipality front page designs belonging to the newspaper and filter
genres.
The focus of the web page analysis was on the front pages since it is the most complex page
and the first impression communicated to the users. The front page can be seen as similar to
the cover of a magazine or company report and tends to set the tone and theme of the web site
design [Zhang et. al., 2000]. According to Nielsen and Tahir [2002] this page is the most
important and has the purpose of communicating what the company is, the values the site
offers, products and services offered etc. You only get one chance to give a first impression
and you have to deliver on the promises. Mediated values were identified by comparing user
roles communicated by the design (participator, listener etc), action possibilities present in the
design, content elements in the website and their form and position, and communicated
producer intent.
The Swedish municipality web site design is an interesting study of object because of its
importance to the citizens. There is a population of approximately 9 million people who are
communicative targets of these municipalities. Further, not only in Sweden but in many
countries governments are designing and maintaining web sites in order to improve citizen
communication [Ryan et al., 2003]. It can thereby be seen as important to choose the best
suiting website design, communicating the intended values. Thus an ICT is used to
communicate, it is a mediating instrument for communication [Kutti,1996].
De Souza et al. [2001] distinguish between three types of communication that an ICT can
support, user-system interaction, user-user interacion and designer to user communication. In
the first analysis of the two front pages we study the communicated producer intent (see
section 4.2); in what form, how, and directed to whom (user group, e.g. inhabitant). The
designer to user communication is studied. The second analysis focuses on the user in the
interaction with the front page. What user roles that are supported and what action space that
is mediated, thus user-system interaction and user-user interaction (communicated through the
system) (see section 4.3 - functionality analysis).
Mediated values in municipality website design
In this section we exemplify how values are mediated in web designs, through user roles (the
participator, listener etc), mediated action space and communicated producer intent.
4.1 The Newspaper and Filter Genres
Örebro municipality have been categorised as belonging to the newspaper genre (Table 1) and
Hällefors municipality as belonging to the filter genre (Table 2). In this section these genres
will be described. In a previous study 30 municipality web sites were categorised as
belonging to the Newspaper genre and 18 to the Filter genre.

The Newspaper genre
We define newspaper websites as those with a content that is dominated by information about
latest/actual/central news in the community. The purpose is to inform the community about
events/news in the municipality. The main target user is seen as a user who is a listener to
stories, who wants to gain knowledge about the community through navigating through latest
news. The newspaper use advertisement graphics and have influences from the on-line
newspaper in the presentation of the news and/or information and often support an interactive
communication, with web questions, possibilities to give your opinion etc. The newspaper
also gives a feeling of continues updates with e.g. weather reports and daily updated articles.
Table 1: The Newspaper genre
Dominating
content
Form and position Action possibilities Purpose User role
High density of
dated
information
about the
latest/actual/c
entral news in
the community
and
advertisements.
Layout: Soft composite:
short information with
links to information and
services (positioned centred
on the page). Hard
composite: Latest news
often to the right. Graphics
in form of advertisements
(bottom or right). Colour:
white background.
Interactivity in form
of web questions and
possibilities to give
your opinion.
A main
purpose that is
communicated
is to inform
about news in
the community.
The user as
listener to
stories and
performer
(e.g. giving
opinions).
The Filter genre
We define filter websites as sites with the purpose to guide the user through the offered
information via the municipality’s main categories of services (have been categorised in
advance). The website is dominated by the options that are offered. The user role that is
communicated is a knowledge seeking user who wants to orient according to a specific area
of interest. The available choices can be categorised based on user groups such as tourist,
inhabitant, and business. The main action potential that a filter site provides is to choose a
main category. Appelgate [2000] differentiates between three types of portals: horizontal
portals, vertical portals and affinity portals. Affinity portals focus on one well defined target
group for example women, with specific information. The filter can be seen as a variant of
affinity portals where different defined categories are offered to different target groups.
Table 2: The Filter genre
Dominating
content
Form and position Action possibilities Purpose User role
Presentation of
different views
for different
user groups in
some cases with
service/product
descriptions.
Layout: Short, compressed
page, with a flat structure.
The dominated element is
a handful of categorised
navigation (positioned
centred on the page). Low
if any density of
information. Often use
visual elements as pictures.
Colour: Often white
background.
One-way
communication is
focused, filter the
offered information.
A main purpose
that is
communicated
is to guide the
user to the
municipality’s
main categories
of services.
Knowledge
seeking
customer-/
service
oriented.

4.2 Communicated producer intent
The point of departure is to study why the sender wants to communicate (through the offered
action possibility), if it is to inform, suggest, attract, promote, offer etc. In what form and how
and directed to whom (e.g. tourist, inhabitant)? Thereby focus on the design decisions that
have been made. The analysis is based on Yoshioka et.al.’s [2001] taxonomy of genres that
represents six dimensions of genres; purpose (Why), content (What), participants (Who),
timing (When), location (Where), and form (How).
The question of why has been studied with respect to the producers’ mediated intentions with
the content element.In the analysis of Content (What), the content elements on the front page
were identified. The question of Who concerns the participants, that is associated with
different senders and receivers (Tourist, Inhabitant, New inhabitant and Business). In this
analysis the sender perspective is focused through mediated purpose of different content
elements and toward who they communicate. This in contrast to the functionality analysis (see
section 4.3) where the user perspective is focused, in the role as performer of actions. The
timing dimension (When) is not focused in this analysis. Location (Where) has been focused
on the position of the content element in the analysis, thus not on geographical considerations
(Sweden or Italy). In order to relate the positioning of content elements to the front page we
used Ihlström and Åkesson [2004] section and column grid (see figure 1). Section A (Header
of front page) and B (Bt: top half of B-section and Bb: Bottom half of B-section) are visible
on the screen in resolution 1280x1024 pixels, whereas one has to scroll to be able to se
section C and D (footer of the front page). The form (How) concerns the design of the
communication, that is observable features that the identified content element has.
Figure 1 : The Column and section grid (The left picture shows Örebro municipality and the right
shows Hällefors municipality).
Contrasting examples from the conducted analysis of the communicated intent in the two
municipalities will be presented.
Örebro Municipality
The main purpose can be seen as to inform the community about events/news in the
municipality (see table 3). This assumption is made based on the design of the website, where
the prioritised action possibilities, centred on the page, concerns news in the municipality and

the use of the broad sheet metaphor. The website is divided in three main sections. On the left
side (Bt1 and Bb1) the main navigation is positioned, in the middle (Bt2-3, Bb2-3, C2-4)
there are summarised texts about main news in the municipality with links to the whole article
and the latest news is presented as dated headings (Bt4 and Bb4). On the right side
advertisement (Bb5), banners (A1-4) and graphical links (A5, Bt5) are presented.
An on-line newspaper is often dependent of the income from advertisements. This is not the
case for municipality websites, but the same form language is used in the design,
communicating the intent of wanting to inform and persuade, the two basic functions of
advertisements [Singh and Dalal, 1999].
The website uses advertisement graphics and has influences from the on-line newspaper in the
presentation of the news and information. The design of the front page gives a feeling of
continues updates with weather reports (Bt5) and updated articles (Bt4, Bb4). Another
purpose is to gather users’ opinions through a web question (Bb5), give your opinion (C5 and
C1) and contact the municipality (C2-4). The positioning of the possibility to give your
opinion have however not been given a centred place in the design, you have to scroll down
the page. The municipality also intend (Bt4 and Bb1) to include as many users as possible.
Table 3: Communicated producer intent – Örebro
Why (Sender) What
(content element)
How (form) Who Where (Position)
To provide news A. News
A. Headlines
B. Headlines and
summary
C. Headline and
summary and picture
Inhabitant
Bt 4& Bb4
Bt2-3 &Bb2-3
C2-4
To provide contact
information
A1. Contact
information
Text (hyperlink)
Menu choice
All
All
C2-3
Bb1
To persuade/advertise Commercials
Banners/Animations
Graphics
All
All
Bb 5
A3-4 (changing
information in
the header)
A5, Bt5
To gather opinions Opinion
Web question
Graphic with title
Hyperlink
Text and radiobutton
All
All
All
C5
C1
Bb5
To include different
User groups
Adjustments Combobox
Hyperlink
All
(Foreign
language)
All
Bt4 & Bb1
Bt4
Hällefors municipality

The main purpose can bee seen as to guide the user through the offered information
categorised and filtered in advance (see table 4). The main services are centred on the front
page (Bt1-5), municipality, meal, design and technology. The compressed front page presents
the four options and guides the user to the wanted information. Another communicated
purpose is to invite the visitor with the phrase ”Welcome to Hällefors municipality” (A2-4).
Visual elements are also used to give an aesthetic impression through pictures of the main
categories.
Table 4: Communicated producer intent – Hällefors
Why (Sender) What
(content element)
How (form) Who Position (Where)
To offer filtered
information
Main categories
C. Graphics and Titel All Bt 1-5
To inform
(Informative)
A1. Contact
information
E. Text (hyperlink)
All Bb 1-4
To invite &
attract
Welcome
Pictures
Text
Pictures illustrating
the main categories
New inhabitants
Tourist
Business
All
A2-4
Bt 1-5
Comparison; communicated producers intent
The layout of Örebro municipality’s front page supports a newspaper metaphor with e.g.
news, advertisements and web question. The front page of Örebro municipality prioritises
news in the municipality (centred and use much space), where the communicated intent is to
inform (especially the inhabitant) of the news in the municipality. In the front page of
Hällefors municipality the four main categories are focused (centred), the purpose is to offer
different entries depending on the desired information. Hällefors municipality is focusing on
inviting the visitors by the “door” and present the main categories the visitor can choose
between.
4.3 Functionality Analysis: Mediated user roles and action space
The focus in this analysis is on how different design solutions support certain actions and
inactions, and thereby different user roles (e.g. participator) and groups (e.g inhabitants).
The functionality analysis focuses on the user’s use of the website, thus the supported actions
with corresponding functionality. According to Löwgren & Stolterman [1998], functions tend
to be expressed with two words: a verb followed by a noun, representing an action and an
object acted upon, for example, ‘register customer’. A function thus corresponds to an action
that the ICT supports. Identified functions will be described together with the user group (user
or more specific group such as tourist, inhabitant, new inhabitant or business) performing and
interpreting the actions. The functionality analysis will highlight what communication that is
supported. Actions were the results of the action is directed to the user (e.g. navigation
actions), or user to municipality interaction (through e.g. e-mail) are identified. The third type
of identified actions is actions directed to the municipality and other users, e.g. register an
opinion that is directed to the municipality and other users through the displayed result on the
website.

Functionality analysis of Örebro municipality
The front page supports mainly user-computer interaction, e.g. Browse news and Search. The
main target user is seen as a user who is a listener to stories, who wants to gain knowledge
about the community through navigating through latest news, not as a participator.
There exists however possibilities for the user to communicate with the municipality through
a contact information and register opinion (see table 5). A web question also supports the
communication user to municipality and other users. The web question in this sample
concerns whether you have visited any of the nature reserves in the municipality. This action
possibility is not used to gather information about the publics’ opinion about for example a
central question that the municipality shortly will decide upon. Not used to make it possible
for the users to have an impact on the process.
Other kinds of action possibilities offered are adjustments, e.g. to choose language.
Table 5: Examples from the functionality analysis of Örebro Municipality front page
Action Performer Directed Towards System Function
Register opinion User Municipality Present e-mail form
Contact the municipality User Municipality Present e-mail form
Answer a webquestion User Municipality
Other users
Register opinions, display the result of
the opinion. E.g. 30 persons have now
voted and this is the result.
Choose language User User Display the information in the chosen
language
Choose big text User User Display the information in big text
Browse/Read news User User Display chosen news
Functionality analysis of Hällefors municipality
The main action possibilities offered is user-system interaction, specifically navigation
actions where the user is restricted to choose an area of interest e.g. technology and then to
navigate to the selected area of interest. The user is a knowledge seeking customer that is
service oriented. The categories Meal, Design, Technology can bee seen as mainly directed to
the user groups tourist, business and new inhabitant. Because the named navigation
possibilities are characterised by main attractions in the municipality e.g. the municipality is
an old industry community (technology). The navigation action to go to the municipality is
however directed mainly to inhabitants, business and new inhabitant.
Apart from the navigation actions there is one user to municipality action supported, where
the user can contact the municipality by e-mail (see Table 6).
Table 6: Examples from the functionality analysis of Hällefors Municipality website
Action Performer Directed Towards System Function
Contact the municipality User Municipality Activate and display users´ e-mail
program
Navigate to meal Tourist
Business
Tourist
Business
Display meal webpage

New
inhabitant
New inhabitant
Navigate to design
information
Tourist
Business
New
inhabitant
Tourist
Business
New inhabitant
Display design webpage
Navigate to municipality
information
Inhabitant
New
inhabitant
Buisness
Inhabitant
New inhabitant
Buisness
Display municipality webpage
Navigate technology
information
Business
Tourist
New
inhabitant
Tourist
Business
New inhabitant
Display technology webpage
Comparison; mediated user roles and action space
The newspaper’s action space offers a variety of navigation possibilities, while the filter
layout offers a concentrated navigation, with few options. The few navigation possibilities
force the user to take an early stand, what type of information am I interested of? The narrow
action space guides the user to specific information that has been grouped and filtered in
advance. In the newspaper, the information filtering is not in focus, the user explores the
website, in that process the user gets informed about the latest news in the municipality. It
gives the user a more flexible action space and not as predefined as in the filter design. The
user role that is mediated is the user (primary inhabitants) as listener to stories and performer
(e.g. giving opinions), while the filter design prioritizes a user role where the users is a
knowledge seeking customer that is service oriented.
The communication role that is prioritised on the front pages is user-system interaction, thus
to navigate through the offered information. The municipality primarily use the front page to
inform the users, not to make it possible for the users to participate. The two municipalities
offer the possibility to contact the municipality on the front page, making it possible for the
users to take a communication initiative, user to municipality. This communication is
however isolated to the specific people in the communication situation, like a phone call
where others can not participate. In contrast to e.g. the possibility to vote on a subject, were
everyone can see the result of the votes, which gives the possibility to in a more direct way
effect a process.
On Hällefors municipality front page it is possible to navigate to different areas of interest but
in contrast to Örebro municipality front page do not offer different adjustment possibilities.
One example is the possibility to select language (e.g. English), which risks to exclude
inhabitants and tourists with a foreign language. This exclusion of action support indicates a
prioritising where attracting and informing users with a foreign language is not important
enough to earn a place on the front page.
4 Conclusions
The front page of a municipality website is the first impression communicated to its users. It
spans an action space for the users to act within, communicating and prioritising user roles.

In the two examples presented in this paper the focus on the front pages has been to support
the municipality to inform their users, by supporting mainly user-system interaction. The
newspaper layout, consists of different kind of news, mediating a main usage situation to read
municipality news, but is it news that is the most important to promote or something else?
The filter layout used by Hällefors municipality guides the users at the door entrance to their
main area of interest. The selection of action possibilities is narrow as the municipality has
categorised the information in advance. In the two designs a passive user role is
communicated: to read news or select a main area of interest. A user to municipality
communication was however offered through web questions and opinion registration on
Örebro municipality webpage. The question is nevertheless how the communication
possibility is designed and how the gathered information is used. The design concerns e.g. the
content elements position, form and what the web question is about, a general question that
equally could be used on an on-line newspaper that has nothing to do with central issues
concerning the municipality or used as a information source in a decision process. Using web
questions as a way to inform the government about citizen’s views could be one way to
facilitate citizen influence, encourage active citizens, and improve the democratic process.
Thus making it possible for users to participate and influence the decision process, or if the
collected opinions are treated as questions that the municipality should answer, thus to inform
the user.
A website design mediates values by promoting certain user roles and suppressing others,
supporting certain action possibilities where others are not offered, using certain content
elements for example advertisements, and building on earlier genres (e.g. on-line newspaper
genre) and thereby expectations. Thus risking promoting selected user values without having
knowledge of this, and including certain user groups on the expense of others. It is therefore
important to be value aware in website design, mediating the intended values.
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