Effects of local government social media use on citizen compliance during a crisis: Evidence from the COVID-19 crisis in China

Abstract

Improving citizen compliance is a major goal of public administration, especially during crises. Although social media are widely used by government agencies across the globe, it is still unclear that whether the use of social media can help local governments improve citizen compliance especially during crises. Based on an original daily panel dataset of 189 cities in China during COVID-19, this study provides empirical evidence for the positive effect that crisis-related social media posts published by local government agencies has on citizen compliance. In addition, this effect is mediated by the topic of prevention measures in social media posts, and is stronger in cities with higher GDP per capita, better educated citizens and wider internet coverage. The findings imply that social media is an efficient and low-cost tool to assist local government agencies to achieve public administration objectives during crises, and its efficacy is largely dependent on regional socioeconomic status.