Implementing E-learning in Traditional Universities: Drivers and Barriers? : A comparative study of two Chinese universities and one Swedish university

Abstract: Introduction: Along with the rapid spread of the World Wide Web, internet, and personal computers, e-learning has been increasingly adopted by higher educational institutions (HEIs). A serial of studies have been conducted in order to study the implementation of e-learning in HEIs.  This study is a comparative study of two Chinese universities and one Swedish university. It is trying to answer the following research questions: What are teachers’ attitudes towards e-learning and purpose for using it? What are the driving factors and barriers of e-learning implementation? How do national cultures influence the e-learning implementation? Purpose: This study is conducted as an explorative study. It is seeking to find out driving factors and barriers of e-learning implementation in HEIs; Analyse the impact of national culture on e-learning implementation based on the findings and the analysis out of Hofstede´s culture dimension model. Method: The deductive approach will be adopted in this study. Therefore, a hypothesis has been built and tested by both primary and secondary data.  Primary data was collected through questionnaires and the secondary was collected from internet resources, books, published articles and conference papers. Conclusion: There are similarities and differences between universities from the two countries, however, the differences are relatively greater than the similarities. Taken into consideration the significant differences in culture of these two countries, the conclusion can be drawn that national culture is a significant ingredient of factors that can affect e-learning implementations in HEIs.