e-democracy conference [in italy]

Last week was a very busy one. I was in Bologna on Friday presenting my views [and a paper] on electronic democracy at a conference titled 'Tools of democracy'. The conference was organised at the University of Bologna, Dipartimento di Organizzazione e Sistema Politico.

The programme was very focussed, touching upon recent developments in democratic theory [or the lack thereof] and innovations capable [or not] to revive 'democracy'. It was a theoretically thorough day, as Italian political science is one of the main contributors to democratic theory. I found myself looking in amazement at times, as models, concepts and constructs were handled with exceptional competence, precision and relevance. It is not often that this happens at conferences, for lack of time or for the prevalence of 'straw man' empiricism.

Will conclude on Lakatos here:

Mature science consists of research programmes in which not only novel facts but, in an important sense, also novel auxiliary theories, are anticipated; mature science, – unlike pedestrian trial-end-error, has 'heuristic power'

Tools of democracy [Programma in italiano]
Bologna, 25 novembre 2005
Aula dei Poeti, Strada Maggiore 45

Ore 10

Gianfranco Pasquino
Universita' di Bologna
Introduction

Donatella Campus
Universita' di Bologna
Political communication and democracy

Daniela Giannetti
Universita' di Bologna
Deliberative democracy

Wainer Lusoli
University of Chester
E-democracy

12,30 Discussion

13,00 Lunch break

14,30
Pier Vincenzo Uleri
Universita' di Firenze
Referendum

Marco Valbruzzi
Universita' di Bologna
Primaries: a tool for better democracy?

Gianfranco Pasquino
Universita' di Bologna
Innovations in democratic theory

16,45 Discussion

website: law professors blog

I have come across, by chance, the Law Professor Blogs. According to the blog, this is a repository of 'Resources, News & Information for Law School Professors'.

Why, oh Why there is no similar thing for politics professor [or more humbly lecturers and teachers]. Are we less opinionated? Less clever? Less showing-off? Less keen on technology [BINGO!].

A few people have tried:

ITP section of the APSA
Political Studies Association

But no 'bottom up', frequent and recursive forum, as far as I'm aware.

Anyone interested in taking this forward?

the intenret and the logics of groups

I've seen a number of pieces coming out recently about the Intenret and the social logics of groups. In other words, how people use the Internet to 'get organised' in different domains of life. One, from Bruce Bimber et al, is reported in a previous post. Two more, from Beth Noveck and Stephen Coleman, are pasted below. Interesting and long-due developments I would say.

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First Monday, volume 10, number 11 (November 2005)

A democracy of groups
Beth Simone Noveck

In groups people can accomplish what they cannot do alone. Now new visual and social technologies are making it possible for people to make decisions and solve complex problems collectively. These technologies are enabling groups not only to create community but also to wield power and create rules to govern their own affairs. Electronic democracy theorists have either focused on the individual and the state, disregarding the collaborative nature of public life, or they remain wedded to outdated and unrealistic conceptions of deliberation. This article makes two central claims. First, technology will enable more effective forms of collective action. This is particularly so of the emerging tools for 'collective visualization' which will profoundly reshape the ability of people to make decisions, own and dispose of assets, organize, protest, deliberate, dissent and resolve disputes together. From this argument derives a second, normative claim. We should explore ways to structure the law to defer political and legal decision–making downward to decentralized group–based decision–making. This argument about groups expands upon previous theories of law that recognize a center of power independent of central government: namely, the corporation. If we take seriously the potential impact of technology on collective action, we ought to think about what it means to give groups body as well as soul — to 'incorporate' them. This paper rejects the anti–group arguments of Sunstein, Posner and Netanel and argues for the potential to realize legitimate self–governance at a 'lower' and more democratic level. The law has a central role to play in empowering active citizens to take part in this new form of democracy.

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IPPR Paphlet, 11 November 2005

Direct Representation: towards a conversational democracy

Stephen Coleman

The problem faced by contemporary democracy is horribly simple: governments have come to believe that the public don’t know how to speak; the public has come to believe that governments don’t know how to listen. Faced with apparently ‘apathetic’ citizens, the political class complains about the difficulty of governing in a vacuum. Convinced that the political class is not interested in them, the public is increasingly pursuing a conversation in which politicians are outsiders.
It is ironic. Two centuries ago, democracy was regarded as a subversive aspiration. The disenfranchised majority clamoured for the right to participate, and the political elite resisted their claims ‘because their reason is weak; because when once aroused, their passions are ungoverned; because they want information; because the smallness of the property, which they individually possess, renders them less attentive to the measures they adopt in affairs of moment’ (Burke,1871). Now the roles are reversed. The demos are voting with their feet, bored and demoralised by the institutions and processes of ‘politics as usual’, while angst-ridden political elites are desperate to re-engage them.
[...]

journal article: internet, collective action and online politics

I'm not sure if this was a long time in the making, but it is an long-due addition to the debate on the nature of collective action and the Internet.

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Communication Theory
2005 15(4): 365-388

Reconceptualizing Collective Action in the Contemporary Media Environment

Bruce Bimber, Andrew J. Flanagin and Cynthia Stohl

Collective action theory, which is widely applied to explain human phenomena in which public goods are at stake, traditionally rests on at least two main tenets: that individuals confront discrete decisions about free riding and that formal organization is central to locating and contacting potential participants in collective action, motivating them, and coordinating their actions. Recent uses of technologies of information and communication for collective action appear in some instances to violate these two tenets. In order to explain these, we reconceptualize collective action as a phenomenon of boundary crossing between private and public domains. We show how a reconceptualized theory of collective action can better account for certain contemporary phenomena, and we situate traditional collective action theory as a special case of our expanded theory.

journal article: internet effects on participation

This came through the post today; always nice when you know the author...

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The British Journal of Politics & International Relations
Volume 7 Issue 4 Page 561 - November 2005

Online Participation in the UK: Testing a 'Contextualised' Model of Internet Effects

Rachel K. Gibson, Wainer Lusoli and Stephen Ward

This article offers a new test of the mobilisation thesis of Internet effects on individual political participation using data from an NOP survey of 1,972 UK adults during May 2002. The analysis differs from that of previous studies in that it significantly widens the understanding of the dependent variable—online participation—as well as introducing new Internet-specific variables as explanatory factors for this new type of participation. Using this broader 'contextualised' model of online political activity we find support for the idea that the Internet is expanding the numbers of the politically active, specifically in terms of reaching groups that are typically inactive or less active in conventional or offline forms of politics. In drawing these conclusions our article joins with a growing body of literature calling for the re-evaluation of the so-called normalisation thesis which argues that ultimately the Internet will lead to a further narrowing of the pool of politically active citizens by reinforcing existing levels of engagement. At a broader level we consider the findings point to the need for scholars in the area to work towards a more sophisticated theoretical and empirical modelling of participation in the online environment.

e-democracy conference

I was at the Headstar e-democracy conference today, presenting on one panel about evaluation of e-democracy projects [BTW, thanks to all participants for a fresh take on evaluating e-democracy].

However, the highlight was a memorable word match between a Cambridge philosopher and an Oxford professor. About the nature of democracy and the need of the 'e'. The [former] Sheffield legislator tried to moderate, but I reckon the enjoyed the debate as much as the audience did. Pity if you've left earlier and missed it.

journal article: local e-government in northern ireland

I'm starting to trawl through older meterial, brace yourself for more, one-a-day.

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Local government Studies
Volume 31, Number 3 / June 2005
pp. 307-320

Maeve Paris

Local E-Government and Devolution: Electronic Service Delivery and the Digital Divide in Northern Ireland

There are billions of annual transactions between citizens and government; most of these are between citizens and local government. Both central and local government share the same target for electronic service delivery: 100% of key services online by 2005. In Northern Ireland, however, district councils are being left behind on the e-government agenda. The Northern Ireland Assembly, currently suspended, has no provisions or recommendations for local e-government, although many transactional services of interest to ordinary citizens are provided by local councils. The absence of a strategy for local e-government means that district councils are left to their own devices, and this contrasts with the rest of the UK. A snapshot of local councils is used to assess the extent of provision of electronic service delivery, highlighting examples of innovation, and indicating significant challenges for Northern Ireland local e-government during a period of suspended devolution.

online politics Japanese style

The other day I came across this rather exceptional bit of news implying that online elections are/will be soon illegal in Japan. Reportedly:

According to an article in the online version of Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun, Internet campaigning for the upcoming Lower House elections are prohibited by the Public Offices Election Law. Candidates may not update Web sites or report activities in e-mail magazines.

The reason, says the article, is that the Liberal Democratic party fears that online campaigning will "disadvantage parties with elderly supporters," and "the system could be abused to slander candidates."

Blimey, I thouhgt, this sounds harsh. Better ask the expert.
Leslie Tkach-Kawasaki, that is [try here] , who has looked at online elections in Japan for quite some time [e.g. read this, or this]. Here's the response:

Quoting from the GovTech site, it is true that "candidates may not update Web sites or report activities in e-mail magazines" during the 10- to 12- day period prior to an election. Candidates usually do one of
the following:

* Completely stop updating their websites for that period -- more than 50%
(About 10 to 15% of these candidates have a notice on their websites regard ing this).

* Take the entire website off the web (so you get broken links when you try to access the site). Less than 50% of the candididates do this.

Parties are allowed to update their websites during the same period, but are very careful to avoid updating "election-related" content. Most update current events and "political education" news items.

The second article states: "They're [parties] not even permitted to announce when candidates will be giving a speech or upload their party platforms." The first half of that sentence is true. The second half, however, is contro versial. It probably refers to the controversy during the 2003 general election.

The main opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, wanted to publicize its manifesto (election platform) on its website as well as send it out via postal mail. The government countered that this was in contravention of the section in the POEL (Public Offices Election Law), that prohibits the distribution of election platforms to an unlimited (uncountable) number of people.

Remember, the POEL was initially brought to enable *costing* of election-related materials so that an even playing field could be assured to all candidates. During this particular election campaign period in 2003, the DPJ eventually succeeded in having the POEL changed to allow them to send out their manifesto in pamphlet format, but the POEL has never been changed to address new media technologies such as the web.

Confusing? It's supposed to be.

Alway ask the experts. Put this way, it seems to me remarkably similar to what happened in the UK in the 2005 election !

Want to know more?
More on Japanese politics online.
More on poltical blogging in Japan.

report: poltical use of the internet in china

I admit to having missed this, amazing study. But I'll set time aside to read [not implying though that you should do the same].

You've Got Dissent! Chinese Dissident Use of the Internet and Beijing's Counter-Strategies

Michael S. Chase
James C. Mulvenon

TOC

Preface
Figures and Tables
Summary
Acknowledgments
Acronyms

Chapter One: POLITICAL USE OF THE INTERNET IN CHINA

Introduction
The State of the Internet in China
The State of Unsanctioned NGOs Inside China
Use of the Internet
Measuring Success
Future Trends

Chapter Two: GOVERNMENT COUNTERSTRATEGIES

Beijing's Dilemma: Control versus Modernization
The Nature of the Chinese Information Security Environment
Counterstrategies
Measuring Success
Future Trends

Appendix: Dissident Web Sites

References

journal article: the media in the 2005 British election

An article on the role of the media in the 2005 British election. Only three paragraphs about the Internet though.

Parliamentary Affairs
2005, 58(4):699-711

John Bartle

The Press, Television, and the Internet

IN the 1997 and 2001 general elections, New Labour triumphed at the polls and in the media. In 1997 it had received the endorsements of six out of eleven national daily newspapers and been given largely sympathetic coverage in the broadcast media. In 2001 it made even more progress among the print media, with the endorsement of seven out of the eleven. By 2001, however, its relationship with the media had became progressively more difficult. The party found it difficult to adjust from opposition to government and it quickly gained an unenviable reputation for spinning. Those at the centre, such as Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister’s Press Secretary, became increasingly sensitive to criticism. Their relationship with the BBC, in particular, became increasingly strained. A Panorama investigation into the NHS, broadcast shortly before the 2001 election, caused particular resentment. As early as June 2001, the Deputy Head of BBC News was . . . [Full Text of this Article]

today I did not blog because...

I was busy writing this. It is an introduction to a forthcoming issue of the journal Information Polity, about the role of the Internet in the 2004 EP election (edited by Nick Jankowski and yours truly).

The Internet and the European Parliament Elections: Theoretical Perspectives, Empirical Investigations and Proposals for Research

Abstract
This article reviews the existing literature on the study of on-line aspects of elections along three well-rehearsed theoretical frameworks: equalisation vs. normalisation, information vs. engagement, and mobilisation vs. reinforcement. It then examines the contribution of this volume to the field, first by direct reference to existing literature, then more generally, touching upon the notion of the ‘comparative’ – theoretical, geographical and empirical. The article examines the contribution of the articles, considered as a collective effort, in relation to the increasing specialisation in the study of on-line aspects of elections. Then the framing of issues and the evidence presented within and across individual articles is used to assess the import of the internet for election campaigns with respect to increasing pluralism, professionalisation, and audience activity (or the lack thereof). It will be argued that this theme issue represents a first, necessary contribution towards gaining a crossnational understanding of the growing role of the internet for electoral practice. The last section further elaborates on possible future directions of online campaign studies, drawing on the study of the 2004 EP online election.

Keywords
Internet, elections, European Parliament, political communication, comparative research

If you are interested, you can download a copy of a draft here, before it is published. Then you're certainly better off with a paginated copy.

book: internet politics

Quite unusual in that the blog precedes the book.

Internet Politics: States, Citizens, and New Communication Technologies
Andrew Chadwick
OUP

This is sure to make a good and comprehensive reading about the Internet and politics. And a neat blog to match.

From OUP's website:

In the developed world, there is no longer an issue of whether the Internet affects politics--but how, why, and with what consequences. With the Internet now spreading at a breathtaking rate in the developing world, the new medium is fraught with tensions, paradoxes, and contradictions. How do we make sense of these? In this major new work, Andrew Chadwick addresses such concerns, providing the first comprehensive overview of Internet politics.

Internet Politics examines the impact of new communication technologies on political parties and elections, pressure groups, social movements, local democracy, public bureaucracies, and global governance. It also analyzes persistent and controversial policy problems, including the digital divide; the governance of the Internet itself; the tensions between surveillance, privacy, and security; and the political economy of the Internet media sector. The approach is explicitly comparative, providing numerous examples from the U.S., Britain, and many other countries. Written in a clear and accessible style, this theoretically sophisticated and up-to-date text reveals the key difference the Internet makes in how we "do" politics and how we "think about" political life. Featuring numerous figures, tables, and text boxes, Internet Politics is ideal for undergraduate and graduate courses in political science, international relations, and communication studies.

The blog is organised around the same themes as the book:

Ch 01: Intro
Ch 02: Concepts
Ch 03: Net History
Ch 04: Digital Divide
Ch 05: E-Democracy
Ch 06: E-Mobilization
Ch 07: E-Campaigning
Ch 08: E-Government
Ch 09: Global Info Society
Ch 10: Internet Governance
Ch 11: Surveillance
Ch 12: Political Economy
Ch 13: Futurology

[though this is from the blog, not the OUP website]

journal article: new zealand parties online

I thought I would keep it to one-a-day, then I stumbled across this. The first piece on New Zealand parties online, as far as I'm aware.

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An evaluation of New Zealand political party Websites
Information Research, Vol. 9 No. 4, July 2004

Matthew Conway
Dan Dorner

In a very short time, Websites have become vital campaign and communication tools for political parties around the world. This study examines the effectiveness of the Websites of New Zealand political parties, focusing on the functions that the parties were performing online and on how effectively they were delivering these functions. The research was designed to provide a quantitative evaluation of party Websites and to allow for longitudinal comparisons and comparisons between countries. Using a coding scheme that measured 50 different criteria numerically, providing for objective evaluation and comparison, the study found that New Zealand political parties were not using the Internet effectively, mainly because most were using their Websites for information provision, yet were not providing the tools required to make this information as accessible as possible. The research also found that the major parties were using their Websites more effectively than the minor and non-parliamentary parties, but the most effective Website belonged to the Green Party.

journal article: internet effects on civic participation

This is remarkably similar to a recent piece from Rachel [Gibson], Steve [Ward] and myself in BJPIR, from a US angle. The issue of modelling Internet effects on political participation is becoming hotter by the day. Partly because, erh, it's not been done before? [and this sounds strange]

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Communication Research
Vol. 32, No. 5, 531-565 (2005)

Information and Expression in a Digital Age Modeling Internet Effects on Civic Participation
Dhavan V. Shah, Jaeho Cho, William P. Eveland, Nojin Kwak

This article examines the role of the Internet as a source of political information and a sphere for public expression. Informational media use, whether traditional news sources or online public affairs content, is expected to foster interpersonal political discussion and online civic messaging, contributing to increased civic participation. Using two-wave national panel survey data, three types of synchronous structural equation models are tested: cross sectional (relating individual differences), fixed effects (relating intraindividual change), and auto regressive (relating aggregate change). All models reveal that online media complement traditional media to foster political discussion and civic messaging. These two forms of political expression, in turn, influence civic participation. Other variable orderings are tested to compare the theorized model to alternative causal specifications. Results reveal that the model produces the best fit, empirically and theoretically, with the influence of the Internet, rivaling the mobilizing power of traditional modes of information and expression.