1. The Expressive Turn of Political Participation and Citizenship in the Digital Age Presentation for E-Democracy Conference 2010 Danube University Krems Austria Jakob Svensson, Ph.D. Media and Communication Studies Centre for HumanIT

3. Jakob Svensson Internet is considered the new arena for citizenship In digital late modernity, when more and more people socialze, organize, contribute, inform and publish their concerns and themselves online,the rational(s) for political participation and enacting citizenship(s), shifts.

4. Jakob Svensson Citizens ≠Human beings in general

5. Jakob Svensson Citizens ≠Human beings in general Centre of power

6. Jakob Svensson Citizens ≠Human beings in general Centre of power Citizenship as a process in relation to some kind of authority

10. Jakob Svensson What is the political here? What does the political consists of?

11. Jakob Svensson What is the political here? What does the political consists of? Concerns of the organization and structure of society Power - equal division society’s common goods Discursive and relational

12. Jakob Svensson Community?

13. Jakob Svensson Community? Community of interest - community of common meaning making practices

14. Jakob Svensson Community? Community of interest - community of common meaning making practices In late modernity non fixed

15. Jakob Svensson Political Community An ensemble of people concerned with the organization of society and making sense of these concerns in a similar way.

16. Jakob Svensson Political Community An ensemble of people concerned with the organization of society and making sense of these concerns in a similar way. When people then participate and act upon shared meanings, address issues of the structure of society and the division of its common goods, in relation to an authority, they enter into the practice of citizenship

18. Jakob Svensson Late modernity (liquid modernity, second modernity, high modernity, reflexive modernity)

19. Jakob Svensson Late modernity (liquid modernity, second modernity, high modernity, reflexive modernity) - dispersion of cultural frameworks due to pluralization and fragmentation along lines of ethnicity, media consumption, cultural interests, life styles, tastes et cetera

24. Jakob Svensson The instrumental - communicative rationality dichotomy Revisited - not least because of the deliberative turn

25. Jakob Svensson Instrumental Rationality Rationality as an instrument for reaching pre-defined purposes Particitipation as an instrument for self-centered purposes E-administration Problems: Free riders - costs higher than benefits

26. Jakob Svensson Communicative Rationality Rationality to overcome our inherent subjectivity, strive for enlightenment Particitipation as a way to talk to each other, form opinions and agre on courses of action E-participation Problems: utopic, motivation

27. Jakob Svensson Civic disinterest becomes difficult to explain from from a CR tradition Late modern civic engagement is difficult to explain from a IR tradition

28. Jakob Svensson Civic disinterest becomes difficult to explain from from a CR tradition Late modern civic engagement is difficult to explain from a IR tradition Even though deliberating citizens rarely meet the theorists’ strict standards of communicative rationality, these citizens do speak together, produce and maintain meanings (communities), identities in a way that theories yet have to capture

29. Jakob Svensson Civic disinterest becomes difficult to explain from from a CR tradition Late modern civic engagement is difficult to explain from a IR tradition Even though deliberating citizens rarely meet the theorists’ strict standards of communicative rationality, these citizens do speak together, produce and maintain meanings (communities), identities in a way that theories yet have to capture hence we need other analytical tools in order to understand citizenship and political participation, analytical tools that also considers cultural changes in digital late modernity

31. Jakob Svensson Processes of identification, reflexive self-realization in digital late modernity

32. Jakob Svensson Processes of identification, reflexive self-realization in digital late modernity Expressive preferences ≠market preferences

33. Jakob Svensson Processes of identification, reflexive self-realization in digital late modernity Expressive preferences ≠market preferences Networked individualism/ the looking glass self

34. Jakob Svensson A focus on self realization and processes of identification concern expressing, maintaining and redefining discourses in order to make participation and deliberation meaningful and relevant for the citizens.

35. Jakob Svensson A focus on self realization and processes of identification concern expressing, maintaining and redefining discourses in order to make participation and deliberation meaningful and relevant for the citizens. This is neither communicative nor instrumental rationality. Citizens are motivated by a will to express, perform, maintain, create and recreate identities and their meanings

36. Jakob Svensson A focus on self realization and processes of identification concern expressing, maintaining and redefining discourses in order to make participation and deliberation meaningful and relevant for the citizens. This is neither communicative nor instrumental rationality. Citizens are motivated by a will to express, perform, maintain, create and recreate identities and their meanings From this perspective we can understand participation both if citizens are motivated by pre-established self-interest or not, and wether these will change during the deliberation or not

37. Jakob Svensson Participation is understood as an act of identity expression Participation provides participants with meaning Communities are sustained by such participation In political communities - citizens participate and participation revolves around the structure and organization of society

38. Thank you for listening! [email_address] www.kau.se/en/humanit www.facebook.com/jakob.svensson twitter.com/lilltrasan