Keynote for the ICT4Democracy Summer School in New Delhi, March 2014.

1. E-Participation
Dr. Jakob Svensson
& Mag. Judith Schossböck
ICT4Democracy Summer School
Keynote – March 12 2014
New Delhi, India

2. Todays Keynote
Participation – History and introduction to a loaded concept
Bringing the E to participation
Evaluating E-participation
Case study: Results and
lessons learned
Questions

3. What is participation?

4. What is participation?
A rights and a duty
An equal right to participate in a democracy – but it is also our
duty
Important for the
”social contract” / ”civic bond”

5. The historical development of participation
a) The Greek agora where people met and discussed with each
other
b) Development of religions (where political membership
become dependent of a common faith)
c) The development of autonomous city states in Europe
d) The development of nationalism and the national state that
followed from the French revolution
e) The creation of the welfare state for the institutionalism of
social rights
Development of participation

6. Not only about political rights – and a relation to a state and
common identity – this is also about social equality
T.H. Marshall
Development of participation?

7. T.H. Marshall
Citizenship builds upon our equal right to participation –
however capitalist societies are far from equal
At the same time – it is the argument that we have the right to
be different and develop our individualities – that capitalist then
use to justify that society becomes unequal.
Marshall discussions of social rights was a way to make the idea
of every citizens equal right, more equal in reality
Development of participation

8. Wide vs. narrow participation (Verba & Nie, 1972)
Maximalist vs. minimalist participation (Carpentier, 2011)
(can be traced back to Elitist (Schumpeter) vs. Participatory
(Pateman) ideals of democracy)
Different forms of participation

9. The idea is that participation may occur outside of Parliamentary
institutions if we understand participation as the act
to influence public decision makers (Verba & Nie, 1972)
Lately participation has come to indicate the act
to influence society in general (Esaiasson & Westholm, 2006)
Activities that school citizens democratically and make them
capable to govern over themselves (Pateman 1970)
which is close to the definition of empowerment as recognizing your power to
create/induce change (Lennie & Tacchi, 2013) – which in turn resonates with
Sens (1999) understands development as a freedom which lends itself towards
the capacity of individuals to assess and transform, their situations.
Different forms participation

10. Tripartite delineation of participation (Svensson, 2011)
Depending on where it is initiated and towards where it is directed
1) Parliamentary initiated participation (from within Parliament)
2) Activist initiated participation (initiated outside the Parliament but
directed towards it - Both single-issue adhoc movements and more long-
lived so-called social movements (demand – Laclau, 2005)
3) Popular cultural participation (Cultural Public Sphere – Hermes, 2006)
Different forms of participation

11. Tripartite delineation of participation (Nilsson, 2005)
Depending on its relation to parliamentary institutions
1) Integrated forms of participation (Elections and political party
membership)
2) engrafted forms participation (civic/ users committees)
3) Independent forms of participation (village communities, political
consumption)
Different forms of participation

12. Participation today
Parliamentary initiated participation
legitimacy crisis
Activist initiated and popular cultural participation
Lifepolictics – Giddens
Suppolitics – Beck
Mundane citizenship - Bakardjieva
Participation today

13. Participation vs engagement (Dahlgren 2009, 2013)
Engagement is the subjective/ individual prerequisite for
participation
Participation vs interaction Participation is always linked to
power and the political (Carpentier, 2011; Dahlgren, 2013)
What is Participation

14. Parliamentary initiated participation
Internet as a magic elixir (Strommer-Galley, 2000)
Strategic communication Instrumental uses (in campaigns)
Deliberation Communicative uses (engaging citizens in
dialogues)
Image-Management Expressive uses (negotiating your image as
a politician)
Bringing the E to participation

15. Activist initiated participation
Internet as a tool for organization of participation and for mobilizing
participation – smart mobs (Rheingold, 2002)
Issue engagement (Verba et al., 1995) – you engage in issues that affects to
(personally and emotionally) and issues that are controversial – more
passionate than pragmatic participation. Participation needs a certain
amount of emotional investment (Melucci, 1996)
Connective action (Bennett & Segerberg, 2012) – messages memes that can
easily be personalized and spread
Clictivism and Slactivism
Bringing the E to participation

16. Popular cultural initiated participation
Pop-up (Manchester United, Docu-Soaps)
Smaller parts of affinity portals to which political discussions are
directed
Bringing the E to participation

17. From “techno-optimism” to realism
Ann Macintosh, Angus Whyte, (2008)
“Further research is needed in two main areas; first, on the
applicability (where) of eParticipation tools to particular
contexts, and second, to integrate fieldwork methods to assess
social acceptance of eParticipation (why) and represent the
diversity of views obtained from citizens, community groups and
other stakeholders.”
• Cognitive impact (agenda setting, by whom?)
• Idea of direct impact on policy making
• Agenda setting in hybrid media environment
Evaluating E-participation

18. • AT
• CZ
• GR
• UK
Discussion in 4 languages and pilots in four countries
Integration of Social Media and Networks
Involvement of
Young people
Decision makers and institutions
ePart for young people in the EU

19. • Creating a e-participation platform and community on EU
level
• Forward the results of the deliberation process to decision
makers and institutions.
• To make young people familiar with decision makers
• Features:
Mobile communication channels, Facebook Integration,
Google Translate
Large scale e-participation – aims

20. 1. Topic creation: Suggest a theme and rate a theme
2. Discussion: Discuss a theme and provide comments and
proposals; rate comments
3. Voting: Vote for the proposals
4. Summary and results: Show results and get feedback
from relevant bodies and persons.
4 stages deliberation model
4.189 registered participants (03/14)
The averge user looks at
6+ pages and stays for
6+ minutes.

21. Dedicated online campaigns, selected topic campaigns and topic
promotion on banners, Video advertisement in mass media,
social media promotion (regular means of marketing no effect)
Topic campaigns

22. Points system for motivation
Gamification elementsGamification Elements

23. • Likes
• Thumbing
• Voting for Proposals
• “Lurkers”
• Inclusiveness and transparency
– Moderators inform users about reasons for deleting content
– User diversity: throughout political spectrum
– Empowerment: Users and decision makers are same users
Low participation threshhold

25. Thumbing
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
Platform Activity
Threads Users Thumbs Posts

26. Methodology
– Online Questionnaires
• Feedback Questionnaire (310 filled out, 76 counted)
• Long Questionnaire (420 responses)
– Interviews with decision makers and users (21)
– Discourse Analysis
– Focus Group (December 2013)
– Platform Data and Google Analytics
– Facebook Data
Evaluation of E-Participation Projects

27. 4 evaluation levels
• Political
– Relevancy and Popularity of selected deliberation themes
– Effectiveness of communicating the trial results to decision
makers and relevant public bodies
– Degree of influence on decision-making process and
political actions
• Technical
– Platforms and tools usability
– Platform purpose suitability
Methodology based on Macintosh

28. • Social
– Effectiveness of integrating multiple evaluation tools
– Digital connections created between users
– Quality of discussion and deliberation process
• Methodological
– Effectiveness of dissemination activities
– Effectiveness of user engagement tactics
Methodology based on Macintosh

29. Users:
• Do you think platforms like OurSpace are got to get involved
or more interested in politics?
• Did you get more interested in the life of a politician?
• Do you think they can improve trust in politics?
• Do what extent do you feel empowered?
Decision makers:
• Did the platform have an influence on daily political work?
• Did the platform have an influence on policy making?
Political level

30. ”...In the work of a politician”
Did you get more interested in the work of a politician that you
met/that posted on OurSpace?
Yes Rather yes Neutral Rather no No Responses
AT 18 % 25 % 30 % 10 % 17 % 167
CZ 17 % 28 % 16 % 19 % 21 % 43
GR 6 % 14 % 42 % 15 % 22 % 85
UK 21 % 19 % 37 % 6 % 16 % 62
ALL 15 % 22 % 32 % 12 % 18 % 357

31. • Most users did not find that the platform could improve trust in
politics and politicians, however, a lot of them were rather
indifferent (35%).
• Czech users slightly varied: 81% found that the platform has helped
them to improve their trust in politics and politicians.
• Greek users: 18% said it could help them.
”...level of trust improvement”
”...empowerment...”
• Majority of users feeling empowered or very empowered (59%) by
the platform.

32. • Different levels of user activity in pilot countries
– Thumbing more often in AT than UK
– Most active users in CZ
– Most registrations in Greece
• Decision maker participation
– Positive response in Austria (40% of MEPs)
– No decision maker participated in Greece
Comparative perspective

33. • Language and cultural conditions still major obstacle in cross-
country deliberation
• Gender was no barrier
(e.g. female politicians very active,
diverse user group)
• EU Legislation difficult
• Transferring people from established media (e.g. Facebook
monopol, leaflets)
Barriers in cross-country e-part

34. • Young people are generally very positive regarding e-
participation as a tool for political engagement and informed
decision making
• Potential for empowerment and decision making processes
out of classical institutions
• They are criticial regarding political impact on policies
• Engagement beyond politically active target group is difficult
• Sen (capabilities) young people need guidance (vs. „Digital
Natives“)
Lessons Learned

35. Questions?

36. Thank you for listening!
jakob.svensson@im.uu.se
judith.schossboeck@donau-uni.ac.at