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e-democracyIs the internet bad for democracy? How people do politics since and with the internet is the topic of discussion. Our contributors begin with this question, before casting an eye over the latest examples of internet use by governments across the globe. Finally, we'll turn to new and intriguing efforts to use the internet, locally and globally, to facilitate solutions to political problems lying beyond the nation state. Plus: The e-democracy world map.
Wikipedia's visionless, self-selected, value-light online encyclopedia is a deformed shadow of what the global public deserves, says former editor-in-chief of Encyclopædia Britannica, Robert McHenry. Read the rest of this post...
"The same patterns seen in the mass media are replicating themselves on the internet." David Shariatmadari speaks to the Wikipedians countering systemic bias in the world’s biggest encyclopaedia. Read the rest of this post...
A directive that challenges our fundamental right to privacy became law in the EU this month. Monica Horten charts its course through Brussels and details the concerns of its many critics Read the rest of this post...
The promise of e-government is a transparent, accessible, efficient state in a new partnership with its citizens. But, asks Giovanni Navarria, could it be the model of an invisible model of political control? Read the rest of this post...
Should we despair at the power of an authoritarian regime to censor the most democratic force of our time? Giovanni Navarria sees a ray of hope burst through the clouds hanging over Chinese netizens. Read the rest of this post...
As the first international Wikimania conference is held this week in Frankfurt, pioneer Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan – who will blog for openDemocracy from the event – tests the “wiki’s” democratic potential in a bold new experiment. Read the rest of this post...
Will the era of digital networks and terrorism produce the worst of both worlds: a society of mass surveillance that increases insecurity? William Davies maps a new political-technological frontier. Read the rest of this post...
The British government is intent on making identity cards essential to citizens’ daily lives. Shami Chakrabarti, director of the civil-rights group Liberty, is unpersuaded by its arguments. Read the rest of this post...
ID cards will only prove what British citizens are not. Hans Steketee asks: what kind of identity is that? Read the rest of this post...
The elections in North Rhine-Westphalia should be remembered for their far-right online politics as well as for the defeat of Germany’s ruling party, says Alan Connor. Read the rest of this post...
Britain’s government plans to introduce a national identity-card system. Are fears of state intrusion on civil liberties justified? Sweden’s experience offers an answer, reports Sara Forsstrom. Read the rest of this post...
Google is doing business with a communist China notorious for internet
censorship. Not only techno-libertarians should worry, says Becky Hogge.
Politics online does not itself guarantee more accountable, transparent government. But what can the internet achieve politically? William Davies asks how interactivity can be made democratic. Read the rest of this post...
The route from poverty to empowerment starts with the click of a mouse, says Maartje Op de Coul of Oneworld International. But can internet social projects also make markets work in their favour? Read the rest of this post...
Iran’s censors have a new enemy: the internet. But users of new media in the country are inventing ways to speak truth to power. Read the rest of this post...
When poor people can speak, the world will change – and mobile communications technology is giving them the tools for transformation. Read the rest of this post...
The World Summit on the Information Society venue was bland, the rhetoric cloudy, the chocolates consoling – but ideas and energy flowed around the fringes. Read the rest of this post...
The appropriate use of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) could make a vast contribution to solving the problems of development and democracy. But to realise this potential, a global conversation is needed to match the global nature of economic, social and environmental challenges. Read the rest of this post...
The UN’s World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva is intended to create ways of bridging the global ‘digital divide’. But will its political tensions and complex agenda make it less of an “internet-Kyoto” and more of an arid talk shop? Read the rest of this post...
E-democracy, fuelled by new techniques like automated text summaries, is more than a tool of efficiency, customer service or good public relations – it could help create a refreshed public space and a more accountable democracy. An innovative project in Canada’s New Brunswick province highlights the benefits of continuing to experiment. Read the rest of this post...
A persistent western narrative views the internet boom in China as a vehicle for the “opening of a closed society” that is hitherto shielded by an informational “Chinese Wall.” The impenetrable wall may always have been a fiction; in any case, the information explosion of Chinese cyberspace challenges stereotype and heralds the emergence of a new social force: public opinion. Read the rest of this post...
Siva Vaidhyanathan’s argument is entertaining but simplistic, argues this journalist, programmer and editor of openDemocracy’s Media & the Net theme. A democratic and open network regulated by the state, not techno-anarchism, is the only practical approach. Read the rest of this post...
The political potential of the internet lies not in connecting people to politicians, still less in online voting; it lies in the possibility of bringing citizens together to help themselves, argues a veteran of online politics. Read the rest of this post...
The internet is culture not trade, library not warehouse, treasure-house not bank, popular not elitist. Free it, train everyone to use it, and it will fly – and carry democracy on its wings. Read the rest of this post...
How future online services will address problems of civic engagement in the UK. Read the rest of this post...
The old ‘new’ media – television, cable TV – have disappointed the civic hopes invested in them. Communication has turned to cacophony. Will the same happen to the internet? Two political scientists lay out an agenda for preventing the corporate takeover of cyberspace; they propose the founding of a radical but credible European civic commons. Read the rest of this post...
Can information and communication technologies (ICTs) help advance social justice and development goals worldwide? This will be a key theme of the coming World Summit on the Information Society. The director-general of UNESCO puts the case for the global importance of e-democracy. Read the rest of this post...
Political engagement is changing, not dying, and the Internet is part of that change. But to realise its democratic potential we will have to use the technology much more creatively, and transform the way we interact with it. Read the rest of this post...
The challenge Open Source offers to Microsoft’s monopoly could precipitate a new form of global civil society. Read the rest of this post...
We are still lulled by complacent enthusiasm for e-democracy. Unless we are vigilant, we could have a monster on our hands. Read the rest of this post...
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