Fourth Research Programm of the MZES (1999

Mobilisation, Participation and Organisation via new Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs)

Director/Researcher: Andrea Römmele

Duration: 3 years

Modern democracies are representative democracies. Therefore, communication between leaders and led is a central pre-condition for the democratic process. In modern mass democracies, political parties connect government and the people, i.e. communication is channeled by and through political parties. The internet is a new revolutionary form of communication allowing political actors and citizens a new form of dialogue. The internet and its possible implications for the democractic process is currently a popular research topic in communication sciences, research aspects from a socio-political angle have rarely been touched upon so far (Gellner/von Korff 1998; Gibson/Ward 1999, 2000; Kamps 1999; Norris 1999, 2000).

The project "Mobilisation, Participation and Organisation via new ICTs" explicitly connects to the existing studies but takes an international comparative angle. With researchers from four other European institutions (England, the Netherlands, Italy, and Sweden) the question is pursued which relevance the internet has for political parties in connecting leaders and led. How far can new ICTs widen and deepen democratic participation? Where is the Internet most likely to effect change? Do country-specific contexts make a difference? These are the key research questions the project aims at finding answers to.

This threefold research question divides the project into the following steps:

information of citizens: Whereas political actors can only partially control the message being transmitted via the mass media, the internet allows for full controll over the message being sent out. It also allows for targeted information. The research question to be tackeld with in this first part of the project is: What do parties offer via the internet and how congruent is their message compared to the party program? What do parties offer via the internet and how congruent are these messages to the party platform?
participation of citizens: New ICTs allow citizens to participate (chat rooms, e-mails to representatives etc.). How far can new ICTs widen and deepen democratic participation? Can the Inernet increase the numbers engaging in political activity and will it enrich or reduce the quality of that participation?
Communication within political organisations: Finally, the use of the internet within institutions and organisations is analysed. Where is the Internet most likely to effect change? Is it most suited to more passive and conventional types of participation such as voting, political discussion, and information gathering, or does it advance more direct and active particiaption in terms of moving nascent organisations into more fully fledged format?

The planned project conributes to the research at the MZES in various ways: by systematically comparing five European countries it stands in the tradition of compararative empirical research at the MZES. With its focus on the analysis of political participation it touches one main reseearch area of the Arbeitsbereich B and connects to ongoing research. Finally, it strenghtens the reserach of political parties and party organizations at the Mannheimer Zentrum.

A proposal for this project has been submitted to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Heisenberg-Stipendium).


	Fourth Research Programm 1999 - 2002
	Mobilisation, Participation and Organisation via new Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) Director/Researcher: Andrea Römmele Duration: 3 years Modern democracies are representative democracies. Therefore, communication between leaders and led is a central pre-condition for the democratic process. In modern mass democracies, political parties connect government and the people, i.e. communication is channeled by and through political parties. The internet is a new revolutionary form of communication allowing political actors and citizens a new form of dialogue. The internet and its possible implications for the democractic process is currently a popular research topic in communication sciences, research aspects from a socio-political angle have rarely been touched upon so far (Gellner/von Korff 1998; Gibson/Ward 1999, 2000; Kamps 1999; Norris 1999, 2000). The project "Mobilisation, Participation and Organisation via new ICTs" explicitly connects to the existing studies but takes an international comparative angle. With researchers from four other European institutions (England, the Netherlands, Italy, and Sweden) the question is pursued which relevance the internet has for political parties in connecting leaders and led. How far can new ICTs widen and deepen democratic participation? Where is the Internet most likely to effect change? Do country-specific contexts make a difference? These are the key research questions the project aims at finding answers to. This threefold research question divides the project into the following steps: information of citizens: Whereas political actors can only partially control the message being transmitted via the mass media, the internet allows for full controll over the message being sent out. It also allows for targeted information. The research question to be tackeld with in this first part of the project is: What do parties offer via the internet and how congruent is their message compared to the party program? What do parties offer via the internet and how congruent are these messages to the party platform? participation of citizens: New ICTs allow citizens to participate (chat rooms, e-mails to representatives etc.). How far can new ICTs widen and deepen democratic participation? Can the Inernet increase the numbers engaging in political activity and will it enrich or reduce the quality of that participation? Communication within political organisations: Finally, the use of the internet within institutions and organisations is analysed. Where is the Internet most likely to effect change? Is it most suited to more passive and conventional types of participation such as voting, political discussion, and information gathering, or does it advance more direct and active particiaption in terms of moving nascent organisations into more fully fledged format? The planned project conributes to the research at the MZES in various ways: by systematically comparing five European countries it stands in the tradition of compararative empirical research at the MZES. With its focus on the analysis of political participation it touches one main reseearch area of the Arbeitsbereich B and connects to ongoing research. Finally, it strenghtens the reserach of political parties and party organizations at the Mannheimer Zentrum. A proposal for this project has been submitted to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Heisenberg-Stipendium).

Fourth Research Programm 1999 - 2002

Mobilisation, Participation and Organisation via new Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs)