Bowling Together
Online Public Engagement
in Policy Deliberation
> About the report
> Introduction
> Representation, Engagement and Democracy
> Two-Way Governance
Connected Citizenship
> Appropriate Technologies For Online Engagement
> Global Case Studies
> References
> PDF (2.5MB!)
Chapter Three
Connected Citizenship
It is not just governance that has to change if democracy is to be re-shaped. Just as the old model of democracy has depended upon a weak conception of representation, so it has assumed a worryingly high degree of indifference and lethargy on the part of the represented. A Lippmannesque caricature of the public has prevailed for too long. We tend to regard disengaged citizens as deserving whatever they get in return for their apathy and engaged citizens as busybodies who want too much. Digital technologies alone will not produce a change in these attitudes; but they can be used as tools to facilitate a more involving, inclusive and porous democratic culture.
In this chapter we first present some new research about what the public wants from e-democracy. Two polls, conducted separately in the UK and Denmark, sought to discover what kinds of online democratic engagement internet users actually want. Following on from these findings, we consider the necessary skills and strategies required by citizens if they are to engage constructively in online policy deliberation.
What citizens want
Despite the historic lack of public involvement in policy-making, and the reservations of many citizens who have been consultees, there is a surprising interest on the part of citizens in exploiting the democratic opportunities for online policy engagement. For example, a MORI poll, conducted in August 2001 asked 1,921 UK adults aged over 18 which new e-services they would most like their MPs to offer them. Over one in five selected 'a consultation forum where he/she can read constituents' views'; the third favourite choice after online surgeries (39%) and active e-mail addresses (32%.) When asked which online services they would most like to see within the next five years, almost one in five (18%) opted for 'public spaces being created on the web where people can debate policy issues.' An October 2001 Danish telephone poll found that while 94% of Danish internet users had never availed themselves of the opportunity to discuss issues with politicians online, 36% would like within the next year to 'participate in online hearings about Bills' and 31% would like to enter into online discussions with politicians.
To analyse these public responses in greater depth, we drew up a series of 20 questions for a 5,883 panel of frequent internet users. Amongst these frequent users (of whom 95% have home internet access and 86% log on at least once a day), 23% had taken part in an online consultation and 73% stated that they would like to take part. 89% favoured the creation of an independent space on the internet where citizens could debate policy issues and 79% thought that the government should be promoting e-democracy.
When offered a range of options for online services and asked to select their preferred two, online policy consultations proved to be the most popular (see diagram 1).
Again, when invited to select from a range of policy goals for government, more respondents opted for online policy consultation as one of their two preferences than for any other option (see diagram 2):
These findings reflect the views of internet-connected citizens - 'netizens' - who are not representative of the wider population. But, as majority and near-universal access to the internet approaches - as has happened with telephone and television penetration - these views are indicative of more than a minority enthusiasm.
What citizens need to know
If citizens are to be brought into the policy-making process, it is important that they know what their rights are. What kind of information does government want from them? How much of what they say can they expect to be used by decision-makers? How much genuine interaction can they expect to have with politicians? In what form, and within what timeframe, can they expect a response to their deliberations? How will the consultation engagement be evaluated, and by whom?
Useful codes of consultation practice have been drawn up by the Australian Capital Territory Government and the UK Government. The Canadian Government is in the process of producing guidelines specifically for online consultations. There is a need for robust, transparent standards in public engagement, which leave citizens in no doubt about their rights and reasonable expectations.
Central to the question of how to define online rights is the need to be clear about what it means to be a citizen. Morrison and Newman are right to observe that: 'there seems to have been very little discussion about how the whole project of connecting citizens with government might and should differ from linking consumers with commercial opportunities.' (Morrison and Newman) Citizens must possess constitutionally rooted rights which are qualitatively different from, if not stronger than, their rights as purchasers in the market. Previous experiments in participatory democracy have often failed because of the absence of connection to such constitutionally embedded rights.
As best practices become clearer, so will formal standards and public expectations. It is important, though, that the process does not become trapped in a culture of entitlements, as if citizens were merely consumers and policy engagement merely a playing out of contractual obligations. Just as we have argued that e-democracy requires institutions of representative governance to adapt, it is also the case that new models of responsible citizenship must be developed, so that citizens can enter into policy deliberation as mature and equal partners in the democratic process.
In the past, citizens could hope at best to be 'listened to' and at worst ignored - except perhaps at election time. Strengthening representation through a process of ongoing, digital discussion and consultation is not about simply giving citizens a better hearing - although that in itself would be a good start. It is about giving citizens ownership of their representation. It is about citizens as shareholders in power rather than consumers of policy. It is also about the responsibilities and obligations of being a democratic citizen within a networked society. We do not envisage a quasi-utopian citizenry that is constantly engaged in decision-making, as would be required by a direct, plebiscitary democracy - but citizens who have learned to use the democratic muscles which have atrophied during long years of exclusion from the deliberative process.
If citizens are to enter the policy debate as informers of their elected legislators, they must enter as informed informers. Just as one-way governance has over-emphasised the need to inform - and sometimes misinform - the public at the expense of letting them communicate, the new, more engaged and interactive age should not celebrate communication to the exclusion of information. Deliberation calls for a plentiful supply of high-quality, balanced and challengeable information sources so that citizens do not come to policy discussions with little more than their own experiences or those of others who agree with them. Sunstein has written persuasively about the danger of the internet creating a fragmented and ghettoised information environment where citizens only connect with self-selected sources of information that confirm their own prejudices.
The digital citizen will need to possess skills that citizens and subjects of previous generations did not have to think about - including those of media literacy. In the past, many of those who were educated to higher levels were taught logical and rhetorical skills. This was an invaluable aid to the production of structured argumentation based upon compelling evidence. Digital citizens need to develop a new rhetoric of participatory discourse. This will entail the development of agreed protocols of public deliberation. Freedom to have your say is all very well, but not if everyone else is speaking at the same time, so democratic discussion must be rule-based.
New languages of politics will have to be admitted into the representative arena, including those based on experience and storytelling as well as analysis and ideological polemicising. There can be no room for the downgrading of vernacular or emotive expression if we are really to take seriously the authentic testimonies of diverse experience as part of the policy process. Some critics of deliberative democracy (or, at least, of its more philosophically lofty proponents) have argued that deliberation could be seen as a constraining mechanism, designed to rein in forms of subjective, expressive and affective advocacy and thereby exclude those social strata less in tune with white, male, middle-class discursive traditions. (Young) Unless deliberation is interpreted in an inclusive sense, there will be a danger of governments seeking the views of the public only as long as the public speaks its particular language.
Conclusions
- Many citizens do not feel that their views or experiences are taken into account by policy-makers and would like to participate in policy deliberation.
- Citizens' participation should be guaranteed by clear standards, setting out their rights and reasonable expectations, but also calls for participating citizens to acquire deliberative skills and accept civic responsibilities.
- Online policy deliberation must embrace the language of the people and not expect citizens to adopt the jargon of government. Political discourse needs to be humanised and made user-friendly.
Bowling Together: Online Public Engagement in Policy Deliberation by Stephen Coleman & John Gøtze
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