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There is a Facebook group for that: Analyzing online participation for Ontario policy-making
Last modified: 2011-06-17
Abstract
In the early 1990s, governments promised to provide opportunities for online deliberation and consultation within eDemocracy programs in Canada and elsewhere. Currently in the province of Ontario, traces of government-initiated interfaces for participation in policy-making exist online. For example, the online version of the Ontario Hansard contains records of legislative committee meetings. Still, government-initiated participation remains less robust than initially imagined. What is notable however, is that citizens are taking a do-it-yourself approach to augment the policy participation opportunities created by government. Numerous web-based artefacts of participation are found on corporate and community run platforms.
This paper shares initial results from my analysis of web-based artefacts for citizen participation in Ontario policy-making. To carry out this work, I commenced by searching the Ontario Hansard records from 2007-2010 and located 20 bills pertaining to issues such as access to information, transparency of government, identity, and bills that received media coverage for participation breakdowns. After the bills were located, I conducted systematic web searches for government and citizen initiated participation web sites relevant to the bills. Governmental records of participation of participation in the policy areas, mainly consisted of Hansard records of public hearings. Citizen created interfaces for participation included Facebook groups, YouTube videos, discussion threads in forums and blog posts. Using a coding schema built upon previous work, I analyzed the participation artefacts. Subsequently, I am carrying out semi-structured interviews with the facilitators and makers of the participation infrastructures (i.e., bloggers, Facebook group administrators, etc.). The interviews explore themes such as motivations, challenges, design intentions, and political engagement. My interviews are using screen capture technology where possible to allow participants to reflect on the technologies they have engaged with and to tell their stories of political participation which pertain to particular Ontario bills. Preliminary findings are revealing interesting insights about how citizens participate in enacting themes such as ‘openness’ in Ontario politics.
This paper shares initial results from my analysis of web-based artefacts for citizen participation in Ontario policy-making. To carry out this work, I commenced by searching the Ontario Hansard records from 2007-2010 and located 20 bills pertaining to issues such as access to information, transparency of government, identity, and bills that received media coverage for participation breakdowns. After the bills were located, I conducted systematic web searches for government and citizen initiated participation web sites relevant to the bills. Governmental records of participation of participation in the policy areas, mainly consisted of Hansard records of public hearings. Citizen created interfaces for participation included Facebook groups, YouTube videos, discussion threads in forums and blog posts. Using a coding schema built upon previous work, I analyzed the participation artefacts. Subsequently, I am carrying out semi-structured interviews with the facilitators and makers of the participation infrastructures (i.e., bloggers, Facebook group administrators, etc.). The interviews explore themes such as motivations, challenges, design intentions, and political engagement. My interviews are using screen capture technology where possible to allow participants to reflect on the technologies they have engaged with and to tell their stories of political participation which pertain to particular Ontario bills. Preliminary findings are revealing interesting insights about how citizens participate in enacting themes such as ‘openness’ in Ontario politics.