IAMCR OCS, IAMCR 2011 - Istanbul

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Not only voting: online involvement of citizens in politics in Poland
Anna Przybylska

Last modified: 2011-03-23

Abstract


Over twenty years ago the decentralization reform in Poland gave the beginning to multiple political scenes. The local communication channels, mostly press, had its part in their establishment and development. Over ten years ago, when the first decade of democracy was being summarized, the municipalities were establishing their presence in the Internet. At first, to have a website was often just a matter of prestige, and authorities that were reluctant to use the Internet, were urged by the members of local communities to increase the visibility of the locale in the world wide web (Przybylska 2010). Slowly, the functionality of local official websites developed and the internet tools became more diversified. In our study we intend to examine how the Internet has been used by local governments to communicate with inhabitants, in the context of democratization process. The evidence from our previous research shows that in some municipalities insufficient managerial skills regarding communication on the side of authorities and the adversarial attitudes towards government on the side of citizens may lead to withdrawal from experimental use of new communication platforms. These challenges as well as opportunities will be discussed in reference to the new and broader quantitative and qualitative data. The attention will be given not only to the scale, but also to the quality of proposed modes of public involvement in politics that the local official websites are to facilitate (online consultations). The analysis will be based on the results of the online poll (N=450) and online group debates (N=60) with the representatives of local government in Poland.