Limitation of digital technologies in direct democracy
Before discussing whether digital technologies have changed the democratic process, understanding the definition of e-democracy could be beneficial for the discussion. According to Hansard Society (2003), e-democracy refers to the new information and communication technology in which citizens are able to connect to each other resulting in broadening political participation. This blog hence would focus more on the limitations of the internet in direct democracy.
Although the internet is available for most citizens, some arguments have been raised in terms of e-democracy. In my opinion, the most important question for the arguments is that how do we know people prefer to use the internet to participate in the democratic process? Is that people’s wills or governments’ wills to reduce the cost? Milner (2006, as cited in Farrell, 2012) also explains that democracies widen internet access but the internet does not broaden democracy. It hence appears that digital technologies might not even be attractive enough for some users to be involved in e-democracy. This is the initial problem which undermines the e-democracy.
However, the internet does enable some of the internet users to participate in politics because it is accessible and available anytime and anywhere. Therefore, people do not need to come to the community forums (Face-to-face meetings — F2F) anymore. Chadwick (2006) also mentions that social media, which include email and other video call channels, has contributed to enhancing participation across the existing communities in which distance is not an obstacle anymore. This author continues that after then, the United States (U.S) government has used the online platform to get the inputs from citizens for the decision makings. This example shows that digital technologies do lead to a new form of direct democracy in which physically public spaces are not primary for community forums anymore while online spaces are promoted.
Having said that, online might be invisible of the participants’ identities which gender unbalance might not be easily spotted by users/governments. This can lead to less liberal e-democracy because some groups might have a dominant voice to influence decision makings. Likewise, Hindman (2010, as cited in Farrell, 2012) says that white men who have a good degree of education have been successful in political blogs. Furthermore, other also claim that digital technologies are not accessible for some groups including people living in rural areas, elderly people and those who cannot afford the prices of internet and electronic devices, especially in developing countries.
In addition to unequal access to digital technologies, Farrell (2012) and Chadwick (2006) explains that the internet also leaves the footprint of political discussions to which business sectors, who develop social media and internet, could interfere or trace the conversations. From my perspective, digital technologies are not only involved with the social media companies but also other software which has been installed in users’ devices. Let’s take the U.S government as an example, in 2017, Kaspersky, which is an antivirus software used by the U.S government, was found that this company tracked data of all users. Because this company is in Russia, under Russia’s cyber law, the Russia government can check all data of Kaspersky which means the Russia government can also check the U.S government information from Kaspersky software. This recently led to the ban of using Kaspersky in the U.S government. The inference from private companies into democracy has also found in the process of voting in the U.S.
What is more important is community involvement in democracy. By comparing the online community and the existing community, the existing community have more opportunities to build genuine relationships and support to be involved and influential in the process of democracy. Online has found to have its boundaries and homogeneity of political discussions. Some authors (as cited in Chadwick, 2006) mention that online has been built and controlled by business sectors in which it has negative impacts including recreating the nature of the community, and boundaries to participate in politics. This argument deliberately discusses online community, who relies on the designed features of social media, and its community forums which have limitations.
To sum up, although digital technologies have positive effects on direct democracy, the boundaries of technologies should have been taken into account including public’s interest in using the online platform, unequal access for some groups of populations, security, and limitations of online features. Still, these points appear to be complicated issues in which private sectors have a prominent role. Also, technology is changing rapidly that requires decision makers to critically predict the future issues emerged from the technology itself. In my opinion, the future trend is inevitable that digital democracy (e-democracy) will be promoted by governments and used by citizens. Therefore, it is worthwhile to learn from the current issues and pay attention to the possible challenges of future digital technologies.
References
Chadwick, A. (2006). Community, Deliberation, and Participation: E-democracy. In Internet politics: States, citizens, and new communication technologies. (pp. 83–113): Oxford University Press, USA.
Farrell, H. (2012). The Consequences of the Internet for Politics. Annual Review of Political Science, 15(1), 35–52. doi:10.1146/annurev-polisci-030810–110815
