ABSTRACT
I. Introduction............................................................................................................ 256 II. Information, communication, and participation ................................................... 257
A. Information Acquisition.................................................................................. 258 B. Political Communication ................................................................................ 262 C. Citizen Participation........................................................................................ 265
III. Components of an electronic democracy ............................................................. 269 A. Network Functionality .................................................................................... 269 B. Fair and Equitable Access............................................................................... 271 C. The Spirit of Community ................................................................................ 273 D. Closeness vs. Deliberativeness ...................................................................... 275
IV. Conclusion.............................................................................................................. 276 References........................................................................................................................ 278
The use of computer networking technology by government has increased dramatically in the last few years. What we originally saw as promising experiments just a few years ago have now become institutionalized. Larger numbers of Americans are going online to access government information, register their views with government, share political information and opinions with other citizens, and so forth. One major question continues to nag much of the analysis of online political participation — will computer networking bring increased democracy to the U.S.? This chapter examines this question by citing the computer networking experience of
various levels of government in the U.S., the work of various nongovernmental organizations, and the theoretical formulations of various analysts and researchers. The chapter concludes on a promising note — while computer networking has not remade American democracy, the growing presence of computer networking in government is having some influence in several different areas of government involvement.
