Non-Technical Aspects of Citizens Engagement in e-Government

1. Non-Technical Aspectsof Citizens Engagementin e-Government

2. Government • A government is required to find solutions to problems of a certain community • Classical notion of a “community” is related witha territory • A territorialcommunity shares some common values, however, it is not homogeneous in all the aspects • A community is a result of communication • Smaller territory, easier, more frequent and richer(multi-aspect) interpersonal communication • More frequent communication, stronger relationships

3. Internet Internet changed the communication,so changed communities too • Features of Internet communication: • everybody may publish his/her own information, including comments to information published by others • information is available everywhere • information is available forever – asynchronous communication • information may be individually searched • information leads to people interested in this information Internet facilitates creation of „content communities”

4. Communities Territorial communities Content communities Communities being a consequence of the interest in common content Communities beinga consequence of living together on a common territory Those consequences are not the same

5. Relationships Territorial communities Content communities • multi-aspect relationships • transitivity • identity • known past • emerging authorities • following leader’s views(knowledge or trust) • hierarchical structure • difficulty in leaving a territory • common interest and common threats (long-term) • aiming at compromise • view unification • single aspect relationships • non-transitivity • anonymity • hidden past • everyone is authority for himself • manifestation of distinctness • equality • easy leaving a community • common interests (short-term) • keeping own opinions • keeping view diversity

6. Contentcommunities • The content communities on the Internet allow their members to learn about a variety of views and opinions from different perspectives • Content communities serve rather to exhibit people’s own opinions acquired elsewhere than to accept opinions of others or to unify opinions • Anonymity of the content community members leads to the lack of responsibility for one’s words • unlimited possibility of changing opinions and positions, • a possibility to present contradictory opinions by the same person using different nicknames • Single-aspect relationships conduct to the radicalization of opinions on a given subject • unconsidered contexts • unconsidered multiple aspects of a problem • Lack of social pressure • no drivers to achieve a consensus • Lack of the hierarchy • a word of a fool equal to a word of a sage

7. Citizen’s engagement • Citizen’s engagement is required to: • Elect a government • Guide the government how to solve problems • During government election • content communities (which are single-aspect) aim at convincing many voters • each voter decides on behalf of him/herself • the result of many votes is a single government • During guiding the government how to solvea problem • content communities (which are single-aspect) aim at convincing a single government • the result of government decision influence the whole territorial community only partially represented by content communities

8. Conclusions When talking about citizen’s engagement via Internet, it is necessary to take into account characteristics of content communities • content communities does not represent the whole territorial community • content communities easier represent negative opinions than the positive ones

9. Conclusions Content communities may provide a government with a variety of partial views, but cannot exempt a government from a harmonized solution for the benefit of the whole territorial community

10. Thank you Wojciech Cellary