e-democracy: in search of tools and methods for effective participation

JOURNAL OF MULTI-CRITERIA DECISION ANALYSIS

J. Multi-Crit. Decis. Anal. 12: 93–100 (2003)

Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/mcda.349

e-Democracy: in Search of Tools and Methods for E¡ectiveParticipation

(AAKEGROº NLUND*.OOrebro University, Informatics/ESI,70182 .OOrebro, Sweden

ABSTRACT

The field of e-democracy has approached the problem of improving democratic decision making by emphasizingencouraging broad participation. This is due to a perceived lack of credibility on part of politicians, indicated bydecline in both turnout in elections and recruitment to political parties. Experiences so far show that while in localcontexts use of electronic tools in combination with redesigned democratic processes have indeed affectedparticipation positively, both scaling and quality requires more sophisticated technical tools of at least two kinds.One kind, recognized by the e-democracy community, are tools supporting cooperative work for facilitatingcommunication among humans. Another kind, this paper argues, is tools for more formal problem modelling. The e-democracy field has so far almost exclusively been concerned with encouraging and}at best}modelling,moderating, and reviewing discussions. Experiences from e.g. citizen juries point to the importance of expertparticipation. Decision Support Systems could provide}mediated}expert participation in virtual groups and incommunication with the public. To achieve this, there is a need to carefully consider both the usability of DecisionSupport Systems and their role in the overall democratic system. Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

KEY WORDS: e-democracy; decision support systems; participation

1. INTRODUCTION

e-Democracy is here defined as ‘use of IT indemocratic processes’. This is a broad definitionchosen to say that use of IT does not imply anyspecific form of democracy. There is no generallyagreed definition, and often the concept is usedundefined. Definitions in the literature range frombroad ones like this to very specific ones, implyinga direct link to some specific form of democracy,usually direct democracy.

Discussions on e-democracy have until recentlylargely been utopian. Over the past few years,however, mass enrolment to Internet use has led tocredibility of real-world trials. There are two basicdrivers. One is the technical development itselfencouraging exploration of new use fields. Theother is a democratic problem in search of asolution, namely lack of public support of thepolitical system, manifested in declining turnout inelections. A couple of years ago, many politiciansand Information and Communication Technolo-

gies (ICT) enthusiasts saw electronic voting as aremedy: the problem was perceived as the troubleof getting to the polling station, and voting fromthe home would overcome that. Experiences so farsay that while popular, e-voting does not increaseturnout, it merely replaces other means of voting(Electoral Commission, 2003; Ohlin and H.aallgren,2002). A method currently considered morepromising is ‘consultations’, where tools for e-discussion, petitioning, surveying and e-voting areused, separately or in combination, for variousdesigns of deliberation on some political issue,usually in a local context. While there are positiveexamples, and not many failures reported, con-sultations are quite rare and there is no generaltrend towards more or better use of IT for thepurpose of enhancing democratic processes. Con-sultation is a method requiring both commitmentand more efficient IT tools than currently com-monly used.

It appears a step change has to be made to makee-democracy fly. This paper reviews findings thatsuggest that for this to happen, there are two mainfactors that have to be dealt with. First, demo-cratic processes have to be more consciouslydesigned to allow for increased and improvedparticipation. Second, more advanced IT tools

Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

*Correspondence to: .OOrebro University, Informatics/ESI, 701 82 .OOrebro, Sweden. E-mail: [email protected]

have to be employed to support the participation.These two factors are interrelated, one cannotcome without the other. The crux for furtherdevelopment is to make the two go hand in hand.Decision support systems, DSS, are a goodcandidate tool to be used, but there is a need tofind a place for them in democratic processes tomotivate the cost. So far DSS are used mostlywithin the bureaucracy, in an engineering manner.This is in contrast to the political sphere of e-democracy, where campaign sites are most popu-lar. It appears problematic to make the worldsmeet. This paper suggests improvements in userinteraction, perhaps in the form of games includ-ing software agents, to increase accessibility of thesystems. But even if this would make systemsbetter, there is still a question as to how tointegrate them in policy-making processes. Who,for instance, would be the host of such systems. e-Democracy experiences point to campaign sitesbeing more favoured by politicians than sitesproviding comparative information.

The article is organized as follows.

* First central concepts are reviewed: participa-tion, different models of democracy, and ageneral government decision-making process.

* Then e-democracy trials are reviewed: what hasbeen done, what is missing given the conceptsdiscussed above?

* Finally the article discusses what would beneeded to take e-democracy further, what roleDSS might play, and what it would take tomake them play such a role.

2. PARTICIPATION

The concept of participation is central to e-democracy. This is natural as the democraticdeficit motivating government to seek remedy inIT use stems from lack of public participation.Participation is, however, not unproblematic in thedemocratic literature. The role of the elite and thepublic, and the role of politicians and adminis-trators respectively, are topics discussed exten-sively (Pateman, 1970; Sartori, 1987). I will not gointo that literature here, only note that there are atleast three kinds of participation discussed in thefield of e-democracy:

1. The general public is the most frequent andsalient target group. Many projects involve

finding ways to include individual citizens ininteraction with the political system by infor-mation, questionnaires, discussions and refer-endums.

2. Among politicians: Politicians are a breed withcommunication problems. Many, especiallylocally, are only involved in politics part timeand hence the lack of time for cooperation is anissue. At the national level, communication is abig issue, including parliament work, partywork, constituency contacts, etc. They typicallytravel a lot and often encounter a need to be attwo places at the same time. In both cases,online availability of various kinds, includingparticipation in virtual meetings, is increasinglyseen as a complement to the physical meetings,and software is being designed to support this.

3. Politicians–administrators: One of the problemsin democracy is that politicians increasinglyhave difficulty keeping pace with the adminis-tration in understanding the problems they areto decide about (Snellen, 1995). Not only aremany local politicians non-professionals work-ing part time with politics. Also the professionalpoliticians find that there is an increasingamount of technical detail which requiresconsiderable expertize to understand and timeto investigate. Technical solutions suggestedinclude better case information by means ofcomputer support of various kinds. One kindincludes DSS-like systems providing politicianswith the opportunity to view problems fromdifferent angles, make simulations etc.(Holmstr .oom, 2000). Another kind includescommunication technology to make surethat at least documents are available to thepoliticians.

These three contexts for participation are quitedifferent, and hence both technologies and meth-ods to support them should be expected to bedifferent. At least it is not obvious that systemsused in one context can readily be transferred toanother (Lenk et al., 2002). Most DSS applicationsare designed for context 3, while most e-democ-racy trials focus on context 1. Context 1 differsfrom context 3 not only in terms of the number ofpeople involved. Also there is theoretical disagree-ment on just how the general public should beinvolved. There are many different models of

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Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. J. Multi-Crit. Decis. Anal. 12: 93–100 (2003)

democracy, and they have different views onparticipation. Let us now briefly overview these.

2.1. Democracy modelsThere are many models of democracy, and we donot need to go through all of them to see bigdifferences. Table I summarizes in three generalcategories different views on public participationand on how IT should be used. The categories arenot each equivalent to one specific model, they aregeneral categories into which specific models canbe characterized. In each of the categories thereare several models proposed. Much of the e-democracy trials are based on the ‘strong’ model,focusing on using IT for discussion. Within the e-government field, on the contrary, the rationale ismost often the ‘thin’ model where the focus is onusing IT to inform the public. The ‘quick’ model,finally, draws on opinion polls to sense the ‘publicopinion’ and base decisions on those measure-ments. Direct democracy is a rough synonym.

Depending on what model of democracy oneprefers, the roles of different actors come outdifferently at different stages in the overalldecision-making process. Let us now brieflyconsider this.

2.2. The (government) democratic decision-makingprocessDemocratic decision making can generally beillustrated by a policy making cycle model usedby both the OECD and the UK Cabinet Officewhich includes five main stages (OECD, 2003):

1. Agenda setting: establishing the need for apolicy or a change in policy and defining whatthe problem to be addressed is.

2. Analysis: defining the challenges and opportu-nities associated with an agenda item moreclearly in order to produce a draft policydocument. This can include: gathering evidenceand knowledge from a range of sources; under-

standing the context, including the politicalcontext for the agenda item; developing a rangeof options (including doing nothing).

3. Creating the policy: ensuring a good workablepolicy document. This involves a variety ofmechanisms which can include: formal consul-tation, risk analysis, undertaking pilot studies,and designing the implementation plan.

4. Implementing the policy: this can involve thedevelopment of legislation, regulation, gui-dance, and a delivery plan.

5. Monitoring the policy: this can involve evalua-tion and review of the policy in action, researchevidence and views of users.

This is recognized to be a cyclic process in whichagenda setting in each round is based on theoutcome of earlier rounds.

The different democracy models point to differ-ent roles for public participation, and, as aconsequence, different roles for DSS.

As for the role of public participation, in thestrong model, the public should be engaged at allstages. Often e-democracy proponents find reasonto engage the public in various ways at all of thestages. In the thin model, on the contrary, thepublic is typically consulted only at the ‘policycreation’ and ‘monitoring’ stages. The agendasetting is a matter for politicians, the (technical)analysis by experts in the administration. At thepolicy creation stage, the public may or may not beconsulted for endorsement, occasionally choice,e.g. by a referendum. Usually at this stage plansare simply made public and left to the press toscrutinize. Sometimes there are rules for a formalfeedback process to be arranged. The implementa-tion stage is a matter for the administration.Individual citizens will be involved, but only tothe extent they will have to be dealt with to makeimplementation proceed}some people may haveto be relocated, some compensated for some lossin life quality, e.g. a noisier environment, etc. At

Table I. Dimensions of democracy ( (AAstr .oom 1999, author’s translation)

Quick democracy Strong democracy Thin democracy

Goal Sovereignty of the people Autonomy Individual freedom

Base for legitimacy Majority decision Public debate Accountability

Citizen role Decision maker Opinion former Voter

Representatives’ mandate Bound Interactive Open

Focus of IT use Decision Discussion Information

E-DEMOCRACY: TOOLS AND METHODS FOR EFFECTIVE PARTICIPATION 95


the monitoring stage, finally, the public may ormay not be consulted by for instance polls: ‘whatdo you think of the quality of the public schools?’

In the thin model, the place of a DSS is typicallyat the analysis stage, and hence it is a tool for theadministration. There may, however, also be a rolefor it in interaction with the public. In the thinmodel, the role in interaction with the public is as apedagogical tool, to inform and explain why acertain decision was made. Some expert or groupof experts use the actual system and come out witha ‘best’ solution. This solution is presented andrationalized using the models, criteria, and pre-ferences used to come up with that solution. Thiswould happen during the policy creation stage.

In the strong model, on the contrary, the role ofDSS would rather be as an interactive tool tofacilitate public discussion. The system would beused publicly, people would be invited to alterweights and explore the effects of differentpreferences. This would start at least at theanalysis stage. Under this model, use accordingthe thin model would be seen as improper powerbalance}the powerful tools should not be in thehands of only one group, as this would unfairlygive rhetoric power to that group of people.

3. e-DEMOCRACY

e-Democracy has so far mostly taken the ‘strong’model to heart. Deliberation, engagement andparticipation are keywords. The tools and meth-ods used so far largely reflect that starting point.

e-Democracy IT tools are so far mainly quitesimple mainstream systems. Web sites are used for(static) information. E-mail is used for commentsand questions related to that information. Some-times there are email ‘lists’ used for discussion.Research suggests that such occur in about10–15% of cities (Ranerup, 1999; Aurigi, 2000;Musso et al., 1999). But only a fraction of these areactually used. Electronic questionnaires for pollsare increasingly popular, but often used in an adhoc manner, not methodologically correct andwith only loose connection to the policy-makingprocess.

More advanced tools, and more sophisticateduses, are still rare. There are several CSCW toolsfor goal-oriented virtual meetings (e.g. similar to‘citizen juries’), but use is only experimental. Thereare tools for e-petitioning (Macintosh, 2002), butuse is so far experimental. Voting/referendum

technology has been tried in several elections andreferendums at local government level and inorganizations such as unions, but after an upsurgein the wake of the disastrous US 2000 electioninterest has decreased as research has shown thate-voting does not increase turnout.

Under the strong democratic model, these toolscan be applied to arrange consultations with thepublic or representative samples thereof, at thevarious policy making stages as Figure 1 suggests:

There are successful examples of applications ofconsultations at least at agenda setting and policycreation stages. But the trade is new, consultationdesign is not mature and in lack of industrystandards. Currently, best practice e-consultationdesigns look something like this:

1. Information about a proposed policy or an issueat stake is put on the web info.

2. There is discussion in some electronic forum:Most often this discussion is open}there is noagenda and voluntary participation. Sometimesdiscussions are guided (there is an agenda),sometimes moderated (there is order).

3. Discussions may start or end with a questionnaire.4. Occasionally there is a formal poll or a vote to

more directly advise decision makers.

These procedures are used together or separately.Sometimes a lot of effort is put into co-ordinatingthem and aligning them to the policy-makingprocess, sometimes they are used more ad hoc(Gr .oonlund, 2001). In the former case, there istypically an integrated parallel ‘manual’ process so

agenda setting

Policy creationimplementation

analysismonitoring

Organisational memory for governance

E-referendaE-petitioningE-votingE-surveys

Evidence-managed facilitiesE-citizen juriesE-consultation

E-consultationE-citizen juriesE-referenda

E-referendaE-petitioningE-votingE-surveys

E-consultationE-citizen juries

Figure 1. Suggestions for e-tool use over the policy-making cycle (Macintosh, 2003).

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as to not exclude people who are not online(Figure 1).

Looking at the relatively few evaluations thathave been conducted (Macintosh, 2003; Macin-tosh, 2002; Wilhelm, 2000; Ranerup, 1999;.OOhrvall, 2002; Gr .oonlund, 2001), it appears thereare limits to current procedures:

* Web information is static and represents onlyone view, alternatively a user has to visit multiple(campaign type) sites and digest information thatis not using a common format and hence is veryhard to compare. Hence, problem modelling isconfusing, at best, on part of the user.

* Goal-oriented discussions are hard to pursue.Electronic discussions are unstructured, hard toscale, hard to monitor and analyse, and hard tomake use of in a credible way. These are likelyreasons why they are typically found to beshallow (Wilhelm, 2000; .OOhrvall, 2002). Nota-bly, the issue of representativity is a problem,but also summarizing and aggregating discus-sions is hard to support technically as well asprocedurally.

* e-voting is straightforward in terms of use, buthas security problems and has not proven to beattractive to politicians as it does not increaseturnout (Ohlin and H.aallgren, 2002).

* e-democracy makes costs rise in the short run.Return on investment does not come in money(CIVTF, 2000).

* The role of participation is unclear from aperspective of democracy theory.

These problems have been observed, and some ofthem have been addressed on rare occasions.There are several methods proposed to arrangegoal-oriented discussions, including:

* Using the Delphi method for arriving atconsensus through a cycle of (e-) discussionsand polls (Gr .oonlund, 2001).

* Citizen juries, where a group of citizensrepresenting the general public in a similarway of a jury in a crime court, gather with fieldexperts to analyse a problem thoroughly(Becker and Slaton, 2000).

* CSCW tools with integrated control facilities(Gr .oonlund, 2001. One example can be found athttp://www.bodieselectric.com).

These methods have been tried, but employingthem means that cost and effort rapidly increase,while the result is still not representative and hencehard to relate to the representative democraticsystem. Where does responsibility rest, for in-stance, if a citizen jury outcome is implemented?

Representativity. Most e-democracy trials sufferfrom a lack of definition of representativity. Self-selection to discussion groups and questionnairesis common, although some models do indeed use(different) representation measures (e.g. citizenjuries: Becker and Slaton, 2000; Gr .oonlund, 2001).

One main reason CSCW tools are not muchused appears to be their relative complexity. Theyrequire some learning on part of the user and areoften seen as prohibiting participation by introdu-cing a technical threshold in addition to thetraditional ones (lack of interest, complicatedissues, language skills, etc.). Another reason isthat recruitment to group discussions aiming atmaking decisions, such as citizen jury, the Delphimethod, etc., is not straightforward. Not only dothese methods require a considerable amount ofwork, also the responsibility of the group doingthe work may be unclear.

Some of the problems in the above list have notso far been addressed at all within the e-democracydebate:

* Formal problem modelling.* Modelling consequences of applying certain

preferences.

Point one could be one tool helping structuringdiscussions. Point two could be a tool fordiscussion responsibilities. As both points are thecompetitive advantage of DSS we shall return tothem in the conclusions.

4. CONCLUSIONS

This article has pointed to some shortcomings incurrent state of the art e-democracy. Let usconclude with a brief discussion on how to makea contribution to overcome at least some of thecurrent problems.

To summarize, what is lacking, given thepurpose to make e-democracy a tool for improvingdemocratic decision making, is the following:

1. There is a need for technical tools to assistparticipation in democratic processes. As (lack



of) mass participation is at the top of theagenda, the e-democracy debate has focused onencouraging general public participation. Thisis so far attempted by using simple butcommonly adopted technical tools, as complextools are seen prohibitive. However, the simpletools used do not suffice to scale and focusdiscussions, and hence these are often not usefulfor decision making.

2. Formal problem modelling is not part of the e-democracy agenda, expression is}deliberationis seen psychological and social rather than‘technical’.

3. There is no obvious organiser for unbiased e-democracy processes. Politicians tend to prefertheir own campaign sites to those providingcomparative information (Dutton et al., 2001).

4. As an aside in this discussion, however im-portant, there is a lack of an economicdriver}nobody sees e-democracy as somethingthat can make an economic gain in some way. Itis only seen as something that}maybe}canmake the public more interested in politics.However important that may be, investmentsare hard to motivate without some clear returnin sight.

e-Democracy can be no better than the politicalprocesses they are used within. As discussed above,the role of participation in representative democ-racy is unclear and controversial. Hence, efforts tosupport participation by electronic tools must beboth technically sound and politically neutral, soas not to be seen as a tool biased towards theinterests of some actor. That is, tools must notimplement any particular democratic model but beopen to different uses in this respect. The require-ment should probably be put even stricter: evenwhen used within one democratic model (e.g. thethin) systems should not prohibit other uses, asthere will always be challenges to democraticprocesses and requirements for openness mayincrease during the run of a process. Not onlyare democratic processes often stretched overmany years, for instance when large, complicated,expensive or controversial projects like a newrailroad, a bridge, or nuclear waste disposalschemes are concerned. During this time, require-ments for openness may change due to unexpectedevents, change of attitudes, or other.

4.1. How to bring DSS into e-democracy?Given the different democratic models discussedabove, projects that want to use DSS in a way thatimproves the broader democratic processes shouldbe designed to allow for public involvement so asnot to make DSS appear a tool for the elite.Judging from previous IS research in general, notonly in the e-democracy field, there are two majorproblems associated with this. One has to do withusability, the other with processes: how opennesscan be achieved across the policy-making cycle.

Usability: Even though good DSS are designedto allow for users ‘drilling down’ into a problem,doing this is not straightforward as at least someknowledge about modelling in general, and sometechnical language, is required. While computeruse is already widespread and becoming moresophisticated, the problem is not so much how tohandle the technical tool (although even thisrequires a learning process), but how to under-stand the issues in the field concerned, the systems’contents. It is likely that DSS could be designed tobe more easy to use by non-experts by addingseveral means of communication, e.g. explanationsof technical terms, figures to complement ofexplain diagrams or formulas, etc.

One more technical innovation could be intro-ducing software agents representing differentworld views and conducting a dialogue with eachother, or with the user. Perhaps, like in games,users should be able to enter as a player, model herpreferences by choosing a character and modifyinghis qualities, and play some game with otheractors, some of them being software agents. Thereis room for innovation, and this is only onesuggestion. However, what is clear is that to reacha wider audience there is a need to overcome theengineering appeal of DSS. This is not a trivialtask. Not only will improved user interactionrequire more work on part of systems designersand builders. Also, any simplifying explanation oragent implementation adds confusion by introdu-cing a lower level of preciseness. This is, however,probably a trade-off that has to be made.

There are two tricks involved. One is finding anappropriate balance between ease of use andaccuracy. The other is making sure use is not toshallow, that is, that users actually learn moreabout the problem under discussion. Therefore, ofcourse, a development along this lines must beaccompanied by testing with users to learn abouthow they use systems and how they understandtheir content.

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Processes: As noted above, the e-democracyfield has not yet considered the complete policymaking cycle. To continue that line of reasoning,let us look at the democratic decision-makingsystem.

Discussing e-democracy stringently requiresdefining the context in which it appears in termsof a public sector model. The above presentedpolicy-making cycle is one beginning. But we sawthat different democratic models viewed participa-tion in the different stages of the model differently.The difference is not just one of involving more or

less people at the various stages. The difference iscultural.

In simple terms, drawing on a textbook inpolitical science, and at a general level wherenational differences do not matter, a democraticgovernment system can be described as shown inFigures 1 and 2. It consists of three interrelatedspheres, the political sphere, the administrativeone, and the civil society one. Each spherecontains individuals, organizations, technical sys-tems, social relations, and value systems.

Table II points to some features of each sphere(for further discussion, see Gr .oonlund, 2003).

e-Democracy has so far been discussed only inthe context of the relation between the politicalsphere and civil society. DSS have so far been usedexclusively in the administration sphere. One effectis that e-democracy is often applied to lofty issues(‘what kind of society do we want to live in 25years from now’?) where hard decisions are notmade at that particular moment, whereas DSS areapplied to concrete physical manipulation (con-struction of railroads, dams, bridges, etc.) whereirreversible decisions have to be made. To becomeused in e-democratic processes, hence, oneDSS challenge is matching multiple modes ofoperations:

* Politics}negotiation* Administration}calculation* Civil society}action

In this article I have sought to point to twochallenges that have to be met to overcome, atleast to some extent, these cultural gaps. Inaddition to the usability challenge, then, theprocess challenge includes finding a trusted,

Table II. Characteristics of the spheres in a government system (Gr .oonlund, 2003)

Political sphere Administrative sphere Civil society

Motivation - Representation - Economic and legal rationality Individual or community wel-

fare and emancipation

- Balancing interests - Equality

- Incompatibility management - Auditability

Focus unit Groups (representation) Individual as social unit Individual or group (as humans

with interests)

Interest Room to manoeuvre - Complete data - Privacy

- Universal/comprehensive models - Expression

- Value-freeness

Mode of operation - Value (policy)-based rhetoric Engineering Ad hoc, situational or issue-

based ( e.g. social movements)

- Negotiation

Figure 2. Basic spheres and relations in a democraticgovernment system. Arrows indicate influence, andcircles indicate domains of control. Intersections in-dicate ‘transaction zones’ where control is negotiated bye.g. lobbyists and media on the left-hand side, inter-mediary service deliverers on the right-hand side andprofessional interaction in government boards andcommittees on the top side. (Adapted from Molinet al., 1975; 16).



capable and sustainable host who can applypreference models in a credible way. This willeventually entail a more participatory view ondemocracy. In a shorter perspective, however, wiseemployment of DSS could serve to achieve some-thing e-democracy so far has not}contributing tomore widespread understanding of complex pro-blems. That would not be a bad start!

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e-democracy: in search of tools and methods for effective participation

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