Public Net-work

Steven Clift writes "I've written up an article titled E-Democracy, E-Governance, and Public Net-work. It illustrates how governments can do more with the Internet to meet public challenges. While the big bad government should be viewed skeptically in terms of censorship and regulation, it also does a million good things related to the non-techie parts of our lives. The question is not whether the government should use the Internet to involve people in meeting their public mission, but how to apply technology in the most effective way."

Comments

Hmm

[B3ryllium]

Where I work, we just did a test-run with the "VClass" software. My boss is big on the idea that such all-in-one software (voice conferencing, whiteboard, app sharing, etc) could be useful for making "Virtual Townhall" meetings, where community members can participate without having to physically show up.

It would make sense to start this government information technology (GIT) revolution on a small scale and work slowly up, ironing out bugs along the way. Who knows, eventually countries might even use the Internet to host referendums for government policies?

Other sectors feel the same way

[192939495969798999]

In the tech group, it's easy to say that the Gov't does the "regular daily stuff" ok. However, ask a PETA person, or a Greenpeace person, or any other focus group that is as knowledgable about their topic as we are about tech, and they'll say, "oh the gov't handles tech fine, but as far as MY topic, they're crappy".

Re:The real problem with "E-Democracy"

[schussat]

Pippa Norris has been doing work in this field for some time, and has amassed a great deal of research. Her book Digital Divide elaborates quite a bit on the problem of "anyone talking, nobody listening" by trying to articulate very specifically what kinds of efforts have been made by governments to incorporate online visibility in decision-making, and what kinds of further institutional changes are needed to make governments accessible to an online polity.

-schussat

Anyone interested in meeting up for this topic?

[smagruder]

Meetup has a topic for E-democracy. From the description, it reads "Meetup with other local citizens to discuss how technology can enhance the democratic process." Who better than Slashdotters to thoroughly engage their fellow citizens on this very important topic?