NordPol
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NordPol: Government-hosted Election and Political Information and Discussion in Northern Denmark
Case Study: Nordpol Northern Jutland, Denmark, 2001
Title: NordPol: Government-hosted Election and Political Information and Discussion in Northern Denmark
Location: Northern Jutland, Denmark
Primary Sponsor: The county council of Northern Jutland, Denmark
Budget: NA
Project Start Date: 10/09/2001
Project End Date: 20/11/2001 but continued nonetheless
Executive Summary
In October of 2001, the county council of Northern Jutland, Denmark initiated a government-hosted website with election and political information and an online discussion forum. Nordpol was part of an overall €700,000 county government information society project. The county government's explicit goal for the project was to enhance the citizens’ interest and knowledge of politics. Special attention was paid to first-time voters based on their traditionally low political participation and the belief that they might be the easiest voters to politically mobilize.
Citizens were able to bring issues such as alcohol treatment, health care and transportation of disabled people to the political agenda. Over 450 postings were made during the month. The number of postings exceeded the county government’s initial expectation and quantitative criterion of success with 200 postings. Data reveals 120 participants posted in the debate including 46 politicians or potential candidates and 74 citizens. Politicians posted 300 entries and citizens posted 150. The main part of the interactions consisted of direct dialogue from citizens to politicians. The process was more similar to a consultation, rather than a broad and general debate. In the subsequent evaluation, both citizens and politicians agreed that the project was a democratic success. Even politicians who were replica handbags sceptical about the project found the debate useful for themselves as well as for the participants. Additionally, some politicians in older age groups took the opportunity to learn Internet skills. Website: http://www.nordpol.dk
Project Rationale and Objectives
Nordpol.dk has been one of the most ambitious government initiatives in Scandinavia in creating a democratic dialogue via the Internet. The project, initiated by a county government in Northern Denmark prior to regional elections in 2001, was part of a bigger project to digitize the entire county government administration. It is working to make the administration more transparent and open to the public. The explicit goal of the project was to enhance citizens’ interest in and knowledge of politics and to strengthen the dialogue among citizens and politicians (Nordjyllands Amt 2002): 3-4.
What was delivered?
Technically, the main element of the project was a website, http://www.nordpol.dk. It initiatially contained information about county administration, candidates for the election, and on policy topics within the county’s areas of administrative responsibility. The most important part of the site was the forum where citizens and politicians were invited to debate. The county government had involved the users in the process of creating the project by inviting voters to attend focus group meetings and to contribute ideas for the design. The project was closely connected to the regional election campaign and promoted in local newspapers and on television.
Special attention was paid to first-time voters based on their traditionally low political participation and the belief that they might be the easiest voters to politically mobilize . The young voters constituted a large share of the focus group members and influenced the project design. Young candidates for the county council were activated in order to attract voters of the same age. The project was marketed in media and forums with a young audience in mind (cinemas, schools and local radio stations).
The technology was provided and maintained by an external company, while county civil servants were responsible for the content. The civil servants set up clear rules and guidelines: postings had to be relevant to county politics, no confidential information could be posted, and defamation prohibited. The moderators reserved the right to delete postings in violation of the rules, which happened twice. As such, the forum was only lightly moderated.
The debate was a priori divided into eight topics relevant to county politics: Business Conditions, Culture, Health Issues, Education, Roads and Traffic, Social Services and Psychiatry, Nature and Environment and Other Topics. Together with the rules and guidelines, this structure set up a clear frame for the debate.
The debate on the website was supplemented with several live chat events where citizens and the candidates for elected office could interact. The chat events were not a great success. The audience was limited and few young candidates chose to participate. Further, several events were cancelled.
Nordpol was also built upon experience gained from Internet projects launched prior to the 1997 Danish local and regional elections. These projects failed due to the lack of Internet access and ICT competence. Today, the share of Danes with Internet access has tripled. ICT competence and motivation show a similar positive trend. Further, the entire project was marketed heavily throughout the county in TV and radio commercials, bus hangers and written material. Expectations for the Norpol were high.
Communication Activity
The debate went on for more than two months, from the launch of the project on September 10, 2001 up to the local elections on November 20, 2001. Some figures:
- 450 postings were made during this period. The number of postings exceeded the county government’s initial expectation and quantitative criterion of success with 200 postings.
- 120 participants posted in the debate:
- 46 politicians or candidates
- 74 citizens
- Politicians posted 300 entries, citizens posted 150. *On average, each politician posted 6.5 entries versus 2 per citizen.
These figures suggest that the politicians dominated the debate. On the other hand, the project was heavily marketed among this group. Certain politicians were hand-picked to initiate debates and encourage lively discussion with citizens. The following will show that this goal was achieved.
There is a widespread concern that postings in online political debates across the Internet are irrelevant and contain spam. 94.6 percent of all postings on Nordpol were topical and related to the debate, while only 4 percent were non-topical. A small portion of the postings reflected the character of other postings and contributed to the self-regulation of the debate, a topic that is discussed later in the study.
In the debate section of the website, participants were urged to identify themselves by their full names and e-mail addresses. 82.8 percent of the postings offered full names and e-mail address; only 2.9 percent were anonymous.
Successes
One of the major successes of Nordpol was the enhanced and respectful dialogue between citizens and politicians. The connection between citizens and politicians adds a vertical dimension to the debate, along with the horizontal dimension constituted by debates among citizens.
This analysis of the debate focuses on the qualitative features evaluated by a model for deliberative processes affiliated with German sociologist Jürgen Habermas. It focuses on three aspects of deliberative processes: argumentation, reciprocity and information.
In most literature about democracy, debates and deliberation, an important normative assumption is that argumentation is a central part of a qualified debate. Arguments attempt to convince others to adopt a point of view or challenge other conceptions presented in the debate. In this tradition, allegations and claims without supporting arguments are considered bad form or counter-productive.
Reciprocity is at the core of the phenomenon of deliberation, a concept that has generated an enormous body of literature. In the broadest sense, many of the measures and variables are aspects of deliberation. The concept of reciprocity used here addresses how debate forum participants take into account the arguments and opinions of the other participants.
Information is a third key concept to be analyzed. Since Jefferson, it has been a common theme in most theoretical accounts of democracy that informed and enlightened participants create rational, factual discussions. As such, it is of the highest importance that new information is provided and generated within a democratic debate.
Argumentation
The implicit assumption when constructing this variable is that rational, validated argumentation contributes to enhancing the “quality” of a debate, while pure allegations are seen as somehow damaging. Basically, argumentation or allegations are found in about 80 percent of all postings. The politicians use more argumentation than the citizens. There is no remarkable difference between the ways in which the two groups argue.
The differences in argumentation mode within the respective relations are more interesting. The highest level of external validation is found when the politicians debate each other, while citizens tend to argue on the basis of internal validation: their own opinions and formations. This shows that, when campaigning for election, politicians tend to be very factual; whereas citizens use the online space to test their own opinions, often in dialogue with politicians. There are no remarkable differences in the levels of allegations across groups and relations, although slightly higher frequencies can be found when citizens address politicians and when somebody uses the forum as a Speakers' Corner.
Reciprocity
Argumentation is often inherent in the debate forum posts. Reciprocity addresses the relationships between postings and how participants take other contributions into account. About half of all posts contain elements of reciprocity. A vast majority of the posts show progress; approximately 10 percent show explicit signs of persuasion. There are only few examples of radicalization. This confirms the impression from the qualitative reading of the debate that only a limited number of quarrels took place. In general, participants were considerate and respectful. One exception was a citizen’s defamation towards a private company. Later, the citizen was forced to post an official apology in the forum and in a newspaper.
It is obvious that the politicians demonstrated more reciprocity than the citizens. This is evident when examining the number of posts and the estimated index. In examining reciprocity across relations, there is a higher degree of reciprocity within the groups of politicians and citizens, respectively, than across the groups. In other words, the horizontal reciprocity seems to be stronger than the vertical.
Information
A third important dimension of a deliberative debate is enlightenment. After the 1970s and the first experiments with teledemocracy, these types of projects aim to enlighten citizens and create a foundation for democratic debate. The county government's explicit goal for the project was to enhance the citizens’ interest in and knowledge of politics.
A survey investigated whether or not this goal had been achieved by asking debate forum users about their level of knowledge after participation. A little more than half of the surveyed citizens felt that they knew more about county politics; over 40 percent felt more qualified to vote. These figures indicate that the debate and the project had some effect on the citizens' level of enlightenment, a tendency supported by other parts of the analysis.
Here, and in an internationally published article, the project was deemed a success. The overall tone of the debate was respectful. The levels of argumentation, information and deliberation were generally high. Further, the presence of politicians created a debate space consisting of more dimensions than a traditional debate among citizens.
Benefits to Citizens
In the sections above, it was concluded that the debate was successful in deliberative democratic terms. However, from the citizens’ point of view, the debate must also be evaluated from a political agenda perspective. For the citizens it was of paramount importance that the debate facilitated access to politicians and influenced political agendas in Northern Jutland.
Although online political discussions seem qualitative, deliberative and fruitful, it is often claimed that they do not relate to external agendas and have little effect on society and politics. In this sense, the debates resemble coffee houses in the 18th century, described by Jürgen Habermas as closed circles for a few well-educated citizens.
The debate of Nordpol did have an effect on the wider political agenda and on certain political discussions in Northern Jutland. Citizens were able to bring issues such as alcohol treatment, health care and transportation of disabled people to the political agenda. In one case, a citizen met with the relevant county council committe and that resulted in a specific political initiative. Nordpol.dk shows that specific issues garner more action than general issues. There was no reaction when citizens asked for the politicians’ attitude to environmental or public works policy in general. These tendencies confirm that Nordpol.dk resembles a consultation process.
Summarizing citizens’ impressions helps shed light on their overall perception of the proceedings of Nordpol. One third of the respondents evaluated the debate as an open process of deliberation, while less than 20 percent considered it a chain of monologues. Although the figures indicate an overall positive impression, almost half of the participants considered the debate as something in-between.
Benefits to Authority
Nordpol was initiated by regional authorities in Northern Jutland. Civil servants played a key role in creating ideas for and developing the projects. The councillors, or elected representatives of the county council, were involved at an early stage. Their support and ideas were incorporated into the process through various focus group meetings and close cooperation. The goals for the project, as outlined above, were set by the civil servants.
From the authorities' perspective, the debate was a major success because it proved to be fruitful and respectful. Further, for the authorities, it was extremely important to keep the debate on track and reserved for political issues related to regional politics in Northern Jutland. Two sudden events could have affected and changed the scope of the debate. The terrorist attacks of September 11th took place the day after the debate was initiated. Four postings appeared on that topic, three from the same person. He was asked to stick to the topic of county politics. After one month of the project, the Danish Prime minister called for a general election to take place on the same day as the local and regional elections. In Denmark, national politics often attract more attention than local politics, which could have shifted the focus of the debate. However, the call for election only resulted in three specific postings. The participants were able to distinguish between different policy levels; national issues did not interfere with the regional debate.
One goal of the authorities was to mobilize first time voters for enhanced political participation. This group usually shows the lowest level of participation in Northern Jutland. That objective was realized to a certain extent, as young voters constituted a large part of the participants in the discussions, in part because the younger candidates for elective office were quite active in the online debate and in the media.
Benefits to Councillors
Another dominant objective of the project was to create enhanced dialogue between citizens and politicians and diminish the communication gap between these groups. Many councillors engaged in the dialogue with the citizens. That objective was realized as a vertical dimension and became an important part of the debate. Almost half of all postings are found within the vertical dimension. The main part of the interactions consisted of direct dialogue from citizens to politicians. The process was more similar to a consultation, rather than a broad and general debate. Most citizens agreed that the goal of closing the communication gap was achieved, as 59 percent are confident that the politicians listened to the citizens and acted accordingly. Only 15 percent show little or no confidence. In that respect, an important objective for the councillors was realized.
Limitations
The biggest problem with Nordpol, from a democratic perspective, is the limited inclusive effect. After the debate, the politicians pointed out that, despite the surprisingly high number of postings, out of 120 participants, only 74 were citizens. A common claim is that this group was small when compared to all citizens residing in the county. On the other hand, according to some of the citizens, the figure corresponds closely with the normal number of participants in the newspaper debate prior to county elections in Northern Jutland. In that respect, the scope of participation on the Internet can be compared to more traditional forms of political engagement. However, political participation on the Internet is an exclusive activity still in its infancy and it is reasonable to believe that the Nordpol project has played only a minor role in the overall election campaign. The Internet has not substituted other participation channels such as TV, radio and physical meetings. If a future project shall play a larger role, it is important that many more citizens and politicians are involved. Both parts mention the limited presence of the other group as a reason not to participate in online debates. Online participation has not yet reached "critical mass."
Another inclusion issue is the diversity of participants compared to the general population. The typical participant of Nordpol.dk is a younger, highly educated male who uses the Internet on a daily basis. Another finding from Nordpol.dk online debates found:
- 70.7 percent of participants were male
- 29.3 percent were female
- The age distribution is more equal, although there were few participants older than 60.
- The project managers have, to a certain extent, achieved the goal of mobilizing first-time voters (18 to 22 years old), while the largest group of participants can be found with the second- and third-time voter group (23 to 29 years old). The presence of a large group in this age group is related to the proportion of students within the body of participants.
- Almost 30 percent of the respondents are students. The Nordpol participants seem to be a well-educated group.
- More than one-third finished or attended advanced studies of five years or more; more than 60 percent finished or are pursuing advanced studies.
The Internet seems to magnify existing trends of political participation where socio-economic status is highly decisive for political engagement. Although more women are now active on the Internet, certain biases prevail and it seems that many barriers, not only access but also skills, motivation and enhanced civic culture, have to be overcome to realize full participation.
Finally, the participants are very active Internet users, as 89 percent use the Internet on a daily basis while the rest are online at least twice every week. This indicates that daily Internet use correlates with online political participation.
Evaluation
The entire project was evaluated from two perspectives. The county administration conducted an internal evaluation and the project was examined from a theoretical democratic perspective as a part of this author’s Ph.D. project. The county council evaluation is accessible in Nordyllands Amt (2002) (mostly in Danish) and some descriptions and outlines of the project and related initiatives can be found at http://www.nordpol.dk. This author’s further academic research is available in Jensen (2003a) and Jensen (2003b). The quality of the debate was evaluated mainly by a content analysis, and qualitative data of speech acts were coded into more quantitative measures, which examined the overall democratic quality of the debate. The demographic characteristics of the participants and their impression of the debate was evaluated through a survey placed on the website of Nordpol, initiated by the county government. The analysis employed in this study comes from the 82 citizens who answered survey questions. The politicians’ impressions of the project are based on focus group meetings and informal interviews mainly made by the county government.
This author benchmarked the project’s success against the theoretical ideals of deliberation and democratic inclusion briefly discussed in the previous sections. The county government evaluated the project mainly from a quantitative perspective. Their initial expectations were 200 debate postings, based on a previous pilot project containing around 100 postings. Only two weeks after the launch of the debate the quantitative goal was achieved and expectations then raised.
Another goal was to mobilize first time voters. As previously discussed, this goal was realized to a certain extent whereas the overall goal of attracting new groups of people for political participation was not realised.
Lessons learnt
Overall, the Nordpol debate was a democratic success when evaluated by prior quantitative expectations and experiences from other online debates. The participants were open-minded and the debate was lively and respectful within all dimensions and relations, apart from the debate among the citizens. Further, the debate showed certain relations to and from an external agenda. Even though the extent was not impressive, Nordpol fared better on that issue than many other Internet forums. In summary, this study addresses less successful aspects of Nordpol and outlines the dynamics of the debate.
In the subsequent evaluation, both citizens and politicians agreed that the project was a democratic success. Even politicians who were skeptical about the project found the debate useful for themselves as well as for the participants. Additionally, some politicians in older age groups took the opportunity to learn Internet skills.
Politicians and citizens agreed that the regional focus, moderation and the presence of politicians were key factors for the relative success of Nordpol. It was concluded that regional issues work to engage higher numbers of participants. Further, the regional boundaries contributed to maintaining the focus of the debate. Except for a few diversions, the majority of posts addressed regional topics.
The debate was not heavily moderated, although the county council reserved the right to remove insults or privacy violations. This rule had to be used only once. In another case, a user was forced to post an official apology for insulting a private company. In the cases of irrelevant postings or spam, the debate tended to be self-regulatory.
Finally, the presence of the politicians seems to have contributed to the respectful tone and the factuality of the debate. The politicians contributed to that trend, as they behave more respectfully and factually than the citizens, but it also seems as if the citizens behaved more respectfully when the politicians were present. On the negative side, the presence of politicians could limit the citizens' willingness to engage in discussions with other citizens. Further, some citizens stated that the politicians used the debate forum for election campaigns and to encourage party affiliation. The presence of politicians seems to be a two-edged sword.
The experiences from Nordpol.dk do not provide a complete set of solutions for future online political participation initiatives. The Internet has proven to enhance the dialogue between citizens and politicians, thereby narrowing the communication gap between the groups. Debates and consultation can take place at the same time. Finally, conclusions from other projects on the importance of geographical boundaries and certain moderations are confirmed.
Regarding the overall design and features of the project, citizens were asked which part of the information on the project websites they found particularly useful. The citizens found the debate itself and the adjacent information on candidates and parties most useful, whereas they found features such as a calendar, a quiz and links to external news sources less relevant. This indicates that the participants prefer more traditional styles of information rather than innovative attempts to motivate and create political interest.
As noted above, the debate consisted mainly of internal debates among politicians and citizens, respectively, and consulation processes between citizens and politicians. The two functions of Nordpol are confirmed by the participants who were asked to compare the project with other forms of political participation:
- 52 percent compared it to a newspaper debate
- Almost 25 percent to an informal political debate with friends, colleagues or family.
- About 25 percent find that Nordpol resembles a town meeting
- 28 percent, that it is like writing letters to or talking to politicians
The last two functions are traditional elements of a consultation process.
What could happen next?
The debate on the website continued after the official election night closing of the project. Today, the site continues to be used as a forum for public hearing processes and aspects of regional politics. The coming reform of Danish local government structures has been widely discussed. However, the project has not attracted the attention or the number of debate participants received during the initial election project.
It should be noted that Nordpol was part of an overall €700,000 county government information society project. Other parts of the project included openbook government, electronic documents and different technical solutions aimed to make life easier for government and citizens. The full effects of this entire initiative cannot yet be evaluated.
The overall task of future projects is to enhance the democratic inclusion and to strengthen initiatives that reach out to the politically excluded, especially the unemployed, the elderly and immigrants. Nordpol participants are a group of well-educated, politically active people, mainly students, public employees or persons in other administrative functions. Finally, participants are frequent Internet users with access from home. Internet access and skills are among the first barriers to overcome in any future effor to engage new citizens in online political activities.
Additional information and sources
This author: Jakob Linaa Jensen, Ph.D. candidate, lecturer, Department of Media Studies, University of Aarhus, Helsingforsgade 14, 8200 Aarhus N., Denmark. E-mail: jakob@linaa.net. Web: www.netdemocracy.dk / www.linaa.net. Phone: +45 20867777. MSN: jakob_linaa@hotmail.com
References:
Jensen, Jakob Linaa (2003a). ”Virtual democratic dialogue? Bringing together citizens and politicians”. Information Polity, vol. 8, issue 1-2
Jensen, Jakob Linaa (2003b). “Public Spheres on the Internet - Anarchic or Government-Sponsored: A Comparison”. Scandinavian Political Studies, vol. 26, issue 4.
Nordjyllands Amt (2002). Nordpol.Dk - Dit Link Til Nordjysk Politik. [Evaluation report of Nordpol.dk.]. Aalborg: County council of Northern Jutland.
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