Parties, Candidates and Citizens On-Line - Åbo Akademi

26; Römmele 2003, 9-11). Therefore, regarding the evolution of campaign
communication:
“The new technology allows for forms of political communication that can be
located schematically somewhere between the local activism of the premodern
campaign (with direct town-hall meetings and political rallies) and the nationalpassive
forms of communication characteristic of the modern television
campaign […] as political use of the internet expands, the postmodern
campaign does seem destined to add yet another distinctive layer of
communication […] supplementing other existing channels” (Norris 2001a,
149)
However, as the internet has become more commonplace in society, scholars have
questioned whether the internet will have such a ‘distinctive’ impact on traditional
political life. Two core arguments merit attention: firstly, when traditional political
organizations employ the web, there is little reason to believe that the ‘new politics’ will
be that much different from ‘politics as usual’ (e.g. Davis 1999; Kamarck 1999; Margolis
& Resnick 2000). Secondly, scholars have argued that politics on the internet could fail to
vitalize the citizens’ political participation. The internet, they say, will primarily be used by
citizens who are already politically interested and active, resulting in a situation where the
political actors are so-to-speak simply ‘preaching to the converted’ on-line (Hill & Hughes
1998, 185-186; Norris 1999; 2001b, 229-231).
***
This thesis focuses on two aspects of internet politics; the use of the internet, mainly in
political campaign contexts, by a) political actors and b) citizens. The thesis has two
delimitations which need to be addressed. Internet politics can be divided into three
general areas (Margolis & Resnick 2000, 8-21): intra-net politics, which exists within the net
with no connection to the real world, politics that affect the net referring to actions taken offline
which regulate the on-line environment, and political uses of the net containing the online
activity, with the purpose of affecting off-line politics, of traditional political actors
such as parties, candidates, government and interest groups. The focus of this thesis is
clearly within this third area of internet politics. It is primarily centred on the on-line
activity of traditional political actors – i.e. the political actors whose activity has been
regarded as essential to modern day representative democracy (Norris 2003, 21-22; Sartori
1976, 24) – and is only to a limited extent concerned with the activity of other types of
organized interests. The thesis is not, however, focussed on the adoption and
employment of the internet by non-traditional political actors, such as transnational
advocacy networks and new social movements. These non-traditional actors have been
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