Parties, Candidates and Citizens On-Line - Åbo Akademi

TABLE 3. Engagement features by producer types. Figures are the percentage of sites
including a specific feature.
Feature
Candidate
(N=62)
Party
(N=11)
Government
(N=7)
Producer type
News
Media
(N=7)
NGO/
Labour
(N=5)
Other
(N=5)
All
types
(N=97)
Contact
Producer
84 100 100 100 100 60 88
Join/Become
a Member
23 82 0 0 60 0 27
Register to
Vote
0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Get E-mail 7 0 0 0 0 0 4
Donate 15 9 0 0 0 0 10
Contribution
to Forum
7 0 29 14 0 20 8
Offline
Distribution
3 18 0 0 0 0 4
Send Links
Public
0 18 14 0 0 0 3
Support
Statement
15 0 0 0 0 0 9
E-
Paraphernalia
2 0 0 0 0 0 1
Volunteer 18 0 0 0 0 0 11
As Table 3 shows, the only engagement feature that all producer types frequently offered
is the possibility to contact the site producer, usually by e-mail. Regarding the other
features, there seems to be a dividing line between, on the one hand, the parties and
candidates’ sites and, on the other, the sites of the other four producer types (i.e.,
government, news media, NGO/Labour, other). The latter group provided very few
engagement features. On the parties’ and, in particular, candidates’ sites, a wider range of
engagement features are prevalent. Thus, a vast majority of the parties’ sites provided
opportunities for visitors to join/become member of the organization. Moreover, the
parties’ sites provided features that encourage the site visitor to mobilize other voters, i.e.,
by enabling visitors to send a link from the site to other voters and encouraging offline
distribution of campaign material. The candidates’ sites, on the other hand, primarily
offered engagement opportunities that enable citizens to become involved in the
campaign. Hence, 23 per cent of the sites provide opportunities to join/become members
of the candidates’ campaign organization. Moreover, 18 per cent of the sites encourage
visitors to volunteer in the candidates’ campaign. Furthermore, 15 per cent of the
candidates’ sites enabled/encouraged visitors to donate money and to make public
statements in support of the candidates.
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