Parties, Candidates and Citizens On-Line - Åbo Akademi

Introduction
Party communication has evolved in different stages over time (Farrell & Webb 2000,
103-108; Norris 2001a, 137-149; Plasser & Plasser 2002, 6). Recently, new communication
technologies have given the political actors new campaign tools and communication
channels (Hansen et al. 2005, 2; Norris 2001a, 120-136; Smith 2002, 175). The rise of the
internet and other information and communication tools (ICTs) raised a considerable
amount of scholarly attention as to its impact on party communication (see discussion in
Norris 2003, 23-24).
The internet is a relatively cheap and fast communication tool; large amounts of
information and multimedia can be published almost instantaneously. It also enables
interactivity, two-way communication and offers an opportunity to bypass traditional
mass-media in getting the political messages to the public (Kamarck 1999). Thus, the
internet could enhance both the top-down and the bottom-up information currents
surrounding political parties (cf. Norris 2003, 26; Römmele 2003, 9-11). The web could be
used for the dissemination of top-down information such as broadcasting or
narrowcasting of political messages, catch-all strategies or targeting of specific voter
segments, the use of more multimedia and political sound bites. Also as Ward et al. argue
(2003, 16-18), the use of ICTs could bring about a return to more traditional forms of
party campaign communication in emphasising information over sound bites,
personalized campaigning over catch-all strategies, interactive relationships over topdown
information and decentralized campaigning over centralised.
Evidently, there is a noticeable uncertainty concerning the potential effects of the
web on party communication. However, Römmele (2003, 8) has provided an insightful
view on how the usage of ICTs by political parties could be considered. She argues that:
“…new ICTs will play different roles for different parties […] The
impact of innovations such as the Internet on political actors is in part a
function of their inherent technical capabilities, but also a product of the
context in which they are used” (Römmele 2003, 8)
In order to better understand how ICTs will be implemented by political parties one
should take the influence of the actual users of the technology, i.e. the parties themselves,
into account (Gibson et al. 2003b, 86-90). This theoretical view, which I choose to call an
‘actor-contructivist’ view, is also traceable in other studies as well (e.g. Löfgren 2001;
Pedersen & Saglie 2005). In her study, Römmele (2003, 15) mainly considered the usage
of websites by political parties in relation to their overall goals and strategies (cf. Gibson
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