Scott London 2000.
All sorts of reasons have been advanced in recent years to explain the decline
of
community in America, from the way we design our neighborhoods to the increased
mobility of the average American to such demographic shifts as the movement
of
women into the labor force. But the onslaught of television and other
electronic
technologies is usually cited as the main culprit. As Harvard sociologist
Robert
Putnam observes, these technologies are increasingly "privatizing our leisure
time"
and "undermining our connections with one another and with our communities."[1]
In his essay "The Strange Disappearance of Civic America," Putnam draws
a direct
parallel between the arrival of television and the decline of what he calls
"social
capital" -- the social networks, trust, and norms of reciprocity that are
the essence
of healthy communities. As he points out, a "massive change in the way Americans
spend their days and nights occurred precisely during the years of generational
civic
disengagement."[2] It follows that computers, VCRs, virtual reality and
other
technologies that, like television, "cocoon" us from our neighbors and communities
exacerbate the loss of social capital.
With the advent of computer networks and "virtual communities," however,
some
feel that electronic technologies can actually be used to strengthen the
bonds of
community and reverse America's declining social capital. Advocates
stress that
electronic networks can help citizens build organizations, provide local
information,
and develop bonds of civic life and conviviality. While the claims are no
doubt
overstated in many cases, as they always are when new technologies are involved,
there is growing evidence that this may be the case, particularly in local
community
networks.
The social and political ramifications of electronic networking has become
a favorite
topic of speculation in recent years. Cover stories, conferences, books,
Web sites,
and radio and television programs devoted to the subject have grown exponentially.
In looking over the burgeoning literature on the political uses of the Net,
I find that
most of it falls into three general categories: 1) questions of democratic
culture and
practice, such as the pros and cons of direct democracy, issues of privacy
and
social control, and the changing nature of public opinion; 2) how on-line
petitioning,
electronic voting, information campaigning and other forms of "netactivism"
can
promote politics more narrowly defined; and 3) the implications of networking
technologies for communities. This paper leaves aside the first two categories[3]
and focuses specifically on the third: whether computer networks can be
used to
strengthen and enhance the bonds of community.
A great deal of attention has been focused on electronic or "virtual" communities
that knit together individuals who may be geographically dispersed but who
share
common interests. While I take up some of the problems with this idea, my
main
focus is on geophysical communities - - municipalities, counties, regional
areas,
Indian nations, etc. -- and the ways they are using networks to build healthier
communities. As I hope to show, electronic networks, especially when
augmented
by face-to-face networks, can strengthen communities by serving as "free
spaces,"
by fostering dialogue and deliberation, and by enhancing the bonds of trust,
reciprocity and connectedness that make up social capital.
Virtual Community
When Vice President Al Gore introduced the idea of an "information superhighway"
in a speech in 1992, it conjured up all kinds of visions: videos on demand,
electronic
voting, on-line shopping, instant access to government information. But
just as the
metaphor of the information highway began to catch on, a book called The
Virtual
Community appeared which offered an altogether different vision of the digital
revolution. As Howard Rheingold saw it, people are not interested in interactive
entertainment and information so much as the opportunity to form relationships
and
interact with other people. The real promise of electronic networks, he
said, is that
they bring people together in new ways.
Rheingold defined virtual communities as groups of people linked not by
geography
but by their participation in computer networks. They share many of the
characteristics of people in ordinary communities, he said, yet they have
no
face-to-face contact, are not bound by the constraints of time or place,
and use
computers to communicate with one another. Even though communities can
emerge from and exist within computer-linked groups, he added, the "technical
linkage of electronic personae is not sufficient to create a community."[4]
Community includes more than merely the exchange ax machine, telephones,
international publications, and computers, personal and professional relationships
can be maintained irrespective of time and place. Today we are all members
of
international `non-place' communities."[8]
The trouble with virtual or "non-place" communities is that they tend to
exacerbate,
rather than challenge, the atomization and fragmentation of modern society.
They
give their members a sense of belonging without any of the obligations of
old-fashioned communities. As a result, they foster a watered-down notion
of
community that is convenient and virtually free of commitment of any kind.
When
we virtualize human relations, as naturalist David Ehrenfeld puts it, we
are no longer
in touch with the essential ingredients of community, "for at the end of
the day when
you in Vermont and your e-mail correspondent in western Texas go to sleep,
your
climates will still be different, your soils will still be different, your
landscapes will
still be different, your local environmental problems will still be different,
and -- most
importantly -- your neighbors will still be different, and while you have
been creating
the global community with each other, you will have been neglecting them."[9]
Virtual communities are, more often than not, pseudocommunities. They lack
many
of the essential features of real communities, such as face- to-face conversation,
the unplanned encounter -- the chance meetings between people that promote
a
sense of neighborliness and familiarity -- and, perhaps most important,
the
confrontation with people whose lifestyles and values differ from yours.
In this
sense, virtual communities tend to be utopian -- they are communities of
interest,
education, tastes, beliefs, and skills. The result, as Stephen Doheny- Farina
writes
in The Wired Neighborhood, is that "much of the Net is a Byzantine amalgamation
of fragmented, isolating, solipsistic enclaves of interest based on a collectivity
of
assent."[10]
Information is the currency of virtual communities, like many other marketplace
cultures. The way it is shared and transmitted therefore has direct implications
for
the overall identity of the group. It works better, as Howard Rheingold
writes, "when
the community's conceptual model of itself is more like barn-raising than
horse-
trading."[11] That may be so, but a more fundamental question is whether
the
exchange of information by itself is a sufficient criterion for community.
Langdon
Winner, in an essay called "Mythinformation," attributes this idea to a
certain
"optimistic technophilia" characteristic of on-line enthusiasts.[12] Community
requires public dialogue and deliberation, he says, not information. Information
is
essential to public debate, to be sure, but it is only meaningful when tied
to
purpose, and only the community can give it purpose.
The metaphor of the information highway, while inappropriate in many ways,
accurately reflects what can happen to communities when they are woven into
a
larger social fabric. Just as the interstate highway system linked existing
road
structures and allowed rapid movement between them, digital networks allow
vast
amounts of information to pass between different locales almost instantaneously.
The danger of the information highway, as futurist Robert Theobald points
out, is
that "we are building it before we have a local knowledge system in place.
We shall
therefore reinforce an already existing pathology of looking outside our
own systems
for the ideas we need rather than finding competence within our own
communities."[13] In this respect, the push toward globalization flattens
not only
local economies and indigenous traditions, but also the knowledge base of
a
community by urging its members to look outside the community for answers.
The Networked Community
In his popular book Being Digital, Nicholas Negroponte observes that the
digital
revolution has removed many of the limitations of geography. "Digital living,"
he
says, "will include less and less dependence upon being in a specific place
at a
specific time, and the transmission of place itself will start to become
possible."[14]
Howard Rheingold acknowledges this possibility, but the virtual community,
as he
sees it, actually does require some ties to physical community. Most of
the stories
he tells in The Virtual Community involve people who live and work in the
San
Francisco Bay Area. When I asked Rheingold about this, he said that a sense
of
community first began to develop on the WELL after members of the group
met
face-to-face. "Different [on-line] conferences had different get-togethers,"
he
recalled. "The parenting conference decided to have a softball game and
picnic in
the summer. We all met each other and the kids we had been bragging about
to
each other, and a lot of solidarity came out of that. Other groups had bridge
games
or poker games or went for Chinese food at different restaurants every Sunday."
As
a result of these face-to-face gatherings, he said, "we started to become
part of
each other's lives and a real community began growing up."[15]
Rheingold's experiences confirm the view that electronic networks are best
understood not as separate worlds in cyberspace but as "nervous systems
for the
physical world," as long-time Internet observer Phil Agre puts it. "Face-to-face
meetings will always be indispensable for cementing relationships and sharing
worldviews, but the Internet is valuable before and after those meetings."[16]
This
point is echoed by Francis Fukuyama in his work on trust and social capital.
The
advantages of technology, he says, are not in creating new communities but
in
strengthening already existing social networks.[17]
This premise is at the heart of a burgeoning movement sometimes referred
to as
"civic networking" which is using computer-based communication to create
new
forms of citizens-based, geographically delimited community information
systems.
These systems, variously known as civic networks, Free-Nets, community
computing centers, or public access networks, are proliferating around the
world
today. In his book New Community Networks, Douglas Schuler estimates that
more
than 500,000 people are regular users of the hundreds of community networks
currently in existence in the United States and abroad.[18] They usually
bring
together a variety of local institutions, such as schools and universities,
local
government agencies, libraries, and nonprofit organizations into a single
community
resource that then serves a variety of functions, from allowing people to
communicate with each other via e-mail to encouraging involvement in local
decision-making to developing economic opportunities in disadvantaged
communities.
The rationale for civic networking is that community information systems
can knit
together the diverse elements of a community, provide access to and information
about local government, stimulate public education, promote socioeconomic
development and equality, foster lateral communication among and between
citizens, and enhance civic participation. Mario Morino, in an oft-cited
1994 paper,
defined civic networking as a "process, facilitated by the tools of electronic
communications and information, that improves and magnifies human
communication and interaction in a community." It does this in a number
of ways:
By bringing together members of a community and promoting debate,
deliberation and resolution of shared issues.
By organizing communication and information relevant to the communities'
needs and problems on a timely basis.
By engaging and involving the participation of a broad base of citizens,
including community activists, leaders, sponsors, and service providers,
on
an ongoing basis.
By striving to include all members of the community, especially those in
low-income neighborhoods and those with disabilities or limited mobility.
By making basic services available at fair and reasonable costs, or free.
And, most importantly, by represent local culture, local relevance, local
pride, and a strong sense of community ownership [19]
The prototypical example of a community network is the Cleveland Free- Net,
which
began as an experiment in making medical information publicly accessible
over an
electronic bulletin board system. Today it has evolved into a sophisticated
network
serving over 160,000 registered users in the greater Cleveland area. Cleveland
Free-Net founder, Tom Grundner, captured the spirit of the civic networking
philosophy when he observed,
America's progress toward an equitable Information Age will not be
measured by the number of people we can make dependent upon the
Internet. Rather, it is the reverse. It will be measured by the number of
local systems we can build, using local resources, to meet local
needs. Our progress ... will not be measured by the number of people
who can access the card catalog at the University of Paris, but by the
number of people who can find out what's going on at their kids'
school, or get information about the latest flu bug which is going
around their community.[20]
A great deal has been written about community networks as tools for promoting
civil
society and they have been the focus of intensive study in recent years.
Nevertheless, much of the literature is still of an advocacy genre and empirical
evidence is difficult to come by. How, then, do we measure the effectiveness
of
on-line networks in fostering stronger communities? In what follows, I outline
three
qualities vital to healthy communities -- public space, deliberation, and
social
capital -- and examine the extent to which networks can support and enhance
these
qualities.
Public Space
In his seminal work on the public sphere, the German philosopher Jurgen
Habermas
defined public space as "a domain of our social life in which such a thing
as public
opinion can be formed."[21] Public space can take many forms, from parks
and
playgrounds to pubs, libraries, cafes and neighborhood centers. The important
thing
is that they provide settings for informal public life, places where citizens
can gather
spontaneously to interact and discuss issues of common concern. To Lewis
Mumford, these places are "civic nuclei." Benjamin Barber calls them "talk
shops."
And in his book The Great Good Place, Ray Oldenburg describes them as "third
places" -- neutral grounds away from home and work where citizens can establish
a
connection with other members of their community and begin to develop a
collective
identity.[22]
One of today's most pressing concerns is what to do about disappearing public
spaces. Across the United States, parks, schools, playgrounds, libraries,
and even
streets are being privatized at an unprecedented rate. One reason is the
drive on the
part of many Americans for increased security, "security not only from crime
but
also from any unwanted interaction with one's fellow citizens," as one journalist
put
it.[23] This is especially evident in many of the nation's newer suburbs
which
separate people not only physically but also on the basis of age, income,
and sets
of interests.
It would be a stretch to call on-line networks "public spaces." They are,
in most
cases, neither public (since network providers are often private, for-profit
enterprises)
nor spaces, at least in the conventional sense. Still, networks can serve
some of
the functions of more traditional public spaces. Some software developers,
in fact,
have actually gone to great lengths to stimulate the kind of informal, serendipitous
conversation that takes place on the street corner, in the university hallway,
or at
the office coffee machine. In her essay "Networlds: Networks as Social Space,"
Linda Harasim likens computer conferences to meetings, learning circles,
and
cafes. They transform "inhospitable message systems into a vibrant social
community," she writes. "There is a purpose, a place, and a population."[24]
Electronic public spaces obviously differ in important ways from conventional
spaces. They are usually text-based, for one thing, which means that many
of the
traditional features of social interaction -- physical cues, voice intonation,
eye-to-eye
contact -- are missing. Computer-mediated communication therefore tends
to be
blind to hierarchy in social relationships. It also benefits people who
may not
typically have a voice in face-to-face situations because of gender, ethnicity,
race,
age, appearance, etc. These important differences notwithstanding, on-line
venues
such as "chat rooms," mailing lists, and newsgroups can go a long way toward
disseminating new information and ideas, naming and framing collective issues,
and
promoting broad- based discussion.
In his important book Strong Democracy, Benjamin Barber identifies nine
functions
of democratic talk:
The articulation of interests; bargaining and exchange
Persuasion
Agenda-setting
Exploring mutuality
Affiliation and affection
Maintaining autonomy
Witness and self-expression
Reformulation and reconceptualization
Community-building as the creation of public interests, common goods, and
active citizens[25]
Whether the sort of discourse that takes place on-line satisfies all of
these
functions depends to a large extent on the participants in the conversation.
A
freewheeling newsgroup on the Internet, with contributors from around the
globe, will
probably not be able to satisfy more than the first two criteria, while
a small group of
individuals in a networked organization or neighborhood may well be able
to satisfy
all nine standards on Barber's list. But in either case, the virtual environment
-- the
"free space" -- enables the conversation.
Deliberation
The difference between conversation and deliberation is the difference between
what
William Gamson in Talking Politics calls "sociable" and "serious" discourse.[26]
The one is more spontaneous, uninformed and unreflective, while the other
is based
on a deeper consideration of various alternatives in addressing a specific
issue.
Deliberation is an essential feature of a democratic society because unless
citizens
have the opportunity to explore, question, and engage each other in a substantive
exchange about pressing issues, they will be unable to resolve those issues
together without outside help. The rationale for deliberation is embodied
in the
phrase: If the problem is ours, the solution must be ours.[27]
Are electronic environments conducive to deliberation? In most cases, no.
Stephen
Bates, a fellow at Annenberg's Washington Program, sums up what seems to
be
the general perception regarding computer-based communication:
It prompts more knee-jerk reactions than deliberative responses. It
gives people a way to respond instantly and often angrily and
aggressively without taking the time to mull something over. And
when there is more interesting discourse, you can tell it's people who
just love to hear the sound of their own voices. They're not really
listening to other people.[28]
Benjamin Barber suggests that the speed of the technology is inimical to
the
deliberative process -- a process which, he says, is "steeped in slowness."
The
increased use of graphical images on the Net is also an impediment to deliberation.
Deliberation is "rooted in words," Barber points out, and yet in our high-tech
age
words are increasingly trumped by visual rhetoric and flashy graphics --
not just on
television, but now on the World Wide Web as well.[29] Bruce Bimber, a political
scientist at the University of California at Santa Barbara, agrees. Despite
the
general difficulties in measuring deliberation, he says, a number of cases
and
examples suggests that there is little to indicate that the Net will be
more
deliberative than other forms of electronic communication.[30]
It should be noted, however, that much of the research on this question
and many of
the standard observations about the lack of deliberation on-line are based
on
situations in which the discussants are largely anonymous, where they have
no
bonds of affiliation beyond their participation in an on-line forum. But
what happens
when preestablished social or professional groups are electronically linked?
Can
deliberation occur between geographically dispersed authors collaborating
on a
book, say, or between networked members of a committee negotiating points
of
agreement and adopting a decision? [31]
In these instances, the electronic medium may actually facilitate deliberation.
One
advantage of computer-based communication is that it is asynchronous --
that is, it
transcends time zones and personal schedules, often allowing time for reflection
and deeper consideration of the issues involved. In the early days of the
Internet, for
example, scholars and researchers routinely posted RFCs, or requests for
comments, in the hope of stimulating dialogue, defining the right questions,
and
mapping the range of alternatives on specific questions. These were, according
to
some Net veterans, highly deliberative exchanges among colleagues. The essential
point is that deliberative dialogues of this sort require that discussants
have some
connection to each other that extends beyond their participation in a computer
network. The closer these ties, and the smaller the group, the more likely
it is that
the medium will support deliberation.
Social Capital
The term "social capital" has been getting a lot of play in recent years
thanks, in
large part, to the work of Robert Putnam. He describes social capital as
the stocks
of social trust, norms and networks that people can draw upon to solve common
problems. His research documents that networks of civic engagement, such
as
sports leagues, women's groups, and parent-teacher associations, are an
essential
form of social capital, and the denser these networks, the more likely that
members
of a community will cooperate for mutual benefit.
As Putnam points out in his influential 1995 essay "Bowling Alone," civic
engagement has been on a steady decline in the United States over the last
20 to
30 years. The most "whimsical yet discomfiting bit of evidence of social
disengagement in contemporary America," Putnam writes, is the fact that
while
bowling is more popular than ever today, bowling in organized leagues has
dropped
sharply over the last decade. The rise of solo bowling, he says, "illustrate[s]
yet
another vanishing form of social capital."[32]
One of the most pressing questions for the future, in Putnam's view, is
how to
reverse America's declining social capital and restore civic engagement
and trust.
It's a pressing question, he says, because stocks of social capital tend
to be
self-reinforcing and cumulative. As he wrote in Making Democracy Work, "virtuous
circles result in social equilibria with high levels of cooperation, trust,
reciprocity,
civic engagement, and collective well-being." But the reverse is also true:
"the
absence of these traits in uncivic community is also self-reinforcing. Defection,
distrust, shirking, exploitation, isolation, disorder, and stagnation intensify
one
another in a suffocating miasma of vicious circles."[33]
The effects of the electronic revolution have been especially pernicious,
according to
Putnam, because "technology is privatizing our lives" to an ever greater
extent.[34]
Furthermore, "Americans are in the midst of a transformation that is privileging
nonplace-based connections over place-based connections," he says.[35]
Technologies like the Internet mean that our connections with people around
the
country and around the world are getting closer, while our ties to our neighbors
across the street are weakening.
In spite of Putnam's dour assessment of the new technologies, a number of
studies
have been done that suggest that electronic networks, especially when grafted
onto
already existing social networks, can in fact enhance social capital. One
of the
most well-documented and far- reaching of these was a RAND Corporation study
of
five community networks:
The Public Electronic Network (PEN), Santa Monica, CA
The Seattle Community Network (SCN), Seattle, WA
The Playing to Win Network (PTW), Boston, MA
LatinoNet, San Francisco, CA
The Blacksburg Electronic Village (BEV), Blacksburg, VA.
The report suggests that local community networks "have the ability to support
interpersonal relationships, local community-building, and social integration."
It went
on to say that "concerns that boundary-spanning networks might facilitate
a
reduction in community affiliation, or disinterest in local affairs, appear
unfounded."[36]
Another study by Andrea Kavanaugh and Scott Patterson, scholars at Virginia
Polytechnic Institute and State University, produced similar findings. In
their
research on the Blacksburg Electronic Village network in Blacksburg, Virginia,
they
found that "the community network is clearly capable of building social
networks
and information exchange needed to achieve collective action." Moreover,
users of
the network reported a sense of being closer to the community. These findings
"point to a kind of capacity building with the potential for increasing
social capital,"
according to Kavanaugh and Patterson.[37]
These findings confirm what Howard Rheingold observed from his long- time
participation on the WELL, namely that "the community-building power comes
from
the living database that the participants create and use together informally
as they
help each other solve problems, one to one and many to many. The web of
human
relationships that can grow along with the database is where the potential
for
cultural and political change can be found."[38]
The important thing is that the electronic linkage reinforce already existing
networks
within the community, not attempt to recreate them. To do this, community
networks must be "woven into the fabric of community -- not patched or pieced,"
as
Douglas Schuler points out. "Community networks need to work strongly and
strategically with other community institutions and organizations."[39]
Steve Cisler
recommends that "any community network that is being designed or already
exists,
not only include face-to-face meetings of the board and technical staff
but also
regular meetings or social events to involve the users and the community
that it
serves."[40]
Conclusion
The trouble with the virtual community metaphor is that it implies that
technology
itself can create community. Usually its effect is the very opposite: it
hastens the
breakdown of traditional community. Still, electronic networks can play
a role in
strengthening communities if they are used to augment social networks that
are
already in place. In addition to their obvious benefits as text-based information
systems, networks can serve as public spaces for informal citizen-to-citizen
interaction, they can support rational dialogue and, in some cases, deliberation,
and
they can promote the social connectedness, trust, and cooperation that constitute
social capital.
Notes
1. Robert Putnam, "The Strange Disappearance of Civic America," The American
Prospect, No. 24 (Winter 1996).
2. Putnam, "The Strange Disappearance of Civic America."
3. For more on the first category, see my papers "Electronic Democracy:
A
Literature Survey" (February 1993) and "Teledemocracy vs. Deliberative Democracy"
(November 1994). For more on the second category, see, for instance, Electronic
Democracy: Using the Internet to Influence American Politics by Graeme Browning
(Wilton, CT: Pemberton Press, 1996) and Net Activism: How Citizens Use the
Internet by Ed Schwartz (O'Reilly and Associates, 1996).
4. Howard Rheingold, "A Slice of Life in My Virtual Community," in Global
Networks: Computers and International Communication. Linda M. Harasim, editor.
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993), p. 64.
5. Rheingold, "A Slice of Life in My Virtual Community," p. 64.
6. Rheingold, "A Slice of Life in My Virtual Community," p. 64.
7. Howard Rheingold, The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic
Frontier (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1993), p. 3.
8. Howard H. Frederick, Global Communication and International Relations
(Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1993), p. 7.
9. David Ehrenfeld, "Pseudocommunities," Orion, Autumn 1993, pp. 5-6. Cited
in
Stephen Doheny-Farina, The Wired Neighborhood (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1996), pp. 83-84.
10. Stephen Doheny-Farina, The Wired Neighborhood, p. 55.
11. Rheingold, "A Slice of Life in My Virtual Community," p. 69.
12. Langdon Winner, The Whale and the Reactor: A Search for Limits in an
Age of
High Technology (University of Chicago Press, 1986), pp. 98-117.
13. Robert Theobald, "The Information Superhighway: Opportunities and Problems."
14. Nicholas Negroponte, Being Digital (New York: Afred A. Knopf, 1995), p. 165.
15. Scott London, "Life on the Electronic Frontier," Insight & Outlook,
KCBX Public
Radio, December 23, 1996 [Original broadcast].
16. Phil Agre, "Some Thoughts About Political Activity on the Internet."
August
1996.
17. Francis Fukuyama, "Now Listen, Net Freaks, It's Not Who You Know, But
Who
You Trust," Forbes, Vol. 156, No. 13 (December 4, 1995), p. S80.
18. Douglas Schuler, New Community Networks: Wired for Change (Reading,
MA:
Addison-Wesley, 1996), p. 25.
19. Mario Morino, "Assessment and Evolution of Community Networking." Paper
presented at "The Ties that Bind" conference on building community computing
networks, Cupertino, California, May 1994.
20. Tom Grundner, "Seizing the Infosphere: Toward the Formation of a Corporation
for Public Cybercasting." Paper presented at DIAC '94 conference of the
Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1994.
Cited in
Doheny-Farina, The Wired Neighborhood, p. 125.
21. Cited in Rheingold, The Virtual Community, p. 282.
22. Ray Oldenburg, The Great Good Place: Caf‚s, Coffee Shops, Community
Centers, Beauty Parlors, General Stores, Bars, Hangouts, and How They Get
You
Through the Day (New York: Paragon House, 1989).
23. Robert Gerloff, "Public Space Minus the Public," Utne Reader, No. 55
(January/February 1993), pp. 46, 48.
24. Linda M. Harasim, "Networlds: Networks as Social Space" in Global Networks:
Computers and International Communication. Linda M. Harasim, editor.
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993), p. 29.
25. Benjamin Barber, Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New
Age
(Bekeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984). Cited in Schuler, New
Community Networks, p. 117.
26. William Gamson, Talking Politics (Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 20.
27. For more on the theory and practice of deliberation, see, for instance,
Deliberation in Education and Society, J.T. Dillon, editor (Norwood, NJ:
Ablex,
1994); Joseph M. Bessette, "Deliberative Democracy: The Majority Principle
in
Republican Government" in How Democratic Is the Constitution? Robert A.
Goldwin
and William A. Schambra, editors (Washington DC: American Enterprise Institute,
1980); John Dryzek, Discursive Democracy: Politics, Policy, and Political
Science
(Cambridge University Press, 1991); Bernard Manin, "On Legitimacy and Political
Deliberation," Political Theory, Aug. 1987, pp. 338-368; and David Miller,
"Deliberative Democracy and Social Choice" Political Studies, 1992 Special
Issue,
pp. 54-67.
28. James M. Pethokoukis, "Will Internet Change Politics," Investor's Business
Daily, November 15, 1995, p. A1.
29. Benjamin Barber, keynote address at DIAC '94 conference of the Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1994.
Cited in
Doheny-Farina, The Wired Neighborhood, p. 79.
30. Bruce Bimber, "The Internet and Political Transformation," December 1996.
31. See, for instance, Linda M. Harasim and Jan Walls, "The Global Authoring
Network," and Jan Walls, "Global Networking for Local Development," both
in
Global Networks: Computers and International Communication. Linda M. Harasim,
editor. (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993).
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