Building Knowledge through Debate: OpenDemocracy on the Internet

Abstract

This comment by the Executive Director of the Center for Democracy and Technology exemplifies the way we were told back in the earlier days of Internet evangelism that the future would be connected. It would be interactive, information would become free to move instantly around the world. Implicitly the digital promise was one of greater democracy. The technology of personal computers connected to each other over the Internet offers an unprecedented reach, transcending limits imposed by nationality, geography, clock-time and access (the ‘digital divide’ notwithstanding). As the theorist of new social movements Manuel Castells has argued (1996, 2001), the model for this new connectivity – in contrast to the top-down state, institution or landscape of distinct class interest – is the network. And this network could potentially include anyone who has a computer and Internet access.

The Internet has the potential to usher in an era of global democracy and communication without borders. Open, decentralized, abundant, inexpensive, user-controlled and interactive, it is the first medium that allows anyone, anywhere to find or create communities of interest, to publish to audiences around the world… to participate in government and civil society across the borders of time and distance.

(Berman 2000).