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Roger Clarke's 'Internet & Democracy'

The Internet and Democracy

Roger Clarke **

Version of 29 March 2004

Prepared for IPAA/NOIE, and included in a NOIE publication in September 2004

© Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, 2004

Available under an AEShareNet Free
for Education licence or a Creative Commons 'Some
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This document is at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/IDemocracy-0403.html


Abstract

The Internet creates new possibilities for the processes of democracy, and at the same time creates great challenges. For example, the most obvious application is to support elections; but the vulnerability of PCs makes online voting a risky proposition.

The Internet has provided greater scope for communications from parties to voters, and from Members of Parliament to their constituents. The Internet also supports a potentially very busy 'back-channel', and parties and politicians may feel some pressure as a result. They are, however, likely to feel far more concerned about representative democracy coming under threat from electronically-facilitated direct democracy.

Some aspects of eGovernment are also relevant to democratic processes. Greater community engagement and participation are possible. On the other hand, these ideas challenge the status quo. Agencies and their staff may perceive them as undermining their power relationships with citizens.

This paper surveys developments in eVoting, ePolitics and eGovernment, and identifies some specific topics on which more detailed research would be valuable.


Contents


1. Introduction

There are many senses in which the term 'eDemocracy' is used. It may refer to the automation of existing processes such as voting. Alternatively, it may encompass ways of improving upon conventional representative democracy. In its more extreme forms, the term might envisage the replacement of existing forms of democracy with something new. To many people, it also implies greater access to the workings of government. The purpose of this paper is to survey the important streams of thought that exist early in the twenty-first century.

The paper proceeds on the following basis. It commences by briefly reviewing the aspects of Internet technology and of cyberspace behaviour that appear to be particularly influential. It considers the prospects for eVoting. This leads into ways in which members of parliaments can influence their constituents, and can use polls to augment their sense of the mood of their electorate, what issues are of current concern to them, and what their opinions are on those issues. It also looks at the scope for voters firstly to monitor their local member's actions and their performance against their undertakings, and secondly to bring pressure to bear on their local members, e.g. through e-mailing campaigns and precinct and issues-based committees whose purposes may be variously to support, to influence, and to oppose.

Consideration is given to whether representative democracy is threatened by the ubiquitous and always-on nature of the Internet. Will polling graduate to referenda, initiatives, recalls and plebiscites; and will representative democracy be qualified by, or even give way to, some form of direct democracy?

Several senses of the term eGovernment are then examined, including information flows driven by agencies, and those driven by the public. Of particular interest is the progressive extension of impact assessment beyond projects with environmental impacts to those with impacts on social values such as privacy. Several movements from the second half of the twentieth century are re-visited, to see whether they may bear more fruit in the new context of the Internet and cyberspace.

The paper concludes by identifying a considerable number of issues that are in need of more detailed study.


2. The Internet's Potentials

Since it became generally available in the mid-1990s, the Internet has established itself as the information infrastructure that the economy and society had been waiting for. This paper investigates its impact on the polity.

The origins and nature of the Internet in Australia are presented in some depth in Clarke (2004). There are weaknesses in Australia's information infrastructure, in such areas as the practical availability and cost of broadband, and disadvantage based on location and on household income. On the other hand, penetration of at least the basic services is high (NOIE 2003a, 2003b), and transformation of both business and social activities is well under weigh. Accessibility appears set to improve further as wireless transmission from diverse mobile devices is facilitated.

The behaviour patterns of individuals and groups in cyberspace has some characteristics rather different from those 'in the real world'. A science is yet to emerge, but some aspects of cyberculture ethos are reasonably discernible (Clarke 1999b, 2004).

There is a blend of entertainment and infotainment, on the one hand, with a considerable amount of social discourse, on the other. Among the catch-words that people associate with the Internet are human communications, openness, egalitarianism, participation, spontaneity and pseudonymity. In the context of democracy, a particularly significant expectation that has derived from the explosion of the Web has been effective freedom of information (Clarke 2000).

The wild enthusiasm of the Web's early years has been tempered by the dot.com implosion and excesses such as spam, 'malware' (such as viruses and worms), and the dissemination of child pornography. Reactions against the Internet's impacts have the potential to seriously constrain access to information (Clarke 1999c), and perhaps even to convert the Internet into a tool of authoritarianism (Clarke 1994, 2001). The focus of this paper, however, is on the use of the Internet to enhance existing democratic processes, and perhaps to change the form of democracy.


3. eVoting

Representative democracy depends on large numbers of people electing small numbers of people to exercise powers that the constitution accords to elected representatives. Voting needs to be conducted in a context free of undue influence, or at least of coercion and a climate of fear. Voting systems must therefore be designed to protect every voter's choices against disclosure. The integrity of a voting system is also critical to public confidence. It must resist manipulation, and ensure that the vote-count reflects the votes actually cast. The system's security and integrity must be both demonstrated in advance, and audited in arrears. Achieving these objectives is very challenging.

3.1 Technology-Enhanced Booth Voting

Information technology can be applied to conventional polling-booth elections. This is often referred to as Electronic Machine Voting (EMV) or Direct Recording Electronic (DRE). Much faster and more reliable calculation of the results is feasible, especially in complex proportional schemes such as the Hare-Clark system used in Tasmania and the A.C.T. DPL (2002) provides a review of the EVACS system developed in Canberra and applied to the A.C.T. elections.

The considerable confidence that exists in relation to EVACS stands in sharp contrast to the situation in the U.S.A. Serious concerns exist there about the many different device-types that have been installed recently to address the parlous state of vote-counting in that country (e.g. Schneier 2003). Given that the modern ballot method is widely referred to in the U.S.A. as 'the Australian ballot', it is only reasonable that Australia lead the world in this area as well (e.g. Zetter 2003).

3.2 Internet Voting

There is considerable interest in enabling voting over the Internet. This is often referred to as Remote Electronic Voting (REV) or online voting. An optimistic scenario involves support for voting on any device attached to the Internet. But the nature of the Internet is such that data transmitted over it is subject to interception and adaptation. The security of commodity workstations is very low, and hence the data stored on Internet-attached devices, and the processing performed on them, are highly vulnerable to unauthorised access and manipulation.

At the other extremity, online voting might be restricted to a set of purpose-designed devices, that are located within controlled locations such as public libraries, and that transmit data over the Internet in a secure manner, e.g. by means of a Virtual Private Network (VPN).

Schemes have been used to support relatively small-scale elections, e.g. for the Boards of industry associations. There is considerable public disquiet, however, about the possible application of eVoting to the election of Members of Parliament, because there are so many risks involved. A few proposals have been put forward that might address those risks in a satisfactory manner (e.g. Chaum 1988). At this stage, none of the many competing developers have convinced sceptics that they can satisfy the requirements of a secure and auditable system.

Moreover, it has been argued that the nature of the Internet is such that it is simply not feasible for a satisfactory scheme to ever be devised. Rubin (2002) provides a review of the challenges. Jefferson et al. (2004) reports on a specific system called SERVE, that was developed in order to enable an estimated 100,000 overseas U.S. military personnel to vote over the Internet in the 2004 Presidential election. The paper concluded that the scheme has all the flaws of any DRE system, together with "numerous other fundamental security problems that leave it vulnerable to a variety of well-known cyber attacks". A matter of days after the Jefferson et al. report was published, the agency responsible for SERVE abandoned the scheme.

The most likely directions currently appear to be that eVoting schemes that utilise the Internet in some way will be applied to low-risk elections, and for informal and semi-formal polling of the views and attitudes of relatively small and well-defined electorates. As experience is gained, security is demonstrated, audits are performed, public confidence increases, comprehensive risk assessments are undertaken, and risk management plans are devised and implemented, eVoting may come to be applied to progressively more risk-prone elections.


4. ePolitics

Whether or not eVoting proves to be effective, it is only one small part of the political process. This section considers the broader question of applications of the Internet to support politics. Firstly, attention is paid to ways in which conventional representative democracy can be enhanced. Then the alternative of direct democracy is considered, followed by the possibility of intermediate forms.

4.1 Representative Democracy

Briefs (1991) argued that "we have to dismiss the idea that computerized systems, however sophisticated and extended they may be one day, will ever play a considerable, more substantive role in political decision making in a genuine sense". More than a decade has elapsed since then, and there have been no changes in 'computerized systems' so major as to undermine that thinking. But has the convergence of computing with communications, and the advent of the Internet, changed the situation?

The potential of the Internet to enhance conventional political processes was recognised at an early stage. Australia was an 'early mover' in the e-publication of Hansard and in web-casting of the proceedings of Parliament and Parliamentary Committees. Further opportunities exist in such areas as the conduct of hearings by means of Internet tele-conference and video-conference, and voter sentiment meters on web-casts, e.g. of Question Time. Progress has been slow in the area of Petitions, however. In almost all Australian jurisdictions, they must still be on paper, and signed by each petitioner in writing (resisting the electronic transactions legislation which was passed before the end of the last century).

Common uses have been for communications to citizens from parliamentarians and political parties. Party web-sites have been established to encourage membership, declare policy, and provide public access to media releases. Domain-names have been acquired to assist in the projection of both party and person 'brand-names', and in specific campaigns.

Email has been harnessed, to such an extent that the House and Senate were virtually unanimous in exempting political parties from the spam legislation that the Parliament enacted in late 2003. It is likely that additional means will be harnessed or invented, in order to to support communication of political messages to voters. For example, 'push-polling' (a political message disguised as a survey question) lends itself to Internet contexts.

The Internet supports voter-pull as well as politician-push. Web-sites and search-engines make the past statements and actions of parliamentarians much more easily researchable than used to be the case. Inconsistency over time and in different venues, and duplicity, are more readily unearthed, and more readily brought to attention. Whether this will cause politicians to become less inconsistent and less duplicitous, or voters to become more cynical about politicans, remains to be seen.

In addition to such 'representative-watch' capabilities, the Internet offers additional scope. There has been a tendency for parliamentarians to treat individual emails as being informal communications rather than 'letters from constituents'. Coordinated email-campaigns can be somewhat more convincing, especially if checks confirm that the identities, the contact-points and the message are authentic. On the other hand, these approaches have to date shown little sign of displacing talk-back radio as the barometer of electoral opinion.

Some more formalised approaches may, however, attract closer attention from representatives. Opinion polling has long been conducted by parties. The economics may be changing, and it could become more feasible for individual MPs to conduct them within their own constituencies. In addition, electronically-supported election committees may prove highly valuable to candidates. If so, then such groups might soon negotiate themselves into a fuller role as standing constituency committees. Issues-based groups may also gain attention, although perhaps only in relation to those issues that are perceived by politicians to be important enough to swing an election result.

Finally, the Internet facilitates social activism. In addition to familiar real-world activities such as marches, demonstrations and sit-ins, social activism has a cyberspace dimension. The Internet has been a boon for interest groups in conducting consultations, preparing submissions, and coordinating action. Instruction in responsible social activism is offered on such sites as Net Action. A case study from the N.S.W. South Coast is provided by Allen (2003).

At its most extreme and non-constructive, social activism can involve automated generation of volumes of emails, web site defacements and redirects, web site parodies, and 'denial of service' attacks on political web-sites. A collective term for such relatively destructive forms is 'hacktivism' (sfear 1999). Politicians can ensure that only extremist trouble-makers resort to such methods by responding positively to more constructive approaches.

4.2 Direct Democracy

One of the original reasons for representative democracy being preferred over other forms was practicality. Transport, electronic communications, and now the Internet have rendered direct democracy far more practicable than it used to be. For the existing system of parliamentary democracy to retain acceptance, it may be necessary for the Internet to be applied to more than just a few minor enhancements to representative democracy. An analysis of alternatives is currently being undertaken by the Victorian Parliament.

Direct democracy involves the voting public having powers greater than merely the election of representatives. Examples include:

Direct democracy risks influence by the powerful, and rapid swings in voter sentiment. On the other hand, these forms originated in Ancient Greece, and they co-exist with contemporary representative democracy. Switzerland and the 50% of U.S. states that have at least some form of direct ballot have not become ungovernable.

The outright replacement of representative democracy may be too risky, or simply too threatening to established interests. Several intermediate forms already exist, however, and more are likely to emerge. For a recent review of developments, see Economist (2003).

An example of particular relevance is the 'deliberative poll'. This involves a forum in which discussion and analysis are conducted, and communicated to both Parliamentarians and the public. It enables participation, and provides voice, but the Parliament delegates no power of decision. This approach is unusual in Australia, although the Constitutional Commission of 1987-88 was an example.

The Internet provides ample means whereby fora could be created to support deliberative polling. Large representative groups could be periodically provided with information, and their thoughts gathered using Internet channels. Individuals could volunteer for limited-term participation in such 'councils', 'advisory bodies' or 'juries'. Assimilation of such elements of direct democracy may be necessary for the existing system of parliamentary democracy to retain acceptance.


5. eGovernment

The term 'eGovernment' is commonly used to refer to any form of information or service delivery by government agencies to other parties, including individuals, business enterprises and other government agencies. The focus of this paper is on only those aspects that directly relate to the democratic process.

Communications from government agencies to citizens have matured from brochure-ware, to information services, and on to discovery processes including both structured menus and search engines. For some years now, entry-points have been provided to mediate between citizen needs and agency structures, in many cases across jurisdictional boundaries (Clarke 1999a).

Other categories of eGovernment are, on the other hand, less well-developed. Some agencies accept communications from citizens by email, or by less user-friendly web-form interfaces. These communications are capable of being supported by sophisticated workflow processes, although correspondence management systems are only now being enhanced to deliver on that promise.

Meanwhile, some agencies appear to be concerned that email will generate increased volumes of unwanted communications from their clients and from other interested parties. The tensions between service, on the one hand, and on the other cost-control and cost-transfer, loom large in this area.

Norms for the handling of enquiries and complaints were set long ago by Ombudsman's Offices and standards organisations, e.g. SA (1995), Ombudsman (1997). Despite this, there has been considerable reluctance among some agencies to support even effective paper-based and phone-based enquiry- and complaints-systems. Still less has the Internet been exploited to facilitate their submission and handling.

eFoI has yet to emerge, because agencies are continuing to work to the letter of the Freedom of Information Act and ignore its spirit, as expressed in s. 3: "It is the intention of the Parliament that the provisions of this Act shall be interpreted so as to further the object [of extending as far as possible the right of the Australian community to access to information in the possession of the Government of the Commonwealth], and that any discretions conferred by this Act shall be exercised as far as possible so as to facilitate and promote, promptly and at the lowest reasonable cost, the disclosure of information".

Laeaks of government information are becoming more common, partly because of the ease with which digital copies are replicated and transmitted, but also because of the convenience and informality of many Internet-enabled communications channels. Moreover, the barriers to effective research by individuals and groups have been broken down by the eLibrary that the Web has enabled, coupled with the power of search-engines. If government agencies fail to adopt a constructive approach to eFoI, public interest groups may mobilise the resources to do the job for them.

The Internet offers many opportunities for improved communications between community groups and government agencies. Distance and cost have been barriers in the past, but it is now much more praticable to establish and maintain focus groups, and to run formal advisory groups and consultative committees. Some Australian government agencies have done so, but others actively avoid constructive consultation with stakeholders. Rare among Australian governments is the guidance on community consultation provided by the government fo Western Australia (WA 2002).

This reluctance is in marked contrast to governments overseas. European countries have been positive about eDemocracy (e.g. CoE 2002, whose key Principle is reproduced in the Appendix to this paper). The European Union has invested in support for interactions among citizens about eGovenment-related matters. Initiatives on consultation and participation have been launched by the governments of Canada and New Zealand. The OECD has also initiated policy discussions in this area (OECD 2003).

Clarke (1992) drew attention to the significant differences between conventional information systems and the then-emergent 'extra-organisational systems', to which people were directly connected. The early examples, such as ATMs and EFT/POS systems, depended on dedicated networks; but the Internet has enabled such systems to become commonplace.

The last half-century has seen a long series of discussions about how to increase the involvement of stakeholders in the conception, design and operation of information systems. These have included:

The emergence of a practical mechanism for participation can be seen in the progressive mutation from Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) to the much more community-involving Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) notion. These are paralleled by the greatly increased recognition of the need for Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) (Clarke 1998), and Social Impact Assessment (SIA).

The Internet has altered the economics of participation. Government agencies may find themselves less well able to resist public demands for meaningful consultation on initiatives prior to the preparation of enabling legislation.


6. Conclusions

The Internet has opened up a greatly increased range of options for the Australian polity. They bring to a head the long-simmering tension between government as mechanism of social control and government as service-provider to citizens. Parliaments and individual agencies will feel the threat of change to long-established institutions and processes, and to the basis on which they exercise power. If the tensions are to work themselves out constructively, much more information is needed on the wide variety of options.

Possible fora within which new ideas might be investigated include the Australian Electoral Commission and the Parliament's Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. Neither appears to have considered eDemocracy matters to date, however. Other possibilities are OIE's Citizen Engagement Program and Policy Consultation Program.

The following are specific projects that, in the basis of the survey conducted in this paper, would make valuable contributions to eDemocracy in Australia:


References

Allen J. (2003) 'Mogo Charcoal Plant Campaign: How the Internet was Utilised' Charcoalition, February 2003, at http://www.acr.net.au/~coastwatchers/charcoalition/objects/howinternetutilised.pdf

Briefs U. (1991) 'Support of Parliamentary Decision Making by Computerized Information Systems: The West German Experience' in Clarke R. & Cameron J. (Eds.) 'Managing Information Technology's Organisational Impact' North-Holland, 1991, pp. 335-339

Chaum D. (1988) 'Elections with unconditionally-secret ballots and disruption equivalent to breaking RSA' In Advances in Cryptology - EUROCRYPT '88 (Berlin, 1988), C. G. Gunther, Ed., vol. 330 of Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer-Verlag, pp. 177-18

Checkland P. (1981) 'Systems Thinking, Systems Practice' Wiley, Chichester, 1981Checkland P. and Scholes J. (1990) 'Soft Systems Methodology in Action' Wiley, Chichester, 1990

Clarke R. (1992) 'Extra-Organisational Systems: A Challenge to the Software Engineering Paradigm', Proc. IFIP World Congress, Madrid, September 1992, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/SOS/PaperExtraOrgSys.html

Clarke R. (1994) 'Information Technology: Weapon of Authoritarianism or Tool of Democracy?' Proc. World Congress, Int'l Fed. of Info. Processing, Hamburg, September 1994, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/PaperAuthism.html

Clarke R. (1998) 'Privacy Impact Assessments', Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, February 1998, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/PIA.html

Clarke R. (1999a) 'Electronic Services Delivery: From Brochure-Ware to Entry Points'. Proc. 12th International Bled EC Conf., Slovenia, June 1999, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/EC/ESD.html

Clarke R. (1999b) 'Ethics and the Internet: The Cyberspace Behaviour of People, Communities and Organisations' Bus. & Prof'l Ethics J. 18, 3&4 (1999) 153-167, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/IEthics99.html

Clarke R. (1999c) 'Freedom of Information? The Internet as Harbinger of the New Dark Ages' First Monday 4, 11 (November 1999), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue4_11/clarke/, and at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/DarkAges.html

Clarke R. (2000) '"Information Wants to be Free"', Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, February 2000, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/IWtbF.html

Clarke R. (2001) 'Paradise Gained, Paradise Re-lost: How the Internet is being Changed from a Means of Liberation to a Tool of Authoritarianism' Mots Pluriels 18 (August 2001), at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/PGPR01.html

Clarke R. (2004) 'Origins and Nature of the Internet in Australia' Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, January 2004, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/OzI04.html#IUse

CoE (2002) 'Draft recommendation on e-governance' Council of Europe Committee of Ministers, June 2002, at http://www.coe.int/t/e/integrated_projects/democracy/02_Activities/01_e-governance/01_e-governance_draft_recs_v2.asp#TopOfPage

DPL (2002) 'Electronic Voting in the 2001 ACT Election' Department of the Parliamentary Library, Research Note 2001-02 No. 46, 18 June 2002, at http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rn/2001-02/02rn46.pdf

Economist (2003) 'Power to the people: A pervasive web will increase demands for direct democracy' 23 January 2003, at http://www.economist.com/opinion/PrinterFriendly.cfm?Story_ID=1534259

Emery F. (1997) 'Participative design: effective, flexible and successful, now!' The Journal for Quality and Participation, 1997, at http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/7527/fred.pdf

Emery F. & Emery M. (1993) 'Participative design for participative democracy' The Australian National University, Centre for Continuing Education

Emery F.E. and Trist E.L. (1960) 'Socio-technical systems' in Churchman C.W. and Verhulst M. (Eds.) 'Management Science Models and Techniques Vol. 2' Pergamon, Oxford, 1960

Jefferson D., Rubin A.V., Simons B. & Wagner D. (2004) 'A Security Analysis of the Secure Registration and Voting Experiment (SERVE)' 20 January 2004, at http://www.servesecurityreport.org/

Kling R. (1999) 'What is Social Informatics and Why Does it Matter?' D-Lib Magazine 5, 1 (January 1999), at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january99/kling/01kling.html

Mumford E. (1983) 'Designing Human Systems', Manchester Bus. Sch., 1983

NOIE (2003a) 'Pocket Stats' National Office for the Information Economy, July 2003, at http://www.noie.gov.au/publications/NOIE/statistics/pocket_stats.htm

NOIE (2003b) 'NOIE Information Economy Index' National Office for the Information Economy, August 2003, at http://www.noie.gov.au/publications/NOIE/NOIE_index/Aug03/index.htm

OECD (2003) 'Engaging Citizens Online for Better Policy-making' OECD Policy Brief, March 2003, at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/62/23/2501856.pdf

Ombudsman (1997) 'Good Practice Guide to Complaint Handling', Commonwealth Ombudsman, 1997, at http://www.ombudsman.gov.au/publications_information/Special_Reports/good_practice.pdf

Rubin A.D. (2002) 'Security Considerations for Remote Electronic Voting' Communications of the ACM, 45, 12 (December 2002)

SA (1995) ' Complaints handling ' Australian Standard AS 4269-1995

Schneier B. (2003) 'Computerized and Electronic Voting' Crypto-Gram Newsletter, December 15, 2003, at http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0312.html#9

sfear (1999) 'Introduction to Hacktivism', Collusion Volume 6, Dec 1999, at http://www.collusion.org/Article.cfm?ID=109

WA (2002) 'Consulting Citizens: A Resource Guide', Citizens and Civics Unit of the Government of Western Australia, April 2002, at http://www.ccu.dpc.wa.gov.au/docs/guidecolour.pdf

Zetter K. (2003) 'E-Voting Done Right in Australia', Wired Magazine, 3 November 2003, at http://www.wired.com/news/ebiz/0,1272,61045,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1


Resources
eDemocracy Generally

Clift S. (2000-) 'E-Democracy, E-Governance and Public Net-Work', at http://publicus.net/articles/edempublicnetwork.html

CoE (2002) 'Draft recommendation on e-governance' Council of Europe Committee of Ministers, June 2002, at http://www.coe.int/t/e/integrated_projects/democracy/02_Activities/01_e-governance/01_e-governance_draft_recs_v2.asp#TopOfPage

Communications of the ACM 44, 1 (January, 2001), Special Issue: 10 articles on eDemocracy

Minnesota E-Democracy, at http://www.e-democracy.org/. Reflecting the intrusion of commercialism, this group claims E-Democracy as their registered trademark since January 1998, at http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=75218010

Pew (2003) 'Untuned Keyboards: Online campaigners, citizens, and portals in the 2002 elections' Pew Research Centers, 20 March 2003, at Report=85http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=85

eDemocracy Generally in Australia

Geiselhart K. (1998) 'Democracy in an Information Age - Attractors and Bifurcations' Melbourne Journal of Politics, vol. 28, at http://www.bf.rmit.edu.au/kgeiselhart/assets/images/melb_j_of_pol.doc

Geiselhart K. (2002-) 'Electronic Democracy Resources, at http://doctordemocracy.net/resources.htm

Griffiths M. (2002) 'Australian eDemocracy? The potential for citizens and governments', Monash University, 26 March 2002, at http://www.egov.vic.gov.au/Documents/eDemocracy1.doc

Victorian eGovernment Resource Centre, at http://www.egov.vic.gov.au/Research/ElectronicDemocracy/edemocracy.htm

Internet Technology

Clarke R. (2003) 'Wireless Transmission and Mobile Technologies' Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, October 2003, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/EC/WMT.html

Clarke R. (2004) 'Origins and Nature of the Internet in Australia' Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, January 2004, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/OzI04.html

Clarke R., Higgs P.L. & Dempsey G. (2000) 'Key Design Issues in Marketspaces for Intellectual Property Rights' Proc. 13th International EC Conference, Bled, Slovenia, 19-21 June 2000, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/EC/Bled2K.html

NOIE (2003a) 'Pocket Stats' National Office for the Information Economy, July 2003, at http://www.noie.gov.au/publications/NOIE/statistics/pocket_stats.htm

NOIE (2003b) 'NOIE Information Economy Index' National Office for the Information Economy, August 2003, at http://www.noie.gov.au/publications/NOIE/NOIE_index/Aug03/index.htm

Cyberspace Behaviour

Clarke R. (1999) 'Ethics and the Internet: The Cyberspace Behaviour of People, Communities and Organisations' Bus. & Prof'l Ethics J. 18, 3&4 (1999) 153-167, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/IEthics99.html

Clarke R. (2000) '"Information Wants to be Free"', Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, 24 February 2000, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/IWtbF.html

Clarke R. (2001) 'Paradise Gained, Paradise Re-lost: How the Internet is being Changed from a Means of Liberation to a Tool of Authoritarianism' Mots Pluriels 18 (August 2001), at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/PGPR01.html

Clarke R. (2004) 'Origins and Nature of the Internet in Australia' Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, January 2004, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/OzI04.html#IUse

eVoting

Chaum D. (1988) 'Elections with unconditionally-secret ballots and disruption equivalent to breaking RSA' In Advances in Cryptology - EUROCRYPT '88 (Berlin, 1988), C. G. Gunther, Ed., vol. 330 of Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer-Verlag, pp. 177-18

Lorrie Cranor's resource pages, at http://lorrie.cranor.org/voting/

election.com Inc., at http://www.election.com

Electoral Commission 2002, 'Modernising elections: A strategic evaluation of the 2002 electoral pilot schemes', at http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/files/dms/Modernising_elections_6574-6170__E__N__S__W__.pdf

'Electronic Voting' entry for an Encyclopedia of Computers and Computer History, at http://lorrie.cranor.org/pubs/evoting-encyclopedia.html

EPIC's Voting Page, at http://www.epic.org/privacy/voting/

e-Voting Security Study, CESG, 31 July 2002, at http://www.edemocracy.gov.uk/library/papers/study.pdf

Fischer E.A. (2003) 'Election Reform and Electronic Voting Systems (DREs): Analysis of Security Issues' November 4, 2003, Congressional Research Service, The Library of Congress, at http://www.epic.org/privacy/voting/crsreport.pdf

Report of the National Workshop on Internet Voting: Issues and Research Agenda March 2001 Sponsored by the National Science Foundation, at http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/voting/nsfe-voterprt.pdf

Tadayoshi K. T., Stubblefield A., Rubin A.D. & Wallach D.S. 'Analysis of an Electronic Voting System', Johns Hopkins Information Security Institute Technical Report, TR-2003-19, July 23, 2003, at http://avirubin.com/vote/

Concerns About the Integrity of eVoting

The Free eDemocracy Project, by Jason Kitcat, at http://www.free-project.org/learn/ (includes 'Key Players' in the industry)

FIPR Reservations, at http://www.fipr.org/eDemocracy/FIPR.html

Jefferson D., Rubin A.V., Simons B. & Wagner D. (2004) 'A Security Analysis of the Secure Registration and Voting Experiment (SERVE)' 20 January 2004, at http://www.servesecurityreport.org/

National Committee for Voting Integrity, at http://www.votingintegrity.org

'Recommendation on legal and operational standards for e-enabled voting (Second Draft)' Multidisciplinary Ad Hoc Group of Specialists for the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers, July 2003, at http://www.coe.int/T/e/integrated%5Fprojects/democracy/02%5FActivities/02%5Fe%2Dvoting/02%5FDraft%5FRecommendation/04IP(2003)47revision_after_LOS_220703.asp#TopOfPage

Rubin A.D. (2002) 'Security Considerations for Remote Electronic Voting' Communications of the ACM, 45, 12 (December 2002)

Schneier B. (2001) 'Internet Voting vs. Large-Value e-Commerce' Crypto-Gram Newsletter, February 15, 2001, at http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0102.html#10

Schneier B. (2003) 'Computerized and Electronic Voting' Crypto-Gram Newsletter, December 15, 2003, at http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0312.html#9

Verified Voting Coalition, at http://www.verifiedvoting.com/

eVoting in Australia

A.C.T. Government report on the A.C.T. election system, at http://www.elections.act.gov.au/EVACS.html

DPL (2002) 'Electronic Voting in the 2001 ACT Election' Department of the Parliamentary Library, Research Note 2001-02 No. 46, 18 June 2002, at http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rn/2001-02/02rn46.pdf

EVACS, the software developer's site for Electronic Voting and Counting System, at http://www.softimp.com.au/evacs.html

Victorian eGovernment Resource Centre, at http://www.egov.vic.gov.au/Research/ElectronicDemocracy/voting.htm

Zetter K. (2003) 'E-Voting Done Right in Australia', Wired Magazine, 3 November 2003, at http://www.wired.com/news/ebiz/0,1272,61045,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1

ePolitics

Briefs U. (1991) 'Support of Parliamentary Decision Making by Computerized Information Systems: The West German Experience' in Clarke R. & Cameron J. (Eds.) 'Managing Information Technology's Organisational Impact' North-Holland, 1991, pp. 335-339

Broder D.S. (2000) 'Democracy Derailed: Initiative Campaigns and the Power of Money' Harcourt, 2000

Chen P. (2002) 'Virtual Representation: Australian Elected Representatives and the Impact of the Internet' Journal of Information, Law and Technology 2002 Issue 3, at http://elj.warwick.ac.uk/jilt/02%2D3/chen.html

Davis S., Elin L. & Reeher G. (2002) 'Click on Democracy: The Internet's Power to Change Political Apathy into Civic Action' Westview, 2002

Economist (2003) 'Power to the people: A pervasive web will increase demands for direct democracy' 23 January 2003, at http://www.economist.com/opinion/PrinterFriendly.cfm?Story_ID=1534259

Norris, P. (2000) 'Democratic Divide? The Impact of the Internet on Parliaments Worldwide, Harvard University' 2001, Proc. Am. Pol. Sc. Assoc. Annual Meeting, Washington DC, 31 August - 2 September 2000, at http://ksghome.harvard.edu/%7E.pnorris.shorenstein.ksg/acrobat/apsa2000demdiv.pdf

Norris P. (2002) 'Democratic Phoenix: Reinventing Political Activism' Cambridge University Press, 2002

Project on Government Oversight, at http://www.pogo.org/

Internet Activism

Allen J. (2003) 'Mogo Charcoal Plant Campaign: How the Internet was Utilised' Charcoalition, February 2003, at http://www.acr.net.au/~coastwatchers/charcoalition/objects/howinternetutilised.pdf

The Hacktivist, at http://www.thehacktivist.com/

McKay N. (1998) 'The Golden Age of Hacktivism' Wired Magazine, 22 September 1998, at http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,15129,00.htmlNet Action (1998-2001) 'The Virtual Activist 2.0', at http://www.netaction.org/training/

Ramasastry A. (2002) 'the Law And Politics Of Internet Activism: The Yes Men, Peta, Rtmark, And The Phenomenon Of Parody Websites', Wednesday, FindLaw's Legal Commentary, Jun. 05, 2002, at http://writ.news.findlaw.com/ramasastry/20020605.html

eGovernment

Clarke R. (1994) 'Information Technology: Weapon of Authoritarianism or Tool of Democracy?' Proc. World Congress, Int'l Fed. of Info. Processing, Hamburg, September 1994, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/PaperAuthism.html

Clarke R. (1998) 'Privacy Impact Assessments', Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, February 1998, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/PIA.html

Clarke R. (1999) 'Electronic Services Delivery: From Brochure-Ware to Entry Points'. Proc. 12th International Bled EC Conf., Slovenia, June 1999, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/EC/ESD.html

Clarke R. (1999) 'Freedom of Information? The Internet as Harbinger of the New Dark Ages' First Monday 4, 11 (November 1999), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue4_11/clarke/, and at http://www.rogerclarke.com/II/DarkAges.html

Consulting Canadians, at http://www.consultingcanadians.gc.ca/cpcPubHome.jsp?lang=en

Ombudsman (1997) 'Good Practice Guide to Complaint Handling', Commonwealth Ombudsman, 1997, at http://www.ombudsman.gov.au/publications_information/Special_Reports/good_practice.pdf

Participate in [NZ] Government, at http://www.govt.nz/en/participate

SA (1995) ' Complaints handling ' Australian Standard AS 4269-1995

WA (2002) 'Consulting Citizens: A Resource Guide', Citizens and Civics Unit of the Government of Western Australia, April 2002, at http://www.ccu.dpc.wa.gov.au/docs/guidecolour.pdf

Consultation and Participation

Beer S. (1972) 'Brain of the Firm' Allen Lane, London, 1972Beer S. (1975) 'Platform for Change' Wiley, New York, 1975

Checkland P. (1981) 'Systems Thinking, Systems Practice' Wiley, Chichester, 1981Checkland P. and Scholes J. (1990) 'Soft Systems Methodology in Action' Wiley, Chichester, 1990

Clarke R. (1992) 'Extra-Organisational Systems: A Challenge to the Software Engineering Paradigm', Proc. IFIP World Congress, Madrid, September 1992, at http://www.rogerclarke.com/SOS/PaperExtraOrgSys.html

Emery F. (1997) 'Participative design: effective, flexible and successful, now!' The Journal for Quality and Participation, 1997, at http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/7527/fred.pdf

Emery F. & Emery M. (1993) 'Participative design for participative democracy' The Australian National University, Centre for Continuing Education

Emery F.E. and Trist E.L. (1960) 'Socio-technical systems' in Churchman C.W. and Verhulst M. (Eds.) 'Management Science Models and Techniques Vol. 2' Pergamon, Oxford, 1960

International Association for Public Participation, at http://www.iap2.org/

Kling R. (1999) 'What is Social Informatics and Why Does it Matter?' D-Lib Magazine 5, 1 (January 1999), at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january99/kling/01kling.html

Miller J.G. (1978) 'Living Systems' McGraw-Hill, New York, 1978

Mumford E. (1983) 'Designing Human Systems', Manchester Bus. Sch., 1983

OECD (2003) 'Engaging Citizens Online for Better Policy-making' OECD Policy Brief, March 2003, at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/62/23/2501856.pdf

Wood-Harper A.T., Antill L and Avison D.E. (1985) 'Information Systems Definition: The Multiview Approach' Blackwell, Oxford, 1985


Appendix: The Council of Europe on eDemocracy

CoE (2002) 'Draft recommendation on e-governance' Council of Europe Committee of Ministers, June 2002, at http://www.coe.int/t/e/integrated_projects/democracy/02_Activities/01_e-governance/01_e-governance_draft_recs_v2.asp#TopOfPage

Principle 2. E-democracy

Member states should


Author Affiliations

Roger Clarke is Principal of Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, Canberra. He is also a Visiting Professor in the Cyberspace Law & Policy Centre at the University of N.S.W., a Visiting Professor in the E-Commerce Programme at the University of Hong Kong, and a Visiting Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the Australian National University.



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