43 research outputs found
Who Cares? Young Europeansâ attitudes towards the disclosure of personal identity data
In policy circles, there is increasing attention to the privacy and safety of young people\u27s personal identity data. Identity disclosure seems to be an integral part of young people\u27s lifestyles. Also, there is mixed evidence on the different attitudes regarding disclosure between young adults and more mature cohorts. The present research examines peoplesâ practices in relation to various services (e.g. social networking, health). It gauges opinions, thoughts and motivations towards personal identity data management and covers policy preferences in relation to the protection of identity data. The study was conducted in seven EU Member States, covering four regional groups where attitudes to disclosure have been shown to differ. Two focus groups were run in each country; one with young people aged 15 to 25, the other involving adults (25 to 70 years old). Analysis is based on two complementary qualitative techniques, using textual analysis software. Content analysis was used to identify the main topics emerging from the groupsâ interactions, while a âdiscriminateâ analysis was performed to obtain a deeper insight into discoursesâ similarities and differences in relation to specific variables such as age and regions/countries. While this research does not aim to provide a comprehensive view of Europeans\u27 perceptions, it highlights significant differences, particularly between young people and adults and between the different countries (cultural differences). This study consequently has significant scientific and policy implications. The results will help shape a final questionnaire for a EU27 survey on the same subject. This work will help the European Commission direct the Information Society agenda in the years to come
One moment, please: can the speed and quality of political contact affect democratic health
Contact between politicians and their constituents is the cornerstone of democracies globally but an area of scholarship that remains relatively underdeveloped. Political contact can help convey authority, provide legitimacy and facilitate governance. This article goes beyond the assumption that representatives need to communicate more with the public and suggests, instead, that the quality of contact matters. Focusing on four processes by which citizens can contact their representatives (face-to-face, by letter, email or social media), we employ an experimental vignette methodology to test whether the character and timeliness of politiciansâ responses to citizen communication affects two indicators of democratic health: (a) the latterâs satisfaction with political contact and (b) their likelihood to re-contact representatives. Our findings provide evidence that personalised communication and to a smaller extent, speed of response, can influence citizen satisfaction and their likelihood of re-engagement. This suggests politicians can improve these indicators of democratic health by adjusting the style of political contact and communication
New Media and Fat Democracy: The Paradox of Online Participation
This piece speculates on the internetâs wider influences on the shape of institutional politics in representative âactually existing democraciesâ. Findings, based on 100 semi-structured interviews with political actors (politicians, journalists and officials) operating around the UK Parliament, suggest two contrasting trends. On the one hand, more political actors at the immediate edges of the UK institutional political process are being further engaged in a sort of centrifugal movement going outwards from the centre. At the same time, the space between this extended political centre and its public periphery is increasing. This fatter, democratic elitist shift in UK politics may be interpreted as ânewâ and ICT-driven. It might equally be argued that new media is exacerbating pre-existing political party and media trends in mature democracies which fail to engage ordinary citizens
Childrenâs rights online: challenges, dilemmas and emerging directions
In debates over internet governance, the interests of children figure unevenly, and only partial progress has been made in supporting childrenâs rights online globally. This chapter examines how the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is helpful in mapping childrenâs rights to provision, protection and participation as they apply online as well as offline. However, challenges remain. First, opportunities and risks are positively linked, policy approaches are needed to resolve the potential conflict between protection on the one hand, and provision and participation on the other. Second, while parents may be relied on to some degree to balance their childâs rights and needs, the evidence suggests that a minority of parents are ill-equipped to manage this. Third, resolution is needed regarding the responsibility for implementing digital rights, since many governments prefer self-regulation in relation to internet governance. The chapter concludes by calling for a global governance body charged with ensuring the delivery of childrenâs rights
The Australian public and politics on-line: Reinforcing or reinventing representation?
Fears for the health of representative politics in advanced industrial
democracies have gained prominence in recent years with observers pointing
to a growing body of evidence that citizens are disengaging from formal
politics. One of the solutions put forward to address these perceived
problems is the incorporation, by politicians, of new communication
channels, such as the Internet and the World Wide Web (WWW). To date,
however, attention has focused largely on the supply-side of on-line
engagement by politicians rather than on levels of demand and actual use
among citizens. This article provides a âbottomâ upâ perspective to the debate
in the Australian context, looking at the e-democracy and, particularly,
e-representation debate from the publicâs viewpoint. Specifically, we address
two questions: how much support do such e-initiatives attract? And can
they bring about the mobilisation of less politically engaged groups? Our
findings show that although Australians broadly support the roll-out of
e-representation tools, current interaction levels are low. Second, although
they may have the potential to engage some younger people in the political
process, widespread mobilisation is unlikely to occur in the near future
Privacy by design: Does it matter for social networks?
Privacy is an important component of freedom and plays a key role in protecting fundamental human rights. It is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore the fact that without appropriate levels of privacy, a personâs rights are diminished. Users want to protect their privacy - particularly in âprivacy invasiveâ areas such as social networks. However, Social Network users seldom know how to protect their own privacy through online mechanisms. What is required is an emerging concept that provides users legitimate control over their own personal information, whilst preserving and maintaining the advantages of engaging with online services such as Social Networks. This paper reviews âPrivacy by Design (PbD)â and shows how it applies to diverse privacy areas. Such an approach will move towards mitigating many of the privacy issues in online information systems and can be a potential pathway for protecting usersâ personal information. The research has also posed many questions in need of further investigation for different open source distributed Social Networks. Findings from this research will lead to a novel distributed architecture that provides more transparent and accountable privacy for the users of online information systems