Will National and Global Democracy Survive - Essay Example

Without the Internet, Will National and Global Democracy Survive? I. Introduction Hundreds of years ago, the telegraph united the world together. However, this unity was of far greater benefit to institutions, and to traditions than it was for individuals. On the contrary, the Internet gave power to individuals as it accomplished in governments or in the business sector. It has facilitated many likeminded individuals in sharing information, from terrorists to activists against globalisation, allowing them to communicate and mobilise throughout the globe. While previous eras of globalisation helped increase the alternatives that individuals had to consume goods and services imported from other countries; globalisation in the 1990’s also improved the capability of individuals to influence political institutions both within and outside the frontiers of their own country (Bimber 2002). Several analysts claim that the Internet is a dynamic society. Probably not unexpectedly as it provided the originality of the new digital media, there is trivial agreement on the specific changes that occurred. The unparalleled technical innovations that led to the creation of the Internet have been thought about from various views and perspectives, above all by professionals such as engineers and computer scientists. However, a substantial aspect of the success of the Internet, the production and development of management, and authority arrangements that have facilitated the interconnection of geographically scattered computer units throughout the globe, is still something of an enigma (Cooke 1993). The processes that government officials, technocrats, entrepreneurs, and other elites in the area of leadership from multiple and diverse autonomous nations have been capable of influencing co-operations in an exceptional short period of time. These processes have prompted co-operations to design and enforce policies and directive for the relatively stabilised functioning of the Internet, within intricate business-related and legal structures at the global lever are still under study (ibid). A. Statement of the Problem This research study aims to develop sound and well-documented answers to the possible impact of the collapse of the Internet and the affect this would have on globalisation, specifically in international politics and democracy. Several analysts have coined the term “electronic democracy” (Dimaggio 2002, 307) to imply two separate meanings. The first is the scheme and operation of digital information and communication technologies to improve democratic political means. The second is a new level of democracy, a level during which the propagation of digital ICTs will have intensified democracy’s strength and legitimacy, whether on a domestic or international basis. This study will then explore and analyse the possible implications of the dissolution of this electronic democracy to the current trend of globalisation (ibid). For the theoretical framework of the study, I, the researcher aptly chose the assumptions formulated by sociologists Anthony Giddens on globalisation and Jurgen Habermas on the public sphere or democratic traditions mobilised by the Internet. B. Research Questions In order to empirically assess the potential effects of the collapse of the Internet to democratic institutions on the national and international levels, two research questions would be tested in the study using methodologies applied in social research. 1. In terms of democratic traditions, both on the national and global scales, what are the implications of the dissolution of the Internet to the evolution of new online forms of democratic enterprise? What are the prospects and difficulties most likely to emerge? What new democratic practices are achievable? 2. In terms of intensifying democracy’s strength and legitimacy, what can humanity anticipate if the Internet declines for a long-period of time? What should be the aspirations/objectives of cyber democrats if legitimate restoration is to take place, and how possible is the realisation of these goals? C. Significance of the Study Building on the research questions lay above, this study will hopefully provide a comprehensive examination of the prospects for electronic democracy, both on the national and global levels, in order to establish the potential global impact of a dysfunctional Internet which will most likely lead to its sudden collapse. I am hopeful that, in principle, the study would provide fruitful insights on the processes of democratic restoration or the prospect for smoothing the progress of the fulfilment of hopes of people from both the global North and South through technology. Drawing on assumptions from diverse disciplines in the social sciences, I am confident that the findings of the study would have profound implications on the trend of electronic democracy presently. This could then provide electronic democracy practitioners a framework for thinking about the possible challenges that national and international democratic institutions would confront if the Internet was to collapse for a prolonged period of time. However, this study would optimistically offer means of developing new technologies as alternatives to the Internet. D. Scope and Limitations This research study will only take into account one important aspect of globalisation, which is democracy, in relation to the contemporary functioning of the Internet. Hence, this study will not be able to provide a comprehensive view of the globalisation phenomenon. Furthermore, the context of the study will be situated on democratic countries of the global North, since these are the regions where the Internet has made sweeping changes. However, in order to somehow provide a brief overview of the effects of the Internet to the global South, I will conduct a secondary literature analysis in order to formulate a prediction of the likely impact of the dissolution of the Internet to Third World countries. Furthermore, given the time and resource constraints, I will only be able to take up a small sample population for the various methodologies that would be employed to answer the research questions posed by this research. II. Review of Related Literature The concept of democracy is initially rather ambiguous because of its two-sided structure. According to the Classical Democratic Theory, democracy can be either direct or indirect. The difference between the two is the channel in which the civic society exploits in order to articulate and assert their right of representation in any government decision-making activity. The participation of the voters in political ventures is greatly valued by the Classical Democratic Theory because of its emphasis on the decision making process of a particular policy and not on the numbers of policies produced within a certain period. However, democracy guarantees that these policies will signify the voices of the people and not of the privileged few. Yet, in order to generate value-free policies in a democratic society, a public sphere should be initially created wherein active and brilliant minds could convene and communicate on important matters with regard to the civil sector, and an effective disseminating mechanism should then be enforced to mould a population that is critically aware on political issues (Shane 3). This public sphere has evolved since time and in the present-day it has an incredibly compelling position through the emergence of information technology, specifically the Internet. The information superhighway, as they claim, is by far the greatest invention of humanity. It has the power to penetrate even the most intangible institutions in a society, such as the concept of democracy. The Internet is mutually beneficial and harmful to both the masses and the elected officials. Nevertheless, the Internet reinforces the objectives of an indirect democracy through informing the electorates of the capability of candidates. In this case, manipulation can be overcome. Also, the Internet provides the people convenience in accessing lawmakers through emails and other online messengers. In this way, the citizens could affect political decisions in a more reachable way (Schaefer 233). Likewise, the voting process can also be made easier and more indeed accessible through the Internet. Some people who are eligible voters sometimes discard this right because of the inconvenience of the voting process. Interest groups that have limited resources to recruit members and publicise pamphlets containing their history and objectives can now compete with large private organisations through the Internet. Similarly, the affordability of the Internet produced numerous political parties that could challenge the dominance of the commonplace two-party system. Biases that are usually transmitted by the leading parties could be mitigated through attempts from the third parties to counter the attack through the Internet. On the contrary, the disadvantages of the Internet can be manifested between the line separating the privileged who are computer literate and those that are marginalised due to defective economic conditions. Instead of levelling off social inequality, the Internet could provide a deeper rift between the two social groups. Another weakness of the Internet is the inability to monitor sites that are loaded with prejudice and biases that could pollute young minds. This corruption of the minds could then lead to the fall of democracy. Finally, the Internet minimises face-to-face interaction among participants of various social movements, hence reducing the likelihood of a clear compromise and agreement (235). The virtual space not only eliminates genuine social interaction but also pristine human attachment. The Internet in a democratic country has been granted the responsibility to strengthen the continuation of an unrestrained and liberated communication between the private and the public sector. Yet, a dilemma will arise if democracy in a particular nation has not yet been legitimised, for example in China. In situations like this, the Internet could aid in the creation of democracy but with much cultural and political drawbacks. Communication technologies have begun to take progressive form. The mass media not only hosted, printed and broadcast sources but so too has computer and information technologies. Information became more accessible through computer and other entertainment-orientated sources. Media became a more progressive public sphere as new communication networks were established. The consumption of information is no longer limited to the elite, corporations, and government. Citizens can now access important public information through communication networks and centres. This universal admittance to essential information will consequently affect the participation of individuals in democratic nations. As the population becomes adequately informed and kept up-to-date with critical occurrences in their society, the more successful the public sphere of the mass media will be. Information technologies could be used either as an advocacy or an opposition against the framework of modern democracies. Nevertheless, communication technology is multi-directional which can link individuals with diverse social, cultural, and political experiences across continents. Individuals are now given the privilege to participate in a public debate or discussion by means of the ingenious modem. Groups of people who upheld different social views and objectives can now affect public opinion through the web sites, online community bulletin boards, or computer-generate symposiums. Computer data bases hold tons of media sources ranging from newspapers to actual conferences and political hearings. Organizations of environmentalists, peace advocates, feminists, post-modern literalists, and others have setup their own data bases for the intellectual consumption of responsive citizens (Kellner para 35-37). Anthony Giddens defined globalisation as a phenomenon wherein social relations and communications take on a worldwide scale. Globalisation makes local nations vulnerable to international events or to incidences happening miles away. The modifications on the social, cultural and economic domains of the domestic sector of every nation become swift and drastic in a globalised world (Fatton 2001: p. 2). Trends such as free trade, capitalism and democracy lead people to think globally. Some people believe that free trade is an access to civil liberties and equal allocation of resources through its emphasis on increasing economic progress and opportunity. Recent international crises such as high prices, high unemployment rate and low standard of living for developing countries motivated people to think in global manner. Some individuals, particularly those from the impoverished societies, consider that free trade arising from globalisation can ease the economic crises that they are continually confronting (Schaefer 1995: p. 440). In the contemporary period, people have been forced by globalisation due to the distant systems that they need to utilise so that they may live their lives efficiently. For instance, new technologies such as online banking and retailing service and other human transactions accomplished through the internet diminish the importance of face-to-face interaction between individuals. The convenience that advance technologies provide makes people wary of their isolated situation hence deciding on to think globally. Globalisation can be clearly understood through the lenses used by the renowned social thinkers such as Weber, Durkheim and Marx. Globalisation is equal to modernity. Weber viewed modernity as a period in which rationality and intensive bureaucratic activities are manifested. For Weber, everyday human activities situated in a modernised setting will still be spontaneous or natural but only within the framework of a hard-lined bureaucratic environment (Giddens 1990 as cited in Lemert 2004: p. 478). Following this premise, it is logical to conclude that for Weber globalisation restrains human activities for subsistence and survival but positively produces a creative rational character. Jurgen Habermas, in his book The Structural Formation of the Public Sphere, stressed the importance of a public sphere within a society. This public sphere will be the melting pot of different ideas and intellect from the citizens aiming for the welfare of the general public. In this form of communication, crucial public opinions may be formed. Modern democracies should definitely have an autonomous public sphere in the area of mass media. The media, as a channel for public participation and as a tool for the carrying out of desired social changes is significant in present-day democratic institutions (Thornton para 1). Participatory democracy through the independent public sphere could be successful if it is carried out with rationality. Political discussions should be devoid of emotions but critical arguments. It is also imperative that the participants will adhere to the objective of sharing the truth. In order to convey only the truth, an autonomous public sphere within a democracy should be able to compromise status discrepancies (Habermas as cited in Lemert 382-383). All participants should stand on an equal ground. In modern democracies, concentration of power and domination is not as close as to being legitimate or publicly acceptable. Robert Dahl, a modern analyst of political power, has observed that telecommunication technologies have a primary contribution in facilitating an advanced democratic nation, where regulations and laws are strongly grounded in the verdicts of the ‘demos’. Dahl is hardly solitary in debilitating a positive response to this concern. Amitai Etzioni perceives in the Internet the likelihood of an expansion in the condition of public dealings through ‘teledemocracy’. Technologist Mitchell Kapor argues the Net will “enable a Jeffersonian revolution” (Bimber 1998, 134). Lawrence Grossman claims that a third great era of democracy is coming through the guise of technology. He argues that immediately as throughout the eighteenth century democratic administration revolutionized the direct democracy founded by the Greeks over centuries ago, an innovative, combination of ‘electronic republic’ is nowadays shaping to replace the thoughts of Montesquieu, Locke and Madison and their fellow thinkers. Graeme Browning, akin to others, indicates that the tradition of ‘electronic democracy’ will vary remarkably from the tradition of historical forms of democracy. The most impressive argument yet may be that of Nicholas Negroponte, who anticipates the city-state or polis to disappear under the impact of innovative technologies (Bimber 1998). These arguments are significant not merely because they deal with an up-to-the-minute subject matter, but because they involve more basic claims regarding the contribution of communication in the configuration of political exercise. The most significant calculations about the Internet and politics amount to contributory arguments about the impact of information dissemination on political participation and the orientation of motives. A number of the well-known claims regarding the internet, communication and political reform are pumped up but not all can be without difficulty discarded (ibid). The development of the Internet is still in its immaturity. The population of people using it all over the world has tripled in the recent years. Technologies such as televisions have deep-seated repercussions for the orientation of political influence and the characteristic of public affair, and it is sensible to believe that the Internet will have mutually well-built consequences. III. Research Design I, the researcher, will conduct face-to-face unstructured interviews with the randomly selected respondents which will be composed of the ordinary citizens, technocrats or computer experts. The interviews will be carried out to the twenty randomly selected citizens of a democratic country from those who are eligible to vote, from all gender orientation and social class. The interview will be unstructured and will require subjective responses regarding the perceived social implications of Internet’s ability to affect democratic practices and the possible impact of the dissolution of the Internet to their democratic rights, such as voting. Moreover, I will attempt to conduct another face-to-face unstructured interview with technocrats or computer scientists; the questions in the interview will try to identify the possible challenges that democracy will confront once electronic democracy begins to collapse and the potential solutions or alternatives to this global phenomenon, the sudden dissolution of the Internet for a prolonged period of time. Aside from the actual methodologies to be conducted, I will delve into available literatures in order to make the arguments and findings of the study logical and well-founded. Ethical considerations such as informed consent will be integrated in the study. References Anthony, T. (1996), Dead Killer Becomes Online Body of Knowledge Technology, Los Angeles Times , A4. Arendt, H. (1958), The Human Condition, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Barber, B. (1984), Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Barrett, E. (1994). Sociomedia: Multimedia, Hypermedia, and the Social Construction of Knowledge. Cambridge: MIT Press. Beiner, R. (1995), Theorizing Citizenship, Albany: State University of New York Press. Bimber, B. (2002), The Internet and Political Transformation: Populism, Community and Accelerated Pluralism, Polity , 133+. Bowen, C. (1996), Modem Nation: The Handbook of Grassroots American Activism, New York: Times Books. Cooke, K. (1993), The Internet: The Whole World is Talking, The Nation , 60-64. Dahl, R. (1973), Size and Democracy, Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press. Dahlgren, P. (1995), Television and the Public Sphere: Citizenship, Democracy and the Media, London: Sage Publication. Dimaggio, P. (2002), Social Implications of the Internet, Annual Review of Sociology , 307. Fatton, R. (2001), Globalization, Poverty and Terror. Flacks, R. (1971), On the Uses of Participatory Democracy, In M. Stolz, Politics of the New Left, Beverly Hills, Calif: Glencoe Press. Franda, M. (2001), Governing the Internet: The Emergence of an International Regime, Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Garnham, N. (1993), The Media and the Public Sphere, In C. Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, Cambridge: MIT Press. Held, D. (1987), Models of Democracy, Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press. Hohmann, H. (1998), Rhetoric in the Public Sphere and the Discourse of Law and Democracy, Quarterly Journal of Speech , 358-93. Kellner, D. (1997), Intellectuals, the New Public Spheres, and Techno-Politics, Education, Technology, and Society . Kivisto, P. (1998), Key Ideas in Sociology, Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publication, Inc. . Lemert, C. (1999), Social Theory: The Multicultural and Classic Readings, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press. Pratyush. (2008), Marx on Globalization, Counter Currents . Risinger, C. F. (2002). Democracy.gov? Social Education , 305. Rodgers, J. (2003), Spatializing International Politics: Analysing Activism on the Internet, New York: Routledge. Saco, D. (2002), Cybering Democracy: Public Space and the Internet, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Schaefer, R. (1995), Sociology, New York: McGraw-Hill. Shane, P. (2004), Democracy Online: The Prospects for Political Renewal Through the Internet, New York: Routledge. Srader, D. (2007), Democracy Online: The Prospects for Political Renewal Through the Internet, Argumentation and Advocacy , 183+. Thierer, A. (2003), Who Rules the Net? Internet Governance and Jurisdiction, Washington, DC: Cato Institute. Thornton, A. (1996), Does Internet Create Democracy? Sydney: University of Technology. Weare, C. (2002), The Internet and Democracy: The Causal Links between Technology and Politics Contribution, International Journal of Public Administration , 659+. Read More