Democracy

ICT enhances communication and the right to freedom of expression, as well as the right to seek, receive and impart information. In this respect, ICT has the potential to increase citizen´s participation in decision making processes, thus strengthening democratization. ICTs are also used for networking, opinion making, monitoring of elections, reporting violations of human rights, and tracking corruption. With lower costs and broader accessibility, mobile phones increase flows of information and facilitate communication, thus increasing people’s capacity to act and participate in democratic processes. These are all factors that enable the poor to improve their lives, since poverty entails, in addition to economic poverty and the lack of physical resources, the lack of information, possibilities and power.In general, one can distinguish between three levels of ICT use to advance democratic processes:

e-Government can be narrowly defined as e-administration, where ICT serves to streamline inter-governmental relations and flows of information to improve government services, transactions and interactions with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government. e-Government can facilitate better service delivery to citizens by offering more accessible information; facilitating access to government services as well as developing depersonalized services that reduce the risk for corruption. With respect to democratic practice, e-government entails more efficient registration of employees and of citizens in general, as well as the collection, aggregation and analysis of facts and statistics for planning purposes. Increased registration of births, and of girls in particular, increases the possibilities of women and men to attain identification documents and to participate in elections, to receive credits and loans, to acquire, own and inherit property – in short, to enjoy their human rights.

e-Governance describes the interface between government and citizens, including increased citizen participation and political influence. e-Governance entails a strategic and conscious use of ICT for the purpose of enhancing democratic participation, in addition to increased services. Examples of e-Governance practice include: enhanced communication between government, parliamentarians and citizens; electronic publication of proposed bills and legislation using the web and SMS in order to enable feedback from citizens; electronic election systems; deployment of community information centers; and citizens’ and civil society’s use of ICT for influencing opinion and political decision processes.

ICT for empowerment entails the use of ICT for horizontal communication and networking, mainly among individuals and civil society. Moreover, ICT improves conditions for influencing opinion, independent of the state, locally and globally, as well as beyond the influence sphere of mainstream media. The Internet provides unique possibilities for low-cost publication, independent of official media channels. This is particularly relevant in contexts where access to independent media and freedom of expression are limited. The political uses of these media may still be less significant than their social use in non-political arenas, but activists are increasingly using the Internet and mobiles to network and mobilize, for contacting elected representatives and organizing protests. In addition, ICTs are utilized for documenting and reporting human rights violations, so called “sousveillance”, and for providing crucial information in conflict situations. Where computers and Internet are scarce, access to Internet can play an intermediary role, i.e. online information can be disseminated via mobile phones and traditional media, such as notice boards, newspapers, radio and TV.