Internet campaigning around the world

A politician or political party using the Web is not a new phenomenon, at least not in Internet years. What is new is how they're using it.

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A decade ago, anyone researching the subject often found themselves staring at a wild jamboree of blinking logos, moving icons and mountains of text that insisted on dropping off the screen. Now, one is more likely to see gleaming white backgrounds replete with media-friendly reference centers and a lot of searchable databases to assist every informational need.

Although this evolution is part of a growing sophistication in Web design, it signals a fundamental shift in political actors' awareness of the importance of the Internet. Now they can send their messages direct and undiluted across a wide geographic terrain. In addition, interactive features offer faster ways to raise money.

From pro wrestler Jesse Ventura's surprise victory in the 1998 Minnesota governor's race to former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean's bid for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination, the skills of individual cyber-campaigners made a lot of buzz.

Internationally, the strongest example of a Web candidate is South Korea's Moo-Hyung Roh, a failed legislative candidate in 2000 who won the presidency three years later. Do these men represent a new trend or are they better viewed as poster boys for a phenomenon whose time has not yet come?

To answer the question, we looked at what's happening among candidates in national elections in five countries: Finland, Germany, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Not only do these countries provide the most comprehensive data so far on local level Web campaigning, but they also offer significant geographic and political variation that may help us understand why the phenomenon is, or is not, taking hold.

As the table below shows, in the United States, Germany and Finland, Web campaigning seems to have taken firm hold, at least among the major parties. Rates of Web campaigning are somewhat lower in Australia, although almost half of major party candidates ran sites during the 2001 federal election.

The most interesting story came from Great Britain, where even the major candidates had weak presences on the Web.

The centralization of the British electoral system could be a factor. Despite the devolution of recent years, power is still concentrated very much at the national level. The federal governments share power more with localities in Australia, Germany and the United States. Finland, although not federal, has a self-governing province for its Swedish-speaking population and a highly fragmentary constellation of political parties. This more decentralised, multi-tiered model of government with its larger number of independent political actors clearly offers a wider platform for electoral innovation and experimentation.

The British electoral system might also ensure politicians are slower to adapt to Web campaigning. The "winner-take-all" approach to its elections weakens the incentive for minor parties to make widespread and concerted efforts to get votes.

Finally, the dynamics of the British electoral context may also play a role here, with UK parties engaging in the unique practice of "knocking up" or locally canvassing the vote on Election Day. Reliance on this more traditional weapon may make the shift to high-tech methods much slower.

And the major parties in the UK, unlike their counterparts in these other countries, have been able to rely more directly on the mainstream press, with broadsheets and tabloids alike taking a partisan line in their news reporting. Given that one of the main appeals of the Web for parties is the opportunity it presents to by pass editorial controls to deliver a direct message, having this "ready-made" channel of mass communication may lower the parties' interest in investing in new technologies.

It is also worth noting the highly restrictive campaign finance regulations that operate in the United Kingdom, which are among the least generous in terms of the amounts candidates can raise and spend. Such limitations mean that any investment in new, largely unproven campaign technology would be considered with great caution.

Overall it appears Web campaigning is well on the way to becoming standard operating procedure in a number of major democracies. Political and institutional arrangements are more relevant in getting these techniques off ground than any strategic calculations about possible electoral returns. In particular, countries with a weak or more pluralistic party system, frequent elections and a reliance on less labor-intensive modes of campaigning appear to provide the most conducive environment for the rapid diffusion of electioneering Web sites.

A broad uniformity in style for political Web sites is emerging, with a premium being placed on the delivery of information rather than any interactivity. Some parties, particularly those on the left, appear to be especially keen to standardize their Web campaigning. The Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), the former East German communists, fit a standard format in the 2002 election. Other more distant contenders for the title are the Australian and British Labour parties.

Such developments reveal the vulnerabilities of the medium to central party control, a weakness that may prove increasingly relevant as politicians succumb to pressure to take their campaigns online.

Percentage of Candidates with Web Sites

               AUSTRALIA  UK   GERMANY  USA  FINLAND

Major Parties  48%        10%  74%      74%  74%
Minor Parties  31         NA   33       45   43
Overall        37          9   52       65   59

Source: Rachel L. Gibson and Andrea Rommele

Rachel K. Gibson is is a fellow at the Australian Consortium for Social and Political Research Incorporated (ACSPRI) Center for Social Research, at the Australian National University in Canberra, Australia. Andrea Rommele is a research fellow at the Mannheim Center for European Social Research at the University of Mannheim, Germany.

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