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This study aims to explore the factors influencing the intention to use e-democracy. The literature depicted conflicting results regarding such domain and especially in the Middle East, where the authors aim at establishing a solid view of the discipline.

A research model was developed based on the theory of planned behavior, technology acceptance model and unified theory for acceptance and use of technology-2. The model hypothesized that perceived public value (PPV), ease of use and enjoyment are major antecedents of attitudes, and subjective norms (SNs), perceived behavioral control (PBC) and attitudes are significant predictors of behavioral intentions. A quantitative cross-sectional design was used. A questionnaire was used to explore Jordanian citizens’ perceptions regarding the research model constructs. A sample of 302 Jordanian citizens filled the surveys based on their awareness of e-democracy concepts and their willingness to participate in the study. This study uses the structural equation modeling approach with partial least square as an analysis method.

Findings indicated that PPV, perceived ease of use and enjoyment jointly determine the attitudes of citizens toward e-democracy. Results also suggest that attitudes, PBC and SNs have a significant effect on citizen’s intention to use e-democracy. Finally, this research supported the role of enjoyment as the most significant determinant of citizen’s attitude toward using e-democracy.

This study is limited by its small sample size and newly developed Arabic instrument. Still, results imply that more research is needed to replicate and validate the instrument and support the role of the selected research constructs. Public institutions are required to make e-democracy applications enjoyable and easy to use. They also need to demonstrate its value to the public.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the few studies to explore e-democracy and the first to conduct an empirical study (survey-based) in Jordan. The foundation of the study depended on three robust theories in the technology adoption theories.

The purpose of editorial to this special issue is this to introduce “We Decide”, a grassroots e‐democracy learnscape. This timely collaborative initiative was conceptualized to promote the deployment of internet communication technologies (ICTs) for advancing social justice and equity in an increasingly digitized era. The special issue presents six individually selected papers delivered at the IADIS International Conference e‐democracy, Equity and Social Justice held in Rome, Italy, 20‐22 July 2011. These papers provide examples of unique innovations that highlight new possibilities and directions for e‐democracy that are grounded in an ethos of greater equity and social justice.

The authors outline the mission and approach of “We Decide” and how it can be understood in the evolution of e‐democracy.

The authors discuss how the six papers in this special issue suggest ways to transform e‐democracy towards equity and social justice.

These papers help researchers and practitioners extend the concept of e‐democracy from a variety of perspectives, and show the importance of thinking about e‐democracy as access to resources for all citizens.

Given the increasing policy demands for effective e‐democracy and active citizenship online through new and emerging social networking technologies, the knowledge produced by “We Decide” brings together researchers, practitioners and activists from across the world. It provides a robust platform to share innovations that challenge us to rethink and re‐research the core concepts and approaches necessary to transform e‐democracy to realize equity and social justice.

Information and communication technology has been identified as a viable tool to proffer solution to the societal problem of disconnect between democratic actors. The issue of sustainability and citizens’ acceptance of online public participation, however, remains a major issue of concern requiring adequate attention. This study therefore aims to develop a strategic framework for e-democracy implementation and sustainability.

Systematic qualitative review using Grounded Theory Method was adopted to develop the e-democracy strategic framework.

The strategic framework is generic and has the potential to serve as a spring board for e-democracy implementation. It abstracts existing strategies and best practice that can be adopted to add value to e-democracy implementation. Using this framework, developing nations can take advantage of their present level of technological development to give voice to the voiceless and improve their democratic system.

E-democracy implementation should be backed up with policy framework which explicitly states the vision, objectives, policies guiding e-democracy implementation and the oversight bodies responsible for monitoring and evaluation. The implementation plan should clearly identify the implementation approach, levels of engagement, roles of various stakeholders and tools and technology to be involved. Government willingness to harness citizens input and commit resource to e-participation is of paramount importance.

The framework developed is useful for the e-democracy research community and government in executing successful e-democracy implementation and evaluating its impact on democratic outcomes.

Bristol City Council has received national and international recognition for its local e‐democracy work. This paper seeks to tell the story of three phases of development of local e‐democracy in Bristol. In summarising findings from the national evaluation of the Local E‐democracy Project, the paper also aims to consider stage four – where Bristol's e‐democracy programme is headed next.

Bristol acted as a lead authority on the evaluation of the Local E‐democracy National Project. This was a large multi‐method academic study, which set out to examine the aspirations and experiences of a variety of “actors” involved in more than 20 e‐democracy pilot projects across England. Professors Stephen Coleman of the Oxford Internet Institute and Ann Macintosh of the International Tele‐democracy Centre at Napier University undertook the evaluation, working with Bristol City Council as part of an E‐democracy Experts Group.

Findings from the national evaluation have been published in reports covering “top‐down” (authority‐led) and “ground‐up” (community‐led) approaches to local e‐democracy. This paper applies evaluation findings to Bristol City Council's experiences. It highlights how authorities can use e‐democracy to move between information sharing and consultation and then to creating space and conditions for ground‐up participation.

The paper focuses on common themes, rather than an in‐depth account of all of the national evaluation findings as they relate to each project that was considered. As a case study, this paper concerns the particular experiences of Bristol City Council.

The study offers insight aimed at local authority e‐democracy practitioners.

Over the past five years, Bristol City Council has accumulated considerable practical experience of local e‐democracy. The authority has benefited from a close association with leading academic experts, leaving it perhaps uniquely positioned to share learning from critical self‐reflection.

Whereas prior research has conceptualized and empirically investigated reinforcement and amplification mechanisms, this paper aims to propose a framework of power that captures the dynamic ways in which different forms of online political action are structured by disparate mechanisms.

The paper derives a theoretical model of power from Foucault and affiliated governmentality studies, which constructs power as the mechanisms and logics that structure the field of possible actions. This model is grounded in research literature on e-democracy and applied in a study of the mechanisms that structure e-democracy.

The paper identifies four mechanisms that balance disparate concerns of e-democracy. Monitoring (M) mechanisms apply logics of security and service to weigh anonymity and publicity against each other. The range of participants is determined by Inclusion/exclusion (I) mechanisms which operate through rules of engagement. Moderation (M) mechanisms balance concerns for heterogenic viewpoints and homogeneity according to a logic of uniformity. Logics of profit-making and shared understanding warrant the balance that Exposure (E) mechanisms strike between information abundance and centralized access. The four mechanisms are combined in the MIME framework.

The MIME framework includes mechanisms that are documented by the English-speaking research community, often with a substantial time lag. Others and potentially forceful mechanisms might not be reported in the research literature.

Practitioners are encouraged to be cognizant of the variety of mechanisms that condition e-democracy; their internal components and external relations of e-democratic practices when designing, building and conducting e-democratic initiatives.

Instead of focusing exclusively on the beneficiaries and the possible payoffs from e-democratic practices, the MIME framework developed in the paper focuses on the mechanisms which structure e-democracy.

This paper aims to investigate the mechanisms behind the development of e-democracy. The contrasting cases of Italy and Hungary are selected as the case studies. With the development of new information and communication technology, more and more elements of domestic politics have been transferred to the internet-based platforms. As a response to the deep financial, economic and political crisis that Europe endured over the period 2010-2015 and as a result of the disappointment with traditional parties, new political movements and parties were created. In this paper, the Italian Five Star Movement (M5S) and the Hungarian Lehet Más a Politika (“Politics Can Be Different”) and Momentum are examined to trace the specific mechanisms that led to their establishment.

The research is based on mixed method approach, using primary and secondary data to identify and examine mechanisms conducive to the emergence of e-democracy. It uses quantitative analysis along with discourse analysis and social media analysis. The research is based on the analysis of respective parties’ social media communication. The social media analysis has been carried out by the SentiOne social listening software within the time frame of February 2018 and the end of 2019. Along different types of democracy measurements, Italy and Hungary have been analysed between 2017 and 2019.

The paper identifies the key preconditions for the emergence of e-democracy. These are freedom, gender gap, inequality and corruption. It also then elaborates on mechanisms, such as social media activity and citizen engagement, which lead to the emergence of e-democracy. The thesis of this article is that in Hungary (compared to Italy), elements of high-quality standards for a democracy are still missing to establish a successful political party which uses the sustainable concept for e-democracy. In Hungary, the examined parties use social media only as media representation without exploiting the possibilities lying in social media platforms. They mostly rely on these networking sites during elections and no strong sentiments can be identified in their communication. Italy is a more developed democracy where online platforms are used to engage citizens regularly. M5S actively communicates through these platforms, which is reflected in the amount of comments and strong social media activity even out of election period.

The originality of the paper is the social media analysis to test the use of social media in the parties’ political communication. The paper defines key factors and mechanisms concerning the establishment of e-democracy through inductive analysis of two contrasting cases. Italy and Hungary are two member states of the European Union (EU) with different development, their current preparation and situation regarding e-democracy give insights on how the quality of democracy determines their attitude towards cyber parties. While Italy being a founding member of the EU has become an established democracy, Hungary, after the transition, has developed into a new democracy.

The purpose of this paper is to find out whether the students of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (FHSS) in Osijek, Croatia, interact online with any sort of e-democracy or e-government information.

This paper presents the findings of a pilot-study conducted among the undergraduate and graduate students of the FHSS in Osijek. The research was conducted in May 2015 on a sample of 246 students. The research was carried out by means of an online and paper survey and reached 59.91 per cent of the population of students enrolled in the first year of undergraduate and graduate studies.

Students in our sample spend a lot of time online. They are relatively active online when it comes to finding information connected with their academic responsibilities (e.g. 77.2 per cent of the students of the sample have gone online for finding information about exams, scholarships, etc.), but rarely engage in democratic processes within the academic community (only 11.8 per cent have contacted their student representative on the University Student Board). They are even less interested in democratic processes within the local community (8.1 per cent have contacted their local authority representatives regarding an administrative or communal matter).

This is the first research of FHSS students’ perceptions and views regarding their engagement and their information behavior regarding e-democracy and e-government processes and one of the very few such researches in Croatia.

The aim is to review developments on the internet, especially those of general cybernetic interest.

A discussion in the CYBCOM discussion list, on possible revision of the definition and nomenclature of cybernetics, is reviewed and discussed, as are also certain proposals for enhancement of existing systems of parliamentary democracy, indicated by e‐democracy.

It is argued that the term “governance” has vagueness and that its use in a definition of cybernetics does lead to clarification. Wiener's reference to “control” is defended, with the observation that it should be realised in loops‐within‐loops, contrary to some treatments emphasising simple circularity. It is observed that principles of e‐democracy are cogently defended by several writers.

Reference to “governance” highlights a need to be clear about the aims of government in general. Proposals for e‐democracy deserve serious consideration.

It is hoped this is a valuable periodic review.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the theme of this special issue, “Advances in e‐democracy: engaging citizens and electorates”.

An overview is provided of developments in e‐government before providing a summary discussion of the papers that are presented in this issue.

While governments around the world, not least in the UK, have been enthusiastic about the use of information and communication technologies to provide better citizen access to government and public services, there is still much to be learned about how these online services can be effectively implemented and will be taken up.

This paper provides a primer for the remainder of this issue which combines research reports from academics working in the e‐democracy field and from practitioners in government and commercial service suppliers.

To describe the initiatives of the Scottish Parliament in the field of e‐democracy and assess the prospects for future developments.

Analysis and review.

The Scottish Parliament has always seen the internet as one of the major mechanisms for engaging Scottish citizens in the Parliament's business and activities. Its most successful initiatives have been the e‐petitioning system, the webcasting of proceedings, the discussion forums and the MSP video diaries.

Relevant to parliaments and other representative institutions.

Simple implementable tools are described that have been shown to be effective.

Few parliaments have been able to put theory into practice in a short time. Applicable to other small parliaments with limited resources wishing to enhance democratic participation by electronic means.