The Democratic Potential of On-Line Discussion Forums: The Case of the Electronic Village Hall in Denmark Lars Qvortrup InterMedia-Aalborg Aalborg University Denmark, October 1998. larsq@mc-aalborg.auc.dk 1. Introduction How can new information technology be used in order to support democratic communication of private citizens? My case is the so-called "Electronic Village Hall" (EVH) which was launched as an experiment by the Danish Technology Council in the autumn of 1995, involving more than 500 persons in a three weeks consensus mobilisation action, thus showing how computer networks can be used as a means of consensus building among citizens in a voluntary network. As an experiment the EVH was evaluated, partly through ongoing discussions within the EVH, partly through a questionnaire performed immediately after the closure of the EVH (cf. Lars Qvortrup: Universel adgang - et spxrgsmel om demokrati. Rapport fra teknologiredets elektroniske forsamlingshus (Universal Access - a Question of Democracy. Report from the Electronic Village Hall of the Danish Technology Council). Copenhagen 1995). The present paper represents a summary of the report. 2. Presentation The subject of the EVH was universal access and the role of libraries in the Information Society. As an on-line discussion forum the participants did not meet physically, but only electronically. However, in order to support the participation of people without a background in virtual communities the "village hall" was chosen as the basic organisational metaphor for the EVH. In Denmark there is a long tradition of village hall and folk high school meetings. Here, one or more invited speakers present a topic, and after a coffee break a public discussion is performed directed by a chairman who at the end summarises the conclusions or viewpoints. The same structure was used in the EVH. Consequently, the conference was welcomed by the Danish minister of Research, Frank Jensen, and subsequently, three introductory lectures presented some of the basic themes of the conference. Then, the chairperson summarised the lectures, presented his suggestions for a discussion structure and opened the debate. Contributions were sent to a list server, and from here structured according to themes. Two to three times a week an "electronic package" of such contributions were distributed to all participants, with an initial summary written by the chairperson, and with suggestions concerning themes of interest for the next round. Thus, the conference was a chaired conference, in difference from most un-edited community lists. 548 people participated in the conference, and during the three conference weeks 94 contributions - small and big, constructive and critical - were received and distributed to all participants, corresponding to almost 200 printed pages. After two weeks a draft proposal of conclusions was written by the chairman, and the last week concentrated on discussing this proposal. Based on this discussion the chairman elaborated the final set of conclusions. Immediately after the conference a questionnaire was distributed to all participants. The answers are briefly summarised below. 3. Conclusions Based on the actual outcome of the conference and on the answers to the questionnaire the following conclusions can be made: The Electronic Village Hall: A New Tool for Public Debate The main conclusion from the Electronic Village Hall is that it does represent a new tool for democracy. It is evident that there was a broad and engaged participation in the debates, that discussions could be structured and developed through the EVH, and that it was possible through the EVH to produce a set of conclusions based on the active contributions of the participants. Thus, it is possible to realise a consensus making process through this new socio-electronic application. Complexity Reduction It was generally agreed that it is important that the EVH is organised by a chairperson who suggest themes and who summarises the total output. While the open, un-edited conference may be relevant for other purposes, within a consensus making process it is important to have somebody reducing complexity and structuring the debate. Transparency However, it is equally important that the discussion is transparent, i.e. that all contributions can be read by everybody, allowing them to check the chairperson's summaries etc. User-friendly Interface It is also important that a user-friendly interface is created with a standardised and simple structure of the electronic packages. Here, it is important that the graphical interface reflects the cultural tradition of the electronic conference, not in the literal sense that the interface provides a naturalistic representation of e.g. a village hall, but in the functional sense that the interface supports the structural procedure of the kind of meeting associated with. 4. Survey Immediately after the conference a small electronic survey was conducted. Of the 548 participants 126 - equalling 23 percent - answered the questionnaire. Compared with the list of participants and with the actual distribution of active and passive participants the answers were relatively representative. First, it is significant that the EVH was dominated by young and middle-aged male academics. 89 percent of the answers in the survey were given by male persons (in the EVH the portion was 83 percent), 57 percent were academics, 95 percent were between 20 and 60 years old. This underlines the general problem that the information society may be dominated by male, well educated "symbol analytics", thus deepening the class structure, although according to new criteria. Second, it is evident that persons with free access to computers, modems and Internet subscription are favoured, compared with those with a private Internet subscription being forced to pay data traffic and subscription themselves. However, generally speaking the conference was successful. Almost 50 percent were satisfied with the conference, and including the neither-nor group the total was 88 percent. Similarly, 92 percent indicated that they would like to participate in similar conferences if the subject is relevant. 69 percent agreed that such conferences should be chaired by a chairperson, while only 15 percent preferred an un-edited conference. These results indicate that the EVH will be a relevant tool for future public debates. However, the specific structure must be further refined. As an example, many participants said that the most important barrier was time: they could not spend several hours each day by reading contributions. Thus, an even harder chair structuring is needed, although of course transparency must still be provided. Finally, it was suggested that the survey technique should be used in future EVHs as part of the process, e.g. as a tool for discussing the conclusions. The Danish Electronic Village Hall. User Survey Numbers Percent 1. SEX: 126 100 Male: 112 88,9 Female: 14 11,1 2. AGE: 126 100 Under 20: 2 01,6 20-40: 68 54,0 40-60: 52 41,3 Over 60: 4 03,2 3. OCCUPATION 124 100 Academic: 71 57,3 Other type of wage earner: 25 20,2 Independent: 7 05,6 Retired: 3 02,4 Unemployed: 4 03,2 Others (primarily students): 14 11,3 4. DID YOU PARTICIPATE FROM HOME OR WORK 114 100 Via Internet subscription at work: 69 60,5 Via private Internet subscription: 41 36,0 Others: 4 03,5 5. WHY DID YOU PARTICIPATE (> 1 ANSWER)? 126 (147) 100 Because of the subject: 101 68,7 Because of the form (electronic conference): 42 28,6 Others: 4 02,7 6. DID YOU HAVE TECHNICAL PROBLEMS (> 1 ANSWER)? 125 (139) >100 (100) Character problems (special Danish characters, ae, oe, aa): 56 67,5 (40,3) Problems receiving the electronic mails: 34 41,0 (24,5) Other problems: 7 08,4 (05,0) No problems: 42 33,6 (30,2) 7. HOW WAS THE OUTCOME? 124 100 Satisfied: 60 48,4 Not Satisfied: 15 12,1 Neither-nor: 49 39,5 8. DID YOU READ ALL PACKAGES? 125 100 All: 58 46,4 Some: 63 50,4 No-one: 2 01,6 9. DID YOU CONTRIBUTE YOURSELF? 123 100 More than one contribution: 19 15,4 One contribution: 26 21,1 No-one: 78 63,4 10. WHAT DO YOU PREFER? 120 100 Chaired conferences (like this one): 83 69,2 Un-chaired conferences: 18 15,0 Don't know: 19 15,8 11. DO YOU AGREE WITH CONCLUSIONS AND SUMMARY? 123 100 Yes: 48 39,0 No: 19 15,4 Don't know: 56 45,5 12. WILL YOU PARTICIPATE. IN SIMILAR CONFERENCES? 126 100 Yes: 116 92,1 No: 1 00,8 Don't know: 9 07,1 126 answers of a population of 548, equalling 23,0 percent 4. Socially Responsible Use of IT As a general conclusion of this paper I will emphasise that if one wants to benefit from new information and communication technologies in the development of public interaction it is vitally important to understand the social nature of public communication in a modern society. It is not enough to make a functional analysis in a merely technical sense. One actually has to understand the social function of public communication and its specific symbolically generalised media and codes. However, if such an analysis is performed new information and communication technologies may be very useful in supporting social communication and consensus building. Of course, a socially irresponsible use of new information and communication technologies may very well erode some of the most important qualities of democracy. These technologies can be used for further accelerating the commercialisation of public communication, they may further reduce the social space of privacy, they may favour the have's at the expense of the have-not's, and/or they may cause an increase of the trend towards public control and censorship of what might otherwise have become an increasingly liberalised public interaction among citizens. On the other hand, if the same technologies are used in a socially responsible way, they may also support the further development of democracy. In my opinion the case of the Danish "Electronic Village Hall" is just an early example of how new technologies can be used in support for a socially beneficial development of modern society. I both hope and expect that more experiments along the same lines of thought will be conducted during the years to come.