Comments on: Technology use in the 2009 South African elections

By: Morten Meyerhoff

Morten Meyerhoff — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 11:12:08 +0000

An update on Web2.0/social media use in South African politics: https://mg.co.za/article/2011-11-22-government-20

By: Morten Meyerhoff Nielsen

Morten Meyerhoff Nielsen — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 09:00:25 +0000

An interesting link in connection with the upcoming European Parliament elections is https://www.euprofiler.eu.

The link is to a online solution helping the visitor/user to discover their position on the political landscape in relation to the European Parliament elections 2009.

Answering 30 questions on a number of issues, their importance and likely support of parties the visitor gets a map of their position vis-a-vis the national parties. The solution also allow the visitor to test their position for all 27 member states and 5 candidate countries.

The solution is offered in the official languages for a selected country plus english.

Try it out…

PS: the solution is developed by Robert Schumann Centre/European University Institute, European Democracy Observatory, Kieskompas.nl, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, smartvote.ch, nccr democracy 21@ and de verdiping Trouwe.

By: South Africa’s ICT Election

South Africa’s ICT Election — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 23:14:11 +0000

[…] Africa can rightly be called South Africa’s first “ICT Election.” According to a report by the Danish Technological Institute, each of South Africa’s four main parties made use of ICT (Information and Communication […]

By: Morten Meyerhoff Nielsen

Morten Meyerhoff Nielsen — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 13:39:19 +0000

Anna Kelly (a Swedish colleague) point out earlier today (on Facebook) that a number of swedish parties have been inspired by Obama’s 2008 election campaign to make more use of social networks and ICT tools.

The inspiration comes at a apt time with the European Parliament elections looming on the horizon.

As with any election the main motivational factor is a wish to canvas the electorate and gain their votes and secondly to bring out the vote. Most Swedish campaign managers point out that social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube are particular important in this regard as these are the mediums which have the highest number of users and those the prime focal areas for potential online canvassing.

For those of you who understand Swedish DN.se published an article on the topic: https://www.dn.se/fordjupning/europa2009/svenska-partier-harmar-obamas-webbkampanj-1.850428

By: Morten

Morten — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 10:59:59 +0000

Interesting and thank you for the reference to the Indian elections. Will be intersting to see that mobile technolgy, like cell phones and sms’s in particular, are become increasingly used in developing economies. Truth of the matter is that cell phones have achieved far greater levels of penetration (compared to the internet) across the globe and are getting increasingly effective for networking, organisation (social, professionally, politically), informtion sharing and distribution – and not only among the younger generations but also marginalised communities and groups like rural areas, women, the elderly etc.

By: Simon Smith

Simon Smith — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 18:03:06 +0000

The World Service’s Digital Planet programme had a feature on technology and the Indian elections yesterday. Download the podcast (until 28 April) at: https://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/worldservice/digitalp/digitalp_20090421-1030a.mp3
Moblie technology seems to be very prominent, and hopes were expressed about improving the turnout among young people, We shall see.