Parties, Election Campaigning, and the Internet

21 Pages·2008·0.22 MB·English

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Parties, election campaigning, and the Internet
Toward a comparative institutional approach
Nick Anstead and Andrew Chadwick
This chapter argues that a comparative approach to analyzing the relationship between technology
and political institutions has the potential to offer renewed understanding of the development of the
Internet in election campaigning. Taking the different characteristics of political parties and the norms
and rules of the electoral environment in the United States and the United Kingdom as an illus-
tration, it suggests that the relationship between technology and political institutions is dialectical.
Technologies can reshape institutions, but institutions will mediate eventual outcomes. The chapter
outlines five key variables: degree of systemic institutional pluralism; organization of membership;
candidate recruitment and selection; campaign finance; and the “old” campaign communication
environment. This approach has the potential to generate a theoretical framework for explaining
differences in the impact of the Internet on election campaigning across liberal democracies.
their everyday lives (Horrigan, 2007).
Since the mid 1990s, it has been widely
Since the public get their news, do their
predicted that the Internet will have a
shopping, and communicate with friends
decisive influence on election campaign-
online, it is hardly surprising that they are
ing. This prophecy has, in part at least,
also being citizens.
been fulfilled in the United States, espe-
However, technology diffusion expla-
cially since Howard Dean’s blog-fuelled
nations of changes in election campaign-
campaign for the Democratic presidential
ing only tell part of the story. There are
nomination in the 2003–4 primary
other countries with high levels of
season, the widespread impact of online
Internet diffusion, in which it has yet to
video during the 2006 midterm elections,
have such a significant impact. In the
and the proliferation of Web 2.0 social
United Kingdom, while more than 60
media during the 2007–8 contest.
percent of the population are now online
It is tempting to think that this “success
(International Telecommunication Union,
story” has been driven by the diffusion of
2005), there is consensus that the Internet
the Internet. By 2005, 76 percent of
has had only a marginal influence on
Americans were recorded as being online
elections, a fact noted on numerous
(International Telecommunication Union,
occasions during both the 2001 and 2005
2005). And, despite ongoing divisions in
national polls (Coleman and Hall, 2001;
patterns of use, the overwhelming major-
Ward, 2005). It seems perverse, therefore,
ity of people have integrated information
to suggest that once Internet penetration
and communication technologies into
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PARTIES, ELECTION CAMPAIGNING, AND THE INTERNET
reaches some kind of critical mass (what- on campaign dynamics, but on individual
ever that may be) a decisive political legislators’ adoption of the Internet.
impact somehow becomes inevitable. Again, this involved a survey of legislator
Given the unevenness of the role played websites in three countries, correlated
by the net in electoral contests across even with independent variables: age of legislator,
the liberal democratic world, we must constituency demographics, the electoral
look for additional explanations for system, and type of government. The
national differences. latter was not disaggregated but defined in
One element of such an explanation basic terms as “presidential” versus “par-
may be found by considering how the liamentary”. Foot et al.’s highly illumi-
Internet interacts with the relevant poli- nating chapter in this volume, while
tical institutions that pre-date its exis- focusing on a wide range of political
tence: in particular, the organization of actors and featuring sophisticated depen-
political parties and the norms and rules dent variables that signal the growth of
of the electoral environment. These vary online campaign “web spheres”— never-
greatly across political systems. Different theless downgrades political institutions in
types of party organization and electoral the overall analysis. The closest of several
environment have the potential to cata- independent variables, termed “political
lyze or to retard the development of culture” is, understandably given the scale
Internet campaigning because they render and ambition of the Internet and Elections
new communication technologies more Project from which it is drawn, defined
or less useful to candidates and parties and measured solely in terms of individual
seeking office. When viewed in com- citizen attitudes and self-reported behavior.
parative context, American parties are Institutions proximate to election cam-
unusual political organizations, and quite paigns can have a direct impact on the
dissimilar to those found in other, notably mobilization of resources, acting as cata-
European, liberal democracies. Such dif- lysts and anti-catalysts. At their most
ferences may help explain the quantitative extreme, institutional structures may act as
and qualitative differences in Internet complete barriers. Examples include the
campaigning across countries. ban on the purchase of television adver-
This is not to suggest that research on tising in the United Kingdom, or on
Internet campaigning has lacked an inter- podcasting in Singapore. Most of the time
national orientation. Rigorous individual institutions may simply make the process
country studies are growing in number. of deploying resources unattractive, as
But, to echo the opening comments of would be the case if stringent regulatory
Foot et al.’s chapter in this volume, with a hurdles had to be overcome to set up a
few exceptions (for example, the editors’ political website, for instance. Opportunity
conclusion in Gibson et al. (eds), 2003c; costs are also entailed in choosing to
Newell, 2001; Tkach-Kawasaki, 2003), deploy a particular resource. A large bill-
very little of the research on parties and board purchase may cut the number of
Internet campaigning is grounded in mailings a party can send; dedicating
cross-national comparison of relevant poli- campaign staff to a blogging campaign
tical institutions. Gibson et al. (2003) may remove them from face-to-face
conducted a comparative survey of can- roles. The Internet may reconfigure or
didate websites in the United States and reduce opportunity costs but it does not
the United Kingdom, but excluded vari- destroy them. The benefits political actors
ables related to parties and the electoral are able to derive are thus strongly
environment. Zittel (2004) focused, not
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NICK ANSTEAD AND ANDREW CHADWICK
influenced by the institutional environ- debate between normalizers and optimists
ment (March and Olsen, 1989). has been useful in creating much of the
This chapter argues that a comparative significant early analysis of the Internet, it
approach to analyzing the relationship has also proved limiting. Both sides have
between technology and political institu- generally paid insufficient attention to the
tions has the potential to offer renewed complex interaction between technology
understanding of the development of the and political institutions.
Internet in election campaigning. Taking While institutions have often been
the different characteristics of political neglected by the normalizers and the
parties and the norms and rules of the optimists, they have at least had an
electoral environment in the United implied significance. Normalization
States and the United Kingdom as an theory argues that the broader resources
illustration, it aims to show that the rela- available to political actors, such as
tionship between technology and political money, bureaucracy, supporter networks,
institutions is best perceived as dialectical. or an interested mainstream media, will
Technologies can reshape institutions, but heavily condition their ability to make
institutions will mediate eventual out- effective use of the Internet for cam-
comes. This approach has the potential to paigning (see, for example, Davis, 1999;
generate a theoretical framework for Margolis and Resnick, 2000). Online
explaining differences in the impact of the advantage accrues to the strongest offline
Internet on election campaigning across actors. In their influential book, Politics as
liberal democracies. Usual, Michael Margolis and David
Resnick (2000: 2) argue that cyberspace
“will be molded by the everyday struggle
Normalizers, optimists, and for wealth and power.”
institutions The relationship between normal-
ization and political institutions can be
The lack of comparative institutional critically understood in two ways. First,
research on Internet campaigning is per- the theory is socially determinist. It
haps best explained by the terms of refer- assumes that pre-Internet power brokers
ence that have dominated discussion of will come to define the online world,
Internet politics more generally. Since the autonomously of technological change. It
net’s early days, analysis of its political therefore neglects important differences
impact has been dominated by two dis- between old media of political commu-
tinct schools of thought: the normalizers, nication, particularly the paper press and
who claim that current political relation- television, and new, low-cost, low-
ships and power distributions will ulti- threshold interactive and participatory
mately be replicated online, and the media. Second, in normalization theory,
optimists, who claim that the Internet will existing institutions offer a framework for
reform politics and radically redistribute the explanation that political behavior
political power. These two camps are will remain normal. The problem is that,
descendants of an older debate between when situated in a cross-national com-
sociological and technological determin- parative context, it is best seen not as a
isms: between those who claim that the universal truth but as a matter for investi-
impact of technology is shaped by social gation. The question we must ask is: what
and political institutions and those who kinds of institutional features are more
believe technology has the power to likely to have affinities with the particular
shape society and politics. While the technological affordances of Internet
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PARTIES, ELECTION CAMPAIGNING, AND THE INTERNET
communication? A comparative approach our perspective, devaluing the role of
allows us to hypothesize what may, or non- or pre-Internet organizational struc-
may not, gain traction in different poli- tures, norms, and rules, in mediating
tical systems. technological forces, and how these pro-
The relationship between institutions cesses may vary across political systems,
and the case made by Internet optimists is renders such an approach problematic as a
more difficult to disentangle, largely framework for the explanation of the
because they do not form a single school development of Internet campaigning.
but can be divided into two broad cate- In summary, normalization and
gories according to their attitudes to Internet optimism approaches do not
representative democracy. Most applicable adequately consider the possibility that
to the American experience is what can some political institutions, as currently
be termed representative democracy optimism. arranged, are likely to act as a catalyst for
This approach does not argue that the the integration of the Internet into elec-
Internet will destroy all representative tion campaigning, while others may not.
institutions, but instead claims that it has
the potential to reform and rehabilitate
indirect vehicles of democratic participa- America’s online success
tion, most notably political parties and story
elections (for example, Trippi, 2004).
This approach has been accompanied by a While the chronicles of headline-grabbing
second: the view that the Internet will examples of Internet campaigning now
actually undermine representative political feature several countries, it is on the
institutions (Morris, 1999). United States that most interest, both
This distinction between representative popular and academic, has focused. This is
democracy optimists and direct democ- unsurprising: the country can claim to be
racy optimists is significant. However, the birthplace of the Internet; it is the
both posit a monocausal relationship only global hyperpower; its elections are
between technology and politics: existing followed throughout the world; and
political institutions will either be interest in its politics is strongly linked to
reformed or entirely replaced under the the idea of Americanization, which sug-
weight of technological change. This is gests convergence in electoral politics,
grounded in how the characteristics of the especially in styles of campaign commu-
Internet differ from previously dominant nication (see, for example, Farrell et al.,
media of political communication, most 2001; Kavanagh, 1995, Negrine and
notably television. The necessities of the Papathanassopoulos, 1996).
television age political campaign are said The Internet’s potential has long been
to have made parties centralized and apparent. In the 1998 Minnesota guber-
steeply hierarchical, and grass-roots acti- national contest, Independent candidate
vism and civic life are said to have Jesse Ventura, running against well-estab-
become emaciated (Trippi, 2004: 37–40, lished Democratic and Republican candi-
214–15). The televisual form is one-to- dates, used the net to organize and
many; the Internet offers rapid, dis- publicize campaign rallies in the hours
tributed, multidirectional, interactive, before polls closed (Greer and LaPointe,
many-to-many communication. 2004: 117; Klotz, 2004: 71). In the
Criticisms of technological determinism Republican presidential primary contest
are of course manifold, and cannot detain in 2000, following his unexpected win in
us here (see Roe Smith, 1994). But from New Hampshire, John McCain was able
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NICK ANSTEAD AND ANDREW CHADWICK
to raise $3 million in donations in ten the Internet. During the Democratic pri-
days (Klotz, 2004: 77), an unprecedented mary for the Senate seat in Connecticut,
feat at the time. During the presidential three-term Senator and former candidate
contest that year, Al Gore organized an for the vice presidency, Joe Lieberman,
innovative series of online “town hall” was defeated by journeyman candidate
style discussion forums. Ned Lamont, who had only previously
However, it was Howard Dean’s can- held local office. Lieberman was an out-
didacy for the Democratic nomination for spoken defender of the Iraq war, a stance
the presidency in 2004 that really seemed that put him at odds with many grass-
to fulfill the early promise of the Internet roots Democrats, while Lamont worked
as a campaigning tool. Dean was little to portray himself as an anti-war candi-
known nationally, though his continued date. Lamont’s attempt to defeat
opposition to the war in Iraq did give him Lieberman was embraced by high-profile
a platform distinct from the other candi- Democratic bloggers, the so-called “net-
dates in the Democratic field. During the roots,” who promoted his candidacy,
early phase of the primaries, Dean strug- raised money, and even starred in celeb-
gled to get his campaign off the ground: rity-style campaign commercials. The
his opinion poll ratings were within the Internet was important in creating
margin of error of zero and he was woe- momentum for Lamont: he convincingly
fully short of cash and known supporters. defeated Lieberman in the primary
At the end of 2002, Dean’s campaign (Murray, 2006; Ned Lamont for Senate,
team restructured its online presence, in 2006).
order to test the networking and fund- The main midterm election period of
raising potential of the Internet. By the 2006 continued to feature extensive use
end of 2003, Dean had gone from being of the net. The most notorious episode
an unknown candidate with very few came during the race for the Virginia
financial resources to the leader in the Senate seat. Republican incumbent
race and the most successful primary George Allen was expected to comfor-
fund-raiser in the history of the tably retain his position, as the precursor
Democratic Party (Chadwick, 2007; to a possible presidential run in 2008.
Hindman, 2005; Trippi, 2004). However, some months before the elec-
Following on from Dean’s success, the tion, Allen was filmed referring to
eventual winner of the Democratic Democratic opponent Jim Webb’s cam-
nomination, John Kerry, while relying paign worker as a “macaca”, a racist term.
mainly on large donors to get him The DIY video of this event was imme-
through the primaries (defined by diately uploaded onto media-sharing site
Hindman, 2005 as those who give the YouTube, and soon became a viral sen-
federal maximum of $2000), nevertheless sation, leading to Allen’s views on race
used the Internet to raise a large number being questioned both online and, cru-
of small donations during the main cam- cially, in mainstream newsprint and tele-
paign. This allowed Kerry, in a situation vision media. From being 20 points ahead
unprecedented for a Democrat, to achieve in the polls at the end of April, Allen
near financial parity with his Republican went on to lose (CNN, 2006; NOI,
opponent, George W. Bush, by the close 2006; YouTube, 2006). By the time of
of the 2004 campaign (Dwyer et al., the close of the 2006 elections, it was also
2004). clear that the netroots movement
The 2006 midterms continued to offer MoveOn, by campaigning in support of
effective demonstrations of the power of several successful Senate and House
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PARTIES, ELECTION CAMPAIGNING, AND THE INTERNET
candidates, had exerted influence on the of citizens claimed to have used it to look
Democratic takeover of Congress. Soon for election information, compared with
after the election, MoveOn’s website dis- 74 percent for newspapers and 89 percent
played a table of statistics for the pivotal for television (MORI, 2001). It appears to
districts, including margin of victory, have played only a marginal role in
financial contributions, and number of influencing how individuals decided to
phone calls to voters. It mobilized volun- vote, and candidates’ online presences,
teers to make seven million calls and host though improving, were not as developed
7,500 house parties (MoveOn, 2007). as those of their American counterparts.
Although hard data are lacking, it seems By the 2005 British general election,
fair to suggest that Allen’s defeat in evidence was emerging that Internet
Virginia was caused by the viral effect of campaigning was shaping political beha-
the YouTube video. Certainly a vior. Some British MPs were using the
Republican online campaigning guide- net to reach out to supporters outside the
book for the 2008 elections suggested that traditional structures of party, via e-mail
this was the case (National Republican distribution lists, for example, which per-
Senatorial Committee, 2007). And, as formed some of the functions performed
Davis et al. reveal in their chapter in this by blogs (Jackson, 2004). Around 50 par-
volume, the 2006 midterms and the early liamentary candidates blogged during the
stages of the 2007–8 primary season wit- 2005 campaign (Kimber, 2005). While
nessed the growing use of online social the Internet presence of candidates was an
networking sites such as MySpace and improvement over 2001, it was clear that
Facebook, with Hillary Clinton and the Internet did not play the role it did in
Barack Obama amassing hundreds of the 2004 U.S. campaign. Blogging
thousands of members in supporter net- remains very much a minority sport
works. among British parliamentarians (Ward and
From this very brief depiction of high- Francoli, 2007).
profile cases it is evident that the Internet In the period following the 2005 elec-
plays a great many roles in the American tion, as social media and social network-
campaign environment, whether it be ing trends reached Britain, politicians
creating political networks, promoting began to experiment with YouTube,
discussion of politics, raising funds, or MySpace, and Facebook. A handful of
storing, retrieving, and automating infor- prominent politicians, including govern-
mation (Howard, 2006). ment minister David Miliband, began
high-profile blogs. In the spring of 2006,
Labour Party leader Tony Blair ordered a
Britain’s online non-events? rethink of the party’s approach to web
campaigning. This led to the creation of
Observers of British elections have long the Labor Supporters Network, an e-mail
been wondering if the Internet campaign list designed to appeal to those who were
phenomena witnessed in the United not willing or able to become fully paid-
States will make their way across the up party members, and MpURL
Atlantic. United Kingdom campaign Membersnet, a social network site that
managers eagerly followed the 2000 pre- provides each party member with a blog,
sidential contest in an effort to “learn les- each local constituency Labour Party
sons” (Gibson et al., 2003a: 51). Overall, organization with an online discussion
however, the net had little impact on the forum, and a number of general policy-
2001 general election. Only seven percent related forums. Meanwhile, the
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NICK ANSTEAD AND ANDREW CHADWICK
Conservative Party’s new leader, David communication environment. The aim
Cameron, pioneered the use of viral here is to show how differences between
online video in mainstream British poli- the United States and the United
tics, with his Webcameron video blog. Kingdom in each of these areas may be
Labour’s deputy leadership contest in the used to hypothesize the distinct char-
spring of 2007 saw all candidates engage acteristics of online election campaigning
with Web 2.0 platforms such as Facebook in each political system.
and MySpace. Thus there are some ten-
tative signs that British parties are inte-
Degree of systemic institutional
grating the net. But does this mean that
pluralism
they will converge on the American
model? And, if so, to what extent? The Federalism and the separation of powers,
next section seeks to provide a framework both key constitutional values in the
for answering such questions through a United States, guarantee substantial insti-
consideration of the differences between tutional pluralism. This weakens national
the United States and United Kingdom party integration (Epstein, 1980; Harmel
party and electoral environments. and Janda, 1982; Key, 1964). The sepa-
rate electoral bases of the presidency and
Congress provide few incentives for party
Party organization and cohesion. Parties have state and local
electoral environment: committees but their influence and level
catalysts and anti-catalysts of organization differs significantly from
for Internet election state to state. Many state committees are
campaigning flimsy, and where there are traditions of
strong party organization, such as in New
The British and American party organi- York state or Pennsylvania, these are still
zations and electoral environments have only weakly integrated with the national
much in common. When it comes to committees in Washington. Parties are
national elections, both are historically important for government formation and
embedded two-party systems: only two affiliation remains a very strong predictor
parties have a realistic chance of securing of congressional behavior, but away from
executive power; single-party executives the capitol, state and local party structures
are the norm at the national level (not at have few direct policy-making roles.
the devolved level in the United National party committees are institu-
Kingdom); and parties “take turns” in tionally separate from the party organiza-
controlling the executive. Both countries tions inside Congress, and while there are
have simple plurality electoral systems differences between the states, much the
based on geographical constituencies, and same can be said of the relationship
this reinforces the two-party system. between state legislatures and state-level
But there are highly significant differ- party committees. The national commit-
ences between the two countries. For the tees have grown in influence since the
purposes of this chapter, these may be 1970s, yet they are still of less importance
mapped along five distinct, though inter- during presidential races than the staff and
related, dimensions: the degree of sys- infrastructure built up by candidates
temic institutional pluralism; the themselves during both the primary
organization of membership; candidate season and the main campaign. Even the
recruitment and selection; campaign most nationally-oriented electoral con-
finance; and the “old” campaign test—for the presidency—necessarily
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PARTIES, ELECTION CAMPAIGNING, AND THE INTERNET
becomes a matter of localized campaign- communication between levels of party
ing in targeted key states, due to the organization and activists. The Internet
electoral college system. In the lexicon of provides for granular communication that
Samuel Eldersveld (1982), the American allows party staff to quickly switch from
party system is stratarchical rather than local to state to national focus and vice
hierarchical. Layers of party organization, versa. It also reinforces the trend, since
driven by factionalism along several the 1970s, towards a more active coordi-
dimensions, are only loosely joined. nating role for the national party com-
Contrast this with the United mittees. Yet, in a system where state party
Kingdom, where the separation of powers organizations often jealously guard their
is strictly circumscribed by the near-fusion autonomy, the open, looser networks
of the legislature and the executive afforded by Internet communication fit
(Lijphart, 1984) and where, despite recent well.
devolution reforms, the state is unitary. Compare this with the United
The prime minister and Parliament share Kingdom, where, as we have noted, the
an electoral base, incentivizing party separation of powers is weak, federalism
cohesion in the interests of policy success absent, and parties comparatively inte-
for the government and re-election for grated and hierarchical. There, though
MPs. British parties are characterized by constituency-level organizations can be
greater levels of national coordination and rebellious, the lines of communication are
integration, and while there are different more vertically oriented, more firmly
political traditions associated with party drawn, and are based in long-established
activism in localities, the party structures formal structures with accompanying
are internally uniform. Local constituency bureaucracies. The Internet’s technologi-
organizations enjoy policy-making influ- cal affordances for creating loose hor-
ence but despite recent trends toward izontal networks have fewer affinities
internal democratization, national head- with this set of arrangements. We can
quarters exert close control over the hypothesize that it is more likely that
whole party. While some local associa- British parties will deploy the Internet in
tions can and do deviate from the leader- ways that jell with internal routinized
ship’s script, national party organizations institutional traits. This is evidenced, for
nevertheless have a major influence on example, by the MpURL Membersnet,
the election campaign by channeling which is a members-only layer of web
resources, coordinating activity, and applications that map onto long-standing
applying sanctions (Ware, 1996). British internal party structures.
parties are comparatively integrated and
hierarchical rather than stratarchical.
Organization of membership
How do these characteristics interact
with the technological affordances of the In his classic work on party systems,
Internet? The pluralistic environment in Duverger (1954) suggested that British
the United States necessitates building (and other European) parties were orga-
campaign networks composed of hor- nizationally “superior” because they
izontal and vertical connections that mesh developed durable mass membership and
with the fundamentally stratarchical basis participation infrastructures. Revisionists
of the system. Integration can be achieved such as Epstein (1980) have suggested that
in a way that leaves intact the operative the weaker American party model is
norms of federalism and the separation of better suited to the age of leader-focused,
powers, but which provides lines of televisual politics. Either way, American
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NICK ANSTEAD AND ANDREW CHADWICK
parties do not have a system of individual spearheaded by the permanent party
membership, though there is a chance for leader of the second largest party in
ordinary party supporters to play a role in Parliament and his or her shadow cabinet.
the selection of candidates through the In Britain, parties have pre-formed struc-
primary system (see below). Nor do they tures containing activists inherited by
have a leader embedded in their structure, successive leaders. United Kingdom poli-
but instead rely on a successful pre- tics is party centered.
sidential candidate to lead the party once The often temporary and short-lived
elected. Parties in Congress are often associations that constitute the American
described as “headless”: there is no con- campaign offer strong incentives for using
cept of permanent opposition (Janda, the Internet. The most successful and
1993: 164). The once decisive role of the publicized examples, for example Howard
party convention in policy discussion and Dean’s use of Meetup or Barack Obama’s
nomination has, since the 1970s, been creation of Facebook groups (Goldfarb,
hollowed out. And, as we have seen, the 2007) in the earliest possible stages of the
difficulty of coordinating solidary resour- campaign are attempts to construct an
ces in American parties is affected by fed- online network of supporters and activists
eralism and the separation of powers. at the lowest possible cost and often well
The lack of a permanent membership in advance of organization on the ground.
necessarily makes American parties heav- We may also consider this from the per-
ily campaign focused. Candidates seeking spective of activists themselves, who seek
office are required to develop their own policy influence and expressive benefits
campaign infrastructure, based around from political participation. For such
personal support for their platform. This is individuals, the Internet provides these
reinforced by the primary system, which earlier and, for some it seems, with
features a large-scale campaign from greater intensity than in the “old” cam-
which elements of the party’s organiza- paign environment.
tion, such as national and state commit- In the United Kingdom, while volun-
tees, are sometimes marginalized. United teer activists are hardly in abundant
States politics is candidate centered. supply, the party membership is at least a
In the United Kingdom, parties have pre-existing resource that can be tapped
an organic existence outside of election in more routinized and predictable ways
campaigns; they are organs of policy and by party elites, candidates, and members
participation and have (currently declin- alike. Party elites often engage in admin-
ing) memberships. National party con- istrative reform of internal structures to
ferences differ in terms of policy influence realize political or bureaucratic goals
from party to party, but conferences do (Webb, 2000), but the sense of fast-
retain a residual policy-making role. moving organizational fluidity, even
Local, regional, and national policy chaos, that often characterizes American
forums provide opportunities for rank- candidates’ attempts to mobilize support is
and-file activists to participate. While not evident.
campaign machinery does tend to dete- Recent developments in Britain do,
riorate during the periods between elec- however, suggest that the Internet may be
tions, greater institutional presence and catalyzing some aspects of party member-
continuous membership do not create ship organization. The permanent mem-
pressures to continually rebuild from bership base of British parties has been
scratch. There is a strong tradition of eroding for several decades. This incenti-
organized opposition in British politics, vizes parties to seek alternative models. As
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PARTIES, ELECTION CAMPAIGNING, AND THE INTERNET
mentioned in our brief description of degree of fluidity and openness as wit-
election campaigning, the Labour Party’s nessed during primaries (McKay, 2005:
new “supporters network” and its internal 93).
social networking model, MpURL Primaries are absent from the British
Membersnet, deliberately seek to attract party system. Internal competition
those who do not commit to old-style between contenders takes place in arenas
party membership, or those who do not sealed off from direct participation by the
engage with traditional face-to-face parti- general public. United Kingdom parties
cipatory structures. This is not to suggest do have internal procedures, which, to
that British parties are converging on the varying extents, involve mass member-
U.S. model. Significant differences will ships in the selection of national leader-
persist, as British parties mold the tech- ship positions, and permanent local
nology in their own ways. Hence, constituency associations select their local
Labour’s Chair Hazel Blears’ view that party candidates, subject to the final
“We don’t want a U.S.-style party with a approval of central staff. But electoral
loose coalition of supporters, rather than rules guarantee party elites a significant
an active membership” (Blears, 2007). power bloc in national leadership con-
Our assumption is that technology can tests, parliamentary candidates are heavily
shape institutions but institutions will vetted by central party elites, and the
mediate eventual outcomes. committees of local constituency activists
are usually small and exclusive. The
environment for candidate selection is
Candidate recruitment and
much less open and fluid, much more
selection
tightly managed, and more nationally-
In the United States, mechanisms for the oriented than is the case in the United
recruitment and selection of candidates States.
offer an institutional framework for sanc- It is notable that in the United States,
tioned dissent (Bogdanor, 1984: x). most of the Internet campaigning inno-
Distrust of the corruption and patronage vations (McCain during 1999–2000;
of urban party machines led to the early Dean during 2003–4; Lamont during
twentieth century reforms specifically 2006; Obama during 2007–8) have
designed to weaken party bosses and occurred during primaries. Primary elec-
increase citizen influence via devices such tions may be influenced but cannot be
as the initiative, the referendum, and the controlled by the parties themselves.
recall, but most significantly, primary Resources permitting, any individual may
elections. While practices have differed run for the nomination and those without
across the states, since the 1970s, primaries “establishment” party backing have found
have become fundamental to U.S. poli- the Internet particularly attractive for gar-
tics. Uncertainty and risk are much nering support. In Dean’s case, an out-
greater for both party elites and candidates sider candidate found that he could use
than their equivalents in Britain. the net to quickly ratchet up a campaign
Participation in primaries is restricted, but in the early primary stages in an attempt
the thresholds are low. One must simply to reduce the costs of overcoming sheer
register as a Democrat or Republican, in geographical scale and the complexity of
some cases only a few weeks before the the different state-level contests. The
ballot. While caucus selection has not uncertainty of the primary environment
entirely disappeared, many caucus votes forces candidates to cast around for
are in any case characterized by the same opportunities to build what are often
65