New media and politics - Their reaches and limits in political processes

Citation: Maldini, Pero, 2012: New media and politics: Their reaches and limits in political processes, in: Petranová, Dana/Magál, Slavomir/Pravdová, Hana (eds.), Megatrendy a médiá 2012: Demokracia verzus mediokracia, Fakulta masmediálnej komunikácie/Univerzita Sv. Cyrila a Metoda v Trnave, (Slovakia): pp. 226-246.

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NEW MEDIA AND POLITICS: THEIR REACHES AND LIMITS IN POLITICAL PROCESSES

Pero Maldini

Abstract: This paper explores the impact of the new media and Internet generally on contemporary politics, and tries to explain their mutual relationship. It identifies the main characteristics of new forms of communication, and how they affect the structural changes in modern societies, especially changes in political structures and political processes considered from the main functional levels of the political system. Comparing classic media and new media, author determines key advantages of the latter, and concludes that Internet and new interactive media are powerful agents of influence, but it does not come by itself, nor always and necessarily affect democracy (or democratization) on positive way. It rather depends on sociostructural and sociocultural characteristics of certain society that shape both the ways of Internet and new media use and levels of its impact to politics.

Key words: New media, Internet, social structure, political system, political processes, democracy.

Modern information and communication technologies' impact on almost all spheres of social life, including politics as well, is evident and undoubtedly profound in today's world. Moreover, that impact is taken as indisputable and often as a crucial, particularly to politics, which is experiencing a serious transformation under such circumstances. However, it seems that it is not a linear, unilateral process and that impact is rather ambiguous. Hence, the question(s) regarding that impact is rather how, to what extent and with what consequences the new media and Internet generally causes transformation of politics, and in what extent it contributing to democracy.

Old media vs. new media

Internet, as a core agent of network society, is a framework that encompasses new information and communication technologies that enable

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all new media as new and substantially different means of communication. They gradually become new standards and, much more important, through the virtual cyberspace they create quite new possibilities manifested through the enhancement and enforcement of public sphere. Numerous and various individual and collective social actors become interconnected more than ever, that enables them to social and political action, much easier and more effective than before. All of that raises the possibilities of political participation, which consequently gains the public influence on political structures and enables increased public control over them. Countless information sources, their accessibility and actuality enable the users to have much better insights into what is going on. Better informed, interconnected, and allowed to (re)act using all the possibilities offered by Internet, they could gain a greater public influence to decision making processes. They can much easier make a pressure on political authorities in order to get them more sensible to their demands, more transparent in their activities, and with more responsibility.

Modern information and communication technologies directly and significantly influence ways how information is mediated to public. They caused specific forms of communication and established entirely new communications standards. Although those standards are technologically determined, they are manifested primarily as communicatively. Completely new set of communication forms, as well as set of entirely new notions that have emerged from that area – quickly became a component of many other spheres of social life. Despite more than a half-century development of the modern electronic mass media – who once made a revolution which has changed fundamentally all modern societies – the new media, as integration of multimedia content, interactivity and (re)action in real time, expanded the content and potential of information to the extent that were unknown until now.

Modern age electronic mass media, such as radio and television, are somehow in the gap between technology and culture. Namely, theirs existence and development are tightly dependent to technology. At the same time, they also rely on traditional forms of expression such as speech (speaking, storytelling, debating), nonverbal expression (acting, body language), arts (visual, musical, graphic) or various combinations of them, in dependency of the nature of specific media, and its technological possibilities and limitations, respectively. Still today, in the age of information society, radio and television combine technology-based change with the long history of cultural tradition.

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However, digitalization is undoubtedly the greatest transformation that radio and television (even a newspaper) have ever encountered as media. The new media emerging and bringing increasingly growing number of information sources that becoming available to the media consumers. They offer the range of choices available to the individuals, promoting them from passive consumers (readers, listeners, viewers) to active participants. Interactivity, implied by the new media, plays a key role. It is crucial feature that causes fundamental change. It is not only on forms of communication, but also the whole communication paradigm, with impact on social and political life quite new and different from usual.

New communication technologies enabled multimedia contents, actually combinations of various types of information that become standards. In addition, two-way communication, and even more multiway, becomes quite usual. New symbols, notions and meanings that emerged from here become not only new communication standards, but also a part of everyday's life. At the same time, usual and long-time known patterns of communication are changed, both functionally and in content, while interactivity enabled users to multilateral communication in real time. This ability created cyberspace, completely new phenomenon that acts as organic part and an extension of real social life. It hugely enhances possibilities and extent of political or social action.

Emergence and development of this virtual sphere implies a deep cultural change. Describing this phenomenon, Manuel Castells, among the other, stated that culture was historically produced by symbolic interaction in a given space/time. With time being annihilated and space becoming a space of flows, where all symbols coexist without reference to experience, culture becomes the culture of real virtuality. It takes the form of an interactive network in the electronic hypertext, mixing everything, and voiding the meaning of any specific message out of this context, except that is for fundamental, non-communicable values external to the hypertext. So, culture is unified in the hypertext but interpreted individually (in line with the "interactive audience" school of thought in media theory). Culture is constructed by the actor, self-produced and self-consumed. Thus, because there are few common codes, there is systemic misunderstanding. It is this structurally induced cacophony that is celebrated as postmodernity. However, there is one common language, the language of the hypertext. Cultural expressions left out of the hypertext are purely individual experiences.


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The hypertext is the vehicle of communication, thus the provider of shared cultural codes (Castells, 2000, 21).

A large number and diversity of open sources enabled by Internet denote certain common good, and offer an alternative ways of getting information, very important in achieving insights into what is going on. Blogs, chat rooms, discussion forums, various kinds of social groups (political, cultural, professional, artistic, sports', leisure etc) create virtual communities, which represent an extension of civil society (Davis, 2005; Norris, 2001). Although virtual (because they are existing in cyberspace), actually they are functioning as an increasingly significant part of "real" life. They are acting as a social and political power, enhancing the possibilities of citizens' influence in public sphere. The power of the virtual sphere also lies in its ability to hold the powerful to account, to pick up and develop stories that the mainstream media may neglect or ignore because of the keeping their own interests (economic, political, professional, ownership's etc.) and remain quite independent from any power influence. As Colvile stated, "if someone is interested enough in politics to make it their obsession, then they will probably want to work in the field already. And not only are they more often outward-looking, and more responsive to comments and suggestions, than the mainstream media, but they provide an environment in which stories and ideas can circulate that could otherwise be ignored by the press. More people talking with more passion about more things are almost axiomatically a good thing for political debate, no matter that the traditional elites find it far harder to control" (Colvile, 2008, 28).

Changes in social and political sphere Cyberspace, as quite new social environment, has imposed an

obligation to regular institutions, government and all other political actors to be more exposed and transparent to public. Actually, they have to allow all information of public interest accessible online in order to keep their legitimacy and credibility. Describing this situation, Colvile says "this might sound like a nightmare for our leaders, but in fact it should privilege transparency and honesty. For example, a politician will not be able simply to change position and deny that a shift has occurred. And any errors in their arguments, or the media’s interpretation of what they have said, can be quickly ferreted out as complaints bounce around the blogosphere" (Colvile, 2008, 17). That way, the new media and new modes of communication and acquiring information they enabled, have a profound effect on the conduct of politics and policy.


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This impact of technology diffusion and new media effects, and theirs consequences to social, political, economic, cultural, etc change, became an important research topic. Main feature of Internet, manifested in capability of integrating of modes of communication and various contents, implies its embodiment in all spheres of life with significant effects on each of them. It significantly affects community, political participation, aspects of socio-economic inequality, social, political and economic organizations and institutions, and cultural diversity. It is increasingly evident, although people often are not enough aware of it and take it for granted.

One of the most important consequences of Internet and its technological and communication potentials is emergence of network society. It already became an area of everyday living, the arena of social, political, economic, cultural, and almost all other parts of social life, a mixture of "real" world and cyberspace, which boundaries is not easy to determine. Network society, in its basic meaning, can be considered more as technological side of phenomenon, and as the basis for information society. That notion, however, refers more to the essence, regarding the social meaning and significance of phenomenon. Information society has a potential to be an agency for liberation, improvement of the quality of life and way to an evolution in our cultural experiences. Information society, understood as a social resource and agent, can reinforce the rights of citizens by providing access to a wide range of information, association, exchange, entertainment, retail, education, health services, gaming etc. That way, it increases both the citizens' competence to better understanding their social and political environment and their capacity to participate in the decision-making processes, and to gain their control over the government affairs. Even more, citizens are fostered to become active producers of information rather than their passive recipients, and that way to take an active role in influencing political decisions.

However, it should be noted that inspite of existence of those opportunities, these advantages are not guaranteed. They are an option that has yet to be achieved, just as democratic system allows citizens to establish and maintain democratic relations, but as a goal that has to be achieved, not as something that comes by itself.1 They will certainly not be possible

1 For instance, democracy does not mean the implicit realization of benefits that are associated with it;

especially it does not happen by itself. Democracy does not guarantee success, it provides opportunities. Democratic political system is framework within which the expressions of demands, organization of interests and fight for development and human rights have a much better option than


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if policymakers will not consider and respond to citizens’ demands. Ongoing discussion, both in the most developed democratic societies and transitional ones, go toward creating a legal framework which enhances and protects democratic rights, establishes rules of engagement that will encourage both the individuals and institutions to use new technologies (quality content, easy access and reasonable tariffs), promotes awareness of the real opportunities available for the citizen and ensures appropriate standards to satisfy consumer needs (intellectual property, common technical standards, etc).

Today's societies (particularly most developed) and their social structures are cumulative product of long lasting process of modernization. As the most prominent modernization theory representatives has stated2, it includes gradual and mutually interdependent development of technological, economic, cultural and political factors that have produced societies as we have today. Manuel Castells, analyzing phenomenon of network society in this context, more recently than his most important study (Castells, 1996), examines the specific interaction between network morphology and relationships of production/consumption, power, experience, and culture, in the historical making of the emerging social structure in 21st century (Castells, 2000). He presumes social structures as sets of organizational regularities historically produced by social actors, and constantly challenged, and ultimately transformed by deliberate social action. He claims that the network society is no exception to this sociological law. Yet, the characteristics of specific social structures impose constraints on the characteristics of their transformation process. Thus, the recurrence and flexibility of information networks, their embedded ability to bypass, ignore or eliminate instructions alien to their programmed goals, make social change in the network society a very tricky task. This is because, apparently, nothing must be changed – any new input can theoretically be added to the network, like free expression in the global media system. Yet, the price for the addition is to accept implicitly the programmed goal of the network, its ancillary language and operating procedures. Thus, his hypothesis is that there is little chance of social change within a given network, or network of networks.

under either by an autocratic system. However, any such realization requires the action and commitment of citizens (Maldini, 2008, 242). 2 From Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Talcot Parsons, over Barrington Moore and Seymour Martin

Lipset to Ronald Inglehart, Christian Welzel, Antony Giddens, and other contemporary scholars.


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Understanding by social change, the transformation of the programme of the network, to assign to the network a new goal, are following a different set of values and beliefs. This is in contrast to reprogramming the network by adding instructions compatible with the overarching goal. According to this analysis, the fundamental dilemma in the network society is that political institutions are not the site of power any longer. The real power is the power of instrumental flows, and cultural codes, embedded in networks. Therefore, the assault to these immaterial power sites, from outside their logic, requires either the anchoring in eternal values, or the projection of alternative, communicative codes that expand through networking of alternative networks. That social change proceeds through one way or another will make the difference between fragmented communalism and new history making (Castells, 2000, 22-23).

Considering the nature of Internet, assumed as network of networks, another dilemma emerges. Internet is undoubtedly a "product" of modernization process, but it seems that such common statement somehow neglecting the impact of Internet as return effect to social change, maybe not always visible in direct relation, but certainly existent implicitly. It is so, particularly because of rising impact of virtual sphere as an extension of public sphere, which becomes increasingly significant, regardless of its content. It has to be considered as a process that will gradually produce certain social changes, as well as other modernization processes embedded in social development.

These changes occur very rapidly and (re)shape our societies, although for accurate determination of their nature and directions, they have to be put under scrutiny. Nevertheless, certain social structures will exist for a long time, and these changes probably will not affect them in order to be significantly changed (if any at all) in a terms of position in social stratification. However, what is under the change is the relationship among the social and political structures and groups in terms of redistribution of political power.

In the analysis of rapid information and communication technologies evolvement, Kahn and Kellner (2005) examines how these new technologies are reconfiguring politics and culture and refocusing participatory democratic politics of everyday life in terms of increase the realm of freedom, community, and empowerment. They argue that the continued growth of the Internet, both as a form of mainstream media and as a tool for organizing democratic


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social interactions, requires that Internet politics be retheorized from a standpoint that is both critical and reconstructive. The new information and communications technologies, to a meaningful extent, are revolutionary and constitute a dramatic transformation of everyday life in the direction of more participatory and democratic potentials. They admit that progressive dimension evolves parallel with processes that also promote and disseminate the capitalist consumer society, individualism and competition, and that have involved forms of alienation.

Given that it is used by all political options and subcultures in order to promote their own agendas and interests, Internet is thus a contested terrain. It is obvious that the political battles are migrating from the streets, factories, parliaments and other sites of past struggle toward the Internet's mediated new media. The later, in turn, opens radical possibilities for a greater range of opinion, new modes of virtual and actual political communities and original forms of direct political action, both on local and global level (for instance, Internet has facilitated the worldwide emergence of the anti-globalization, anti-war and anti-capitalism and pro-democratic movements). Alternative political spheres acquire increasingly importance and every serious public and political actor has to take them into account. Online activist subcultures and political groups have thus materialized in the last few years as a vital oppositional space of politics and culture in which a wide diversity of individuals and groups have used emergent technologies to help produce creative social relations and forms of democratic political possibility (Kahn and Kellner, 2005, 75-77, 93-95).

Huge and constantly growing amount of information, their accessibility and possibility of sharing has enabled many citizens to get both informed and involved. Those circumstances foster the growth of civic awareness about various social, political, ethical and other issues of today's world. At the same time, they also reflect both the global nature of Internet (making a world a place where the problems of unknown individuals and distant societies become our problems too and vice versa) and its "glocal" nature.3 Those processes affect the formation of different types of social networks that are connected horizontally, transcending political boundaries and limitations of nation states and national policies. Those new structures increasingly act as a

3 Glocalization is meant as a process of the mingling of global and local, where the boundaries

between them are blurring. It means that trends of homogenization and heterogenization coexist throughout the modern age, and that local culture assigns meaning to global influences. Therefore, they are interdependent and enable each other (cf. Robertson, 1995).


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global public, even as a global civil society.4 They are disclosing the actions of political authorities at various levels and in different societies, putting them into the public attention. Their criticism and pressure are getting stronger and more influential, expanding the scope of public control over the political power. That way, Internet provides the possibility of alternative forms of culture and politics and instruments of political struggle that could (and actually have) significant impact. It became so commonly that such public can significantly undermine and bring into question the authoritarian regimes, which are characterized by control and restrictions of freedom and civil rights. Namely, such regimes cannot keep any more a control over information, and consequently over their own citizens. So, the Internet, or more precisely Internet's enabled new media, becomes an extremely important instrument in the struggle for democratization.

However, it is not all that simple or linear when we talk about this process(es). Namely, every phenomenon, including this one, has its "dark" side. It is not about drawbacks of the Internet (although there are many of them), but rather about socio-economic reasons who cause problem of reduced or disabled access to Internet and consequences which emerging from it. Accessibility to Internet (and that way to all of its resources) is one of the very important, if not the most important and surely controversial issue.5 Unequal possibilities in accessibility produce new social and economic cleavages and inequalities. They are manifested through the process in which poor that has no access to Internet and consequently to information either

4 Global civil society and transnational democracy as associated notion are increasingly theorized terms. However, despite the indisputable potential of these processes for the development of democracy, serious problems with these concepts are noticeable. Without going into deeper analysis of this issue, it is necessary just to say that creation of global democracy (and consequently global civil society) contains at lest three problems: problem of political identity and formation of political community (which is still dominant on a national level), problem of legitimacy (normative or instrumental-based) and problem of political commitment, i.e. subjecting to collectively binding decisions (cf. Vujčid, 2002). 5 One of the major problems in conceiving the possibilities of the information and communication technologies is in the obvious disparity of access to the basic technology for most of the people in the world. Today's reality is that the Internet is largely a resource "available only to multinationals, governments, armies, and the elite" (Willet, 1995).


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becomes poorer. It deepening the gap between "informational" poor and rich and disabled the poor to trace fast social changes caused by information and communication technologies increasing their lag. It is particularly important considering that it is happening under the circumstances of so called the new "information order", and that consequences will be far-reaching and long lasting in future.6 Another problem in this context is reflected through the control over information and communication technologies. It is almost entirely on the side of just a few most developed and rich societies whose companies actually creates, develops, produces and sells them to all others. That way, they are not only making a profits, but also setting the standards and gaining the control over the rest (particularly undeveloped and poor societies) in terms of increasing their technological dependence, and economical and political as well.7 These limitations and unevenness on a global scale are so significant that it is not possible to talk about the general progress brought by the new information and communication technologies (and consequently new media), because benefits are still limited to a relatively smaller part of the world's population.

6 Already today, situation is not promising, quite an opposite. So the global distribution of accessibility and using of Internet shows that almost 60% of Internet users live in North America and Europe. In the same time (data from 2005) in Africa, there were only 21 million phone connections (less than in New York at same time). Although the number is increased in the meantime, that relation remained the same, if not the worse. Beside that, race, age, educational and gender structure shows pretty unfavorable picture. Many of statistics clearly indicate that access to the new technologies is very dependent on whether you belong to the wealth, literate, white community in an advanced western nation. With such extensive exclusion in global terms, the situation indeed seems not so promising and seriously casts a shadow on huge advantages brought by the information and communication technologies and new media they provide. 7 J. Lockard pointed out just one, but significant aspect of this type of inequity, when he noted: "Access to cyberspace is effectively divided between self-financed, and unprotected non-access. Private access requires significant disposable income to cover computer capitalization and the continuing outlays of phone bills, repair of maintenance-intensive equipment, and periodic recapitalization. For those whose employers pick up the tab, the cost arrives in the form of hierarchical workplaces and limited personal autonomy on the networks" (Lockard, 1997, 220).


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Political system and political processes under impact of new media

Although is not possible to ignore the global aspect, especially inequalities in the information and communication technologies distribution and use, and unequal accessibility to information in different societies, the impact of new media on political processes, particularly in developed societies is more than obvious. Considering the politics generally, it is important to bear on mind that its essence constitutes power and interest. They are present in all their dimensions: polity, policy and politics with decisive impact. Although they are well known common concepts, in order to understand them in this context, it is necessary to explain them, just briefly. So, polity dimension implies constitution, legal and political system, political institutions, political power, political competition and elections, political rights and freedoms. Policy is content and processual dimension and refers to the objectives, tasks and the subject of politics, the political articulation of different and conflicted social interests. Politics, in turn, is procedural dimension that implies political mediation of different political interests, conflict resolution based on compromise and consensus; it is ongoing process of political will shaping. Regarding a power, we can take it as the structural capacity to impose one’s will over another’s will. Politics refers to the set of practices directly aimed at exercising power or contesting and negotiating the exercise of power. Political management and political change are specific to each society and depends mostly on social, economic, cultural conditions and heritage, different and specific for each society.

In contemporary societies, we are witnessing that power and politics are subjected to the transformational effects of technology, economy, culture and communication. This multidimensional transformation takes a place in a dynamic, interactive process on the global level and encompasses, more or less, all worlds' societies. Globalization, as a multilevel and complex set of economical, political and cultural processes8 is strongly fostered just by

8 Globalization is meant as a comprehensive set of various and mutually interconnected and interdependent processes which take a place on a global level and have a strong impact on social dynamics and social changes in all societies, affecting the life of almost every individual. It manifests itself economically (through the establishment of global markets and the global neoliberal capitalist economy), politically (through the weakening of the nation state sovereignty, establishment of global governance institutions, and democratization), and culturally (by intensifying the impact of the mutual influence of different cultures, intertwining and mixing the cultural elements – where the imposition of western culture elements dominates – which is rapidly accelerated by the development of a global


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development of new information and communication technologies and possibilities they enabled. Emergence of cyberspace as a virtual extension of "real" public sphere produces a new kind of power – the power of networks, and a new kind of politics – informational politics. Under such circumstances, characterized by increasing impact of these new kind of power, cotemporary politics, in all of abovementioned dimensions, is facing quite new challenges, unknown until recently.

But, apart from abovementioned dimensions (polity, policy and politics), politics can be also considered through the structural parts (levels) of political system. They are political input, political output and political process in between. So, at these levels transformation processes under impact of new media can be seen even better (because they are more evident).

Political input consists of public requirements, citizens' demands to political system (government) and their expectations from it. Just at this level, the changes are probably the most visible because it is hugely affected by new information technologies and new forms of communication. Quantity, quality, and particularly intensity of citizens' demands are significantly increased. Internet, its sources and abilities enable completely new ways of their demands addressing. At the same time, that ways put the government into position with much reduced possibility to hide out from own citizens or to disobey public requirements. It is forced to respond promptly.

Political output represents system's (government's) response to citizens' demands. It consists of political decisions, laws and regulations in which the government tries to fulfill citizens' demands and, that way, to gain their own legitimacy. At this level, virtual communities offer a widest possible open arena for public reaction. Reception, perception and evaluation of government's responsiveness, and its (system's) performance and effectiveness at all, are promptly reflected in this area.

Political process (corresponds to the institutions of political system, as well as public sphere, and it is located between the political input and political output) is certainly the main one because it is consist of political will shaping,

communications network – that leading toward creating a global culture) (cf. Stiglitz, 2004; Schwartzman, 2004; Held, 1998; McLuhan, Fiore, 1968; Giddens, 1990; Robertson, 1992).


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political interests mediating, political conflicts resolution, establishing and maintaining of procedures through the institutions, and the most important – a decision making process. So, impact of the new media, (and all other parts of virtual sphere) to political process probably is the most important. Diverse political and non-political groups try to influence political processes at this level, particularly political decisions. Classic political parties, in their struggle for political power, increasingly use Internet as a powerful media (particularly in political campaigns) in order to promote themselves more effectively and maximize their voter's base. In that context, virtual sphere acts as an enhancement of real life arena of political competition and became a new field of political struggle between parties. That way, various political interests – although they basically remained the same – are gaining new dimensions, particularly in their promotion and ways of reaching public. Non-political organizations – such are nongovernmental organizations, interest groups, pressure groups, lobbyists, civic associations, ecological, cultural, gender, youth, professional associations and movements and lot of others that consist of civil society – are not struggling for political power, but try to influence on political power (government, parliament, administration) in order to obtain political decisions, laws and regulations in accordance to their interests. Virtual space, and new media as its most prominent part, acts as a very strong support in their efforts. In today's developed democracies, virtual and real life spheres have no boundaries in between; they are fully pervaded and complement to each other.

Considering the changes in political sphere under the impact of the Internet, especially new media, it is easy to see that they are substantial and present at all levels of political activity. Functioning of political system, particularly responsiveness of political institutions and government officials, becomes more prompt, more transparent and with higher level of responsibility. It is so because political participation is strengthening; more citizens are involved in public affairs that create opportunities for a greater public influence to political structures, particularly on decision-making process and increment responsibility of political power, or at least their greater sensitivity to public demands.

However, this process(es) also has its darker side. It is manifested through the quite different direction of same process(es) and different, not so positive consequences. Namely, while the Internet creates new opportunities, on the other hand it acts only as an extension of an existing reality, which is often just replicated in the virtual sphere. Thus, it acts as an agent of political


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promotion, or as a new media whose effects surpasses the effect of traditional media. That way, it acts just as an addition to classic media in overly medialized politics that becomes more political spectacle than political competition (c.f. Meyer, 2003). The power of media and media persuasion, enriched with Internet, turns political leaders into celebrities. Often, it moves a public focus from political message to their appearance, look and trivia related to them. All of that hides the real value(s) of certain individuals, their parties, political programs and interests they represents and usually goes at the expense of public interests. However, the most important consequence, probably, is that it affects changes in criteria of choice of political representatives among average voters which become rather passive recipients of aggressive media contents (including new media too) than active individuals with independent self-attitudes. So, the boundaries between political reality and political spin are very often diminished and danger from political manipulation is pretty real. In that situation, average citizens have to cope with increasing amounts of information of very different quality and even questionable accuracy. However, rise of their capability to distinguish among them is much slower than rise of such kind of information. Under such circumstances, results of political processes could be less certain and predictable than before, more often to the detriment of citizens rather than politicians. The impact of new media in this context is quite different from abovementioned one. That way, all the advantages and opportunities that new media offer are somehow relativized. How the citizens will react, whether they will use the new media in order to increase their influence to political decisions and achieve greater control over the political power, or will they fall under the influence of information that are placed over them – still depends on other factors. One should look for them rather in socio-cultural characteristics of certain society, particularly in political culture and rootedeness of democratic values and civic virtues among the majority of citizens in respective societies.

Another question that arises in this context is regarding of direct or indirect impact of the new media on politics. Sometimes it is direct, but considerably more its impact is indirect, or implied. When citizens can react directly (and when they usually do in the case of inappropriate action of political power), political institutions and politicians will act more cautious having that possibility on their mind. Since Internet and new media enables and fosters citizens to prompt action, it can be argued that they have an amplifying effect on political processes, no matter its impact is direct or indirect. Among the several scholars who claim this effect, Philip Agre states


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that it can amplify political processes in numerous ways. The political process comprises a complicated institutional circuitry of routinized information flows and information technology accelerates many of this circuitry’s constituent activities. A question that naturally arises is this: In what sense can the Internet change anything? The amplification model gives a clear answer to this question: The Internet changes nothing on its own, but it can amplify existing forces, and those amplified forces might change something. But are those changes qualitative, or are they merely quantitative? Does the Internet really bring anything new? And what does "new" even mean? After all, few political phenomena are completely unprecedented. Do only constitutional changes count as "new?" Is "change" a codeword for a political revolution? The Internet is not old enough to have changed political institutions in such major, qualitative ways. But the invention of writing had profound social consequences through the way that institutions appropriated it and the Internet certainly has a great potential to amplify institutional forces. So, information technology is viewed as reinforcing the system rather than repairing it (Agre, 2002, 319).

Besides the aforementioned author, another one continues and expanding these claims. So, Martin Hagen argues that information and communication technologies do not change political institutions and processes by virtue of their mere existence. Rather, their use may amplify existing social behaviors and trends. This can be attributed to the fact that the development of technological applications is controlled by specific dominant factors. With its instrumental character, information and communication technologies becomes a trend-amplifier in a given area of application. Computer technology is not an independent force working for the better or worse of democracy, but it is amplifying other trends at work or reinforces existing institutions. This explains why on the whole, those projects have aimed to support traditional, well-established structures rather than those which have tried to employ new, transformative democratic ways and means (Hagen, 2001, 55-56).

In concluding this brief overview, it is possible to say that Internet and new media have produced at least three types of changes in contemporary politics. The first one, and probably fundamental, is creation of network(s) of variety associations of virtual society that took a part in the political process. Regardless of whether they are passive observers or active participants, they represent much wider public (and consequently political power too), whether potential or active, but that who really matters. This hugely achievement put into existence quite new, but extremely important sphere of society.


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Increased participation of the average citizen in political processes is the second significant change produced by the Internet. It has allowed citizens to gain access to the political process and to political power in a manner not previously available. In earlier times, political involvement of citizens were limited to voting, public gatherings, demonstrations, writing complain letters, and similar activities with not so significant impact to political power in comparison to contemporary means allowed by Internet, particularly new media. In those times, only specialized groups (pressure and lobbing groups, political movements) were politically active and, more or less, influential. Internet, in turn, has enabled much wider audiences as well as any individual interested in politics to participate actively. Moreover, it allowed them to combine their influence, tap public opinion, and take a role in both national and international politics. With such potential, they can organize various kinds of protests much easier and more effective, produce pressures to the government or specific institutions in order to get their more prompt response to their demands, and increase their control over the actions of political power.

However, political actors are not staying aside of these processes, quite an opposite, they are fully involved in them, increasingly using the Internet and new media with all their capabilities. That way, they became mighty agent in their promotion and reaching their voting public. They strengthen their political influence, raise political chances and enhance political activities (especially electoral campaigns). Besides previous two, this could be considered as the third main change that new media made to politics. Namely, in pre-Internet times, politicians usually tried to reach the public using the classic media (newspapers, radio, television) with much higher costs and relatively lower effect in comparison with Internet. Something quite normal today is that politicians use web sites' contents, chat rooms, blogs and email in order to maintain contact with their supporters, and even more to acquire new supporters. Like the classical media, they increasingly use the new media in order to compete with opponent politicians, and their political programs, and even more to undermine them but now much easier, faster, cheaper and more effective than before. Regardless of their operating under conditions where thousands of different and contested voices can be heard, given the possibilities offered by new media, their impact is relatively higher compared to classical media (almost equal, if not bigger even than television).


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In such circumstances, voters have the opportunity to be well informed, but also they can easily be misled.9 So, those dangers can neutralize most of the advantages brought by new media. The issues of citizens' informed, quality and accuracy of information, and their awareness (in sense of their ability to discern the essential from irrelevant and ephemeral, and make an appropriate political choice) do not depend mainly on the new media and their capabilities. They depend much more on citizens' political competence (in sense of knowing political system, understanding political processes and having a will to participate in them).

Final thoughts

The power of information and ways of communication were always depended on technology of the time. For instance, Gutenberg's discovery of movable letters and printing press meant a fundamental change in his time. It initiated a communication revolution and wide distribution of information. That way, as McLuhan stated, it created a "typographic man" (McLuhan, 1962). That revolution is quite comparable with modern change of communication paradigm caused by Internet and its communication capabilities (particularly interactivity), that are reshaping today's world in almost all of its social dimensions. Paraphrasing McLuhan in similar manner, one might say that Internet created a "networked man". This is not just about the change of the overall communications paradigm, but also about profound and irreversible changes in the overall sociability. Namely, virtual sphere, as a parallel sphere of sociability is the main feature of the new reality. Although embedded in the "real" world, it increasingly overcomes its impact in that sense. Its benefits – in terms of communication, exchange and access to information – are exceptional. Decentralization of information power centers and avoiding traditional media guardians, media space in virtual sphere becomes free, while the communication and connection possibilities are almost limitless.

Nevertheless, information also depends on social context in which they occur. It is inseparable of it, because its contents and its meanings, acceptance

9 "The online world is a faster world, a more chaotic world, and a more confusing world. At times, it can resemble a cacophony – a thousand voices shouting at once, and no one making much sense. But it is also, fundamentally, a more open – and therefore a more honest – one. Politicians have two responses: they can try to tighten control, to avoid any slips that might embarrass them. Or they can embrace this new territory, as their voters surely will" (Colvile, 2008, 47).


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and significance are significantly conditioned by political, economic, cultural and social environment, regardless of way of their mediation. So, regarding the content and communication side of new media and their impact to politics, and social life generally, it could be argued that it is not primarily about the technology and quite new way of communication, but about the people (i.e. reaching them and interacting with them, about their will, pre-existing values, attitudes, interests and visions). New media could be seen as "empty vessels" to be fulfilled with our contents and expressions, used and directed toward our desires, purposes and visions. "This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise, it is merely wires and lights in a box" (Colvile, 2008, 47).

From the standpoint of new media's impact to democratic development, which is usually considered as beneficial to liberty and equality, it has to be said that it is not necessarily so. That relation is much complex and depends on various conditions such as content, purpose, media type, quantity and accuracy of information, accessibility, target audiences, and various social, political and cultural contexts where information are produced, distributed and received. Such number of variables (each of which can significantly affect this relation) does not allow unambiguous claims regarding this relationship. Namely, while new media (because of their promptness) may benefit plebiscitary democracy, at the other side, it can undermine deliberative democracy. For instance, emphasis on some specific communication forms (pictures or symbols for example), may be more useful to political propaganda than to civic education. In other words, it can strength quantitative side of political participation rather than political (civic) competence, which is essential sociocultural prerequisite of effective democracy.10

Therefore, it could be argued that there is no certainty that new media contribute to democratization processes always and necessarily on positive way. They are powerful resource and agent, but pretty much depends on who and how use it, and for what purpose. In different societies, their performance and impact will be equally different. This issue is particularly interested in

10 It is about political culture and its relation to political structure. Quite simplified, this relation can be explained so that if political culture does not support political structure (democracy), chances of system's democratic functioning (even for its sustainability) are poor. Culture that consist democratic values widespread and internalized among the majority of citizens (actually, the civic culture) is the type that supports democratic political system and foster democratic processes (cf. Almond / Verba, 2000; Putnam, 2003; Maldini, 2011). If there is no congruency between them, the result is usually some kind of defective democracy, or another type of authoritarian regime (cf. Merkel, 2004).


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transitional societies, particularly regarding of their efforts on democratic development. It is even more actual in some authoritarian regimes which are about to be liberalized or democratized, where some processes started or initiated by new media (for example, recent "social media revolutions" against authoritarian regimes in North Africa and Middle East). Although quite positive from standpoint of democratization, they are often considered as democratization itself or at least as its start (as claimed by many exalted theorists of new media). Such claims, however, could mislead uninformed individuals, because democratization is process that is much more complex and requires certain preconditions even to be started, let alone to be established (after all, chain of later events in those countries just confirmed it).

There is immense number of various new media today (web sites, web portals, blogs, chat rooms, discussion forums) and the closely related social networks, virtual communities and associations, but their performance and impact to social and political life are different and dependent on various factors and conditions, quite specific from case to case, and between certain societies. As stated previously, the new media in this context undoubtedly have a lot of advantages, but also a certain limits. Although is evident that virtual sphere has a significant impact to political processes, described trends still not be considered as essential in sense of change of political paradigm. In addition, some well-known examples (often used in order to support such theories) cannot explain the entire phenomenon. It seems that they remain on the surface of those processes explaining their reshaping (changes of communication modes under the influence of new media and information and communication technologies that catalyzing political processes) rather than change of very essence of political processes, which does not change significantly. Namely, it is still unclear how virtual communities address problems of commitment and trust, political identity, civic and political competence, consensus and compromises, as well as how the institutional conditions encourages or discourages exploitation of new media (and information and communication technologies at all) for collective goals.

Therefore, further researches have to examine just those aspects, which are essential to political processes and functioning of political system. It is also obvious that future analyses need to examine more in detail the impact of the new media, especially with focus on the difference between types of activities performed online, and explore how they affect social capital (social contacts and civil engagement), and political participation respectively, which are crucial for social cohesion and effective functioning of democracy.


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Address

Prof. Pero Maldini, Ph.D. Professor of political science Head of Department of Communication Science at University of Dubrovnik, 20000 Dubrovnik, Croatia [email protected]

New media and politics - Their reaches and limits in political processes

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