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Relevance to the 'user' is a given as individuals and groups themselves de-
cide on the purpose, focus and content of their communications.
Although apparently increasing, the scale of spontaneous citizen action
is hard to quantify and not always highly visible. However, it is an influen-
tial force in society that can only become stronger as more people become
aware of the possibilities. A striking contrast with e-government programs
is the fact that energy and motivation of citizens to engage in these activi-
ties is evident in abundance - there is no need for extensive persuasion or
high profile public relations campaigns to secure their involvement and
commitment.
6.1.3 Focus
The case studies described here also show significant variation in terms
of their focus. As we have already mentioned in Section 6.1.1, the focus of
projects in most cases is defined by the initiator, although the extent of
definition may be very specific or very broad.
Examples which have both a very specific and 'narrow' focus include
the Surrey Over 50's website, and the Bundestag website. Initiatives which
have a specific but potentially broad-ranging focus include Netmums and
WomenSpeak, which sought to elicit the experiences and attitudes of a
particular group in order to inform Government thinking and, potentially,
policy making. Others have an even broader focus. For example, the
Macatawa project, the Chicago neighbourhood planning project, the Jhai
Foundation and the K-Net projects all had broad aims related to the im-
provement and regeneration of a particular community.
In deeply impoverished communities in the developing countries, we
have seen that the focus of initiatives is more likely to be upon improving
basic living conditions through a variety of technologies, including ICTs,
to enable economic activity, health care and education. In western nations,
initiatives are often focused upon the needs of excluded or marginalized
groups. The focus in these cases is upon capacity building in the commu-
nity.
In several of the cases, the specific issue on which the initiative focuses
may in fact be somewhat secondary to a more general aim of engaging
citizens in some way. For instance, 'Logged Off' (cited in the previous
chapter) which was initiated by the Carnegie Foundation. This research
exercise was conducted to explore the potential for ICTs to engage young
people more effectively in political issues, the processes of public decision
making and civil society (Howland and Bethell 2002).
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