Web-Based Participatory Democracy: Findings from Italy - Information and Communication Technologies in Public Administration - page 86

Let us start from the scopes and the target of web-based participatory experiments.
Although the press has given considerable (and, in general, positive) attention to digital
democracy initiatives promoted by the Italian governments, critics have argued that
these initiatives have been promoted mostly for political or electoral purposes. In addi-
tion, when digital participation has been promoted by public administrations other
than the government, the aim, as perceived by many, was that of a “social reporting,”
rather than a true attempt to empower people's voice within policy-making.
As a consequence (and, at the same time, a substantiation) of the partial success
of experiments in digital democracy, it might be relevant to consider the target of par-
ticipants. According to the trend registered in many of the Western democracies, the
number of people connected to the web is in constant growth, and their willingness
to participate in policy-making is thus assumed. As shown by the Deloitte Digital
Democracy Survey (2014), for instance, the so-called digital omnivores in the United
States—those consumers who own a trio of tablets, smartphones, and laptops—
have continued to grow in number, driven by the proliferation of new platforms
and increased device adoption. Deloitte classifies one third (37%) of U.S. consum-
ers as digital omnivores, a 42% growth over the previous year. The report indicates
a growth, which has been driven by continued tablet adoption (33% increase from
2012 to 2013) and, to a lesser extent, smartphone ownership (18% increase).
Italy is no exception to this trend. Almost 62% of Italians are connected to
the web, with an average increase of 9 percentage points per year. Increasingly,
Italians are connected through smartphone (+10% from 2011 to 2012) and tablets.
Nevertheless, Italy is still suffering from a significant gap between the proportion
of the population that is connected and actively engaged with the web and the still
considerable number of citizens who either are not connected to the Internet or do
not engage in any form of online activism, including forms of digital democracy.
As already mentioned, the 2014 report from the Observa Science Society notes that
3.7 of 10 Italians have never used Internet or a personal computer. According to
another think-tank devoted to research on politics and society, Demos&PI, 6 of 10
Italians have an Internet connection at home (they doubled in 10 years: from 23%
in 2000 to 58% in 2013). However, less than half of those citizens (roughly 40%)
are actively engaged online. Also, the level of engagement varies. Demos&Pi dis-
tinguishes between the “cives.net” (25% overall), those who consider the web as an
arena for discussion and political confrontation, and the “infonauts” (15% in total),
who prefer to use the web mostly for getting information.
4.7 A Market in Backsliding and the Digital
Divide in Local Administrations
Let us move to the third and fourth reasons. The third reason that might explain
the limits of web-based participatory initiatives in Italy relates to the Italian digital
market. In 2013, the Italian digital market has shown a considerable backsliding,