Title: The European Union and e-democracy: Interactive Policy-Making (IPM)

Authors: Tuna Baskoy

Addresses: Department of Politics and Public Administration, Jor 727, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario, M5B 2K3, Canada

Abstract: This study assesses the European Commission|s Interactive Policy-Making (IPM) initiative launched in 2001 with respect to its potential to promote democratic participation in the European Union (EU). It is argued that the EU is an example of the consultative, if not participatory model of e-democracy. The first section reviews the existing literature on the implications of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) for democratic participation, followed by a brief history of e-government and e-democracy in the EU in the second section. The third section investigates the IPM project in detail, before evaluating the findings in the last section.

Keywords: e-government; e-democracy; IPM; interactive policy making; EU; European Union; e-consultation; democratic participation; ICT; information technology; communications technology; eEurope; electronic democracy; electronic government.

DOI: 10.1504/IJED.2009.028548

International Journal of Electronic Democracy, 2009 Vol.1 No.2, pp.217 - 232

Published online: 18 Sep 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article