Civil Society, New Media and Participation in Germany

This paper discusses the relation between eParticipation and civil society in Germany using a theoretical framework based on three arenas of political communication: the traditional political system, the mass-media system, and the civil society public space. Currently in Germany the traditional political system prevails and funds research about representative oriented eParticipation activities. Informal and direct democracy oriented eParticipation research and development activities are left to foundations or civil society organizations and activists. 1 Civil Society and eParticipation – perspectives on the concepts There are many definitions of civil society due to the political perspectives of those who write/decide what it is (from the analytical point of view) or what it should be (from the normative point of view). Wikipedia states, that “there are myriad definitions of civil society” (Wikipedia civil society, 2008). They present the definition of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). From the political science point of view the LSE sees civil society as a “concept located strategically at the cross-section of important strands of intellectual developments of the social sciences” (LSE: What is civil society, 2008). There are lots of definitions describing this concept from various perspectives depending on the normative political background. A widely used definition of this concept is 50 Peter Mambrey (2008): Civil Society, New Media and Participation in Germany. In Ovid Pacific Boyd, Peter Mambrey (Eds.), International Reports on Socio-Informatics (IRSI), Empowerment and e-Participation in Civil Society: Local, National and International Implications Workshop Proceedings (Vol. 5, Iss. 1, pp. 50-65)