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The other week I had the opportunity to address staff from 31 parliaments <http://www.eduskunta.fi/ecprd/> across Europe at the Parliaments on the Net conference in Helsinki. There is a growing interest in the concept of "e-democracy" within representative institutions as well as a concern that the expectation of online speed may undermine their attempts to successfully bring these tools into their processes which are by design slow and deliberative. Here are my policy questions - Should parliaments, legislatures, councils and other representative institutions begin to invest real resources in "e-democracy" and build it into their official processes? Do they need to provide a counterbalance to the larger e- government and e-democracy/consultation investments of the administrative branch of government? You check out my answer in my 10MB (yikes) power point presentation: http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/repedemclift.ppt (It includes lots of interesting screen shots of parliamentary sites.) My bottom line: Build representative e-democracy today or you will lose power tomorrow. As the legitimate direct representatives of citizens, your institutional use of e-democracy tools and concepts is paramount to the future of democracy as a whole. Check out their "Photo Album" as I pray for the future of representative e-democracy. :-) Steven Clift Democracies Online Check out the Agenda and Conference Report pages for presentations: http://www.eduskunta.fi/ecprd/ (Or use links below) Conference Reports (Notes): E-Democracy Workshop http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/Edemoc.ppt Knowledge Management Workshop http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/KMworkshop.pdf Quick links to Conference Presentations: 1. E-democracy in practice, Swedish experiences of a new political tool. <http://www.svekom.se/skvad/E-democracy-en.pdf> Tommy Rosén, Project Director, Swedish Association of Local Authorities Address: http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/Rosenaddress.helsinki.pd f Slides: http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/helsinki.ppt (author of the now famous local government e-democracy report) 2. Bruno Vieillefosse/Assemblée nationale France: Les perspectives de la démocratie électronique French: http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/helsinki.pdf English: http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/helskineng.pdf 3. Knowledge Management - projects in the Finnish Parliament, a Member of Parliament’s mission and toolbox as an example, Markku Markkula, Member of the Finnish Parliament, Committee for the Future Developing and Implementing Knowledge Management in the Parliament of Finland http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/KM_Finnish_Parliament.pd f (major report still in the works) 4. Knowledge Management - an accelerator for national competitiveness, Professor Pirjo Ståhle, Lappeenranta University of Technology http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/stahle.pps (not parliament specific) 5. Daniel Schweizer/The Swiss Parliament: Verbalix - near real-time Internet publishing of Parliamentary minutes http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/verbalix-helsinki.zip (Very popular) 6. Per Axelson/The Swedish Parliament: Promoting the exchange of information between Parliaments http://www2.eduskunta.fi/fakta/edustaja/ecprd/Axelson.ppt ^ ^ ^ ^ Steven L. Clift - W: http://www.publicus.net Minneapolis - - - E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Minnesota - - - - - T: +1.612.822.8667 USA - - - - - - - ICQ: 13789183 *** Please send submissions to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** *** To subscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** *** Message body: SUB DO-WIRE *** *** To unsubscribe instead, write: UNSUB DO-WIRE *** *** Please forward this post to others and encourage *** *** them to subscribe to the free DO-WIRE service. ***
