Crisis, Innovation and e-Participation: Towards a Framework for Comparative Research

• Main Authors: Åström, Joachim, Hinsberg, Hille, Jonsson, Magnus, Karlsson, Martin
• Other Authors: Örebro University, Center for Higher Education Policy Studies, University of Twente, Research School for Technology Mediated Knowledge Processes Örebro, Dalarna University, Örebro School of Public Affairs, Maria A. Wimmer, Efthimios Tambouris, Ann Macintosh, TC 8, WG 8.5
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2013
• Subjects: Democratic Innovation; Crisis; e-Participation; Comparative Research; ICT; [INFO]Computer Science [cs]; [SHS.INFO]Humanities and Social Sciences/Library and information sciences; Iceland
• Online Access: https://hal.inria.fr/hal-01491229; https://hal.inria.fr/hal-01491229/document; https://hal.inria.fr/hal-01491229/file/978-3-642-40346-0_3_Chapter.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-40346-0_3

Part 1: Research Directions International audience Why and how do e-participation policies sometimes flow with politics as usual and sometimes lead to challenging powerful elites and institutions? With the aim of investigating this question, we introduce a framework for comparative research that includes not only systemic but also circumstantial factors. The approach is tested in a comparative case study of three northern European countries–Sweden, Estonia and Iceland–that are all experimenting with e-participation but which are experiencing rather different levels of crisis. The results show that innovation and elite challenging aspirations are very much related to the type and degree of crisis. It is therefore argued that the interplay between institutional constraints and circumstantial catalysts needs further scholarly attention and elaboration.