Two-way dialogue or one-way street?

Harnessing the potential of Web 2.0 is proving to be a controversial direction for the EU

 
Reading Manfredi’s article on the use of Web 2.0 in marketing and Public Relations (CD issue 4/2007), I was surprised to find concepts such as “e-participation” and “the use of online media for the democratisation of information and opinions”. The exact same concepts have been at the heart of Political Communication analysis for quite some time now. The idea of clients actively shaping the identity and standing of a brand has its equivalent in politics, where new media are used not only in electoral campaigning in a way that enables grassroots to actively engage in the pre-election campaigns; Web 2.0 is also driving the development of direct citizens’ participation in the decision-making process. Trust-building is a key component found not only in Corporate Communications but also in politics and new media have given a new dimension to this: winning the trust of citizens towards governmental institutions can no longer rely on one-way information-based communication (or in certain cases blatant propaganda). In a similar manner that credible reputation building around a brand nowadays relies on people talking about that brand and companies listening to what people have to say, so do political establishments have to build a two-way communication relationship with their citizens.

Asimina Michailidou

Asimina Michailidou holds a PhD in EU public communication and is a researcher at the Department of Sociology, in the University of Bristol, UK. Her research covers new media and their impact on public communication and political participation, with a focus on EU institutions and politics. She is currently working on an ESRC-funded, cross-national project on the impact of the constitutional process on public debates in EU countries