SOCIETY-TECHNOLOGY: Internet a Tool for Democracy?

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Gumisai Mutume

MEXICO CITY, Nov 26 1999 (IPS) - Eleven years ago when Brazilian activist Chico Mendes was murdered while battling for peoples’ land rights in the Amazon, telegrams and faxes poured into the Brazilian government offices demanding the arrest and prosecution of his killers – even before local media had carried the story.

Mendes was assassinated Dec. 22 1988, near the Peruvian border. Within an hour of the news reaching non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Rio de Janeiro it was being relayed worldwide by electronic mail (e-mail).

The ensuing worldwide pressure forced government to arrest and convict the killers. But that was long before the Internet and e- mail explosion that is radically changing virtually every facet of the way most people communicate and spend their daily life.

The last 15 years also have seen the growth of a vibrant NGO community in the South that is having a profound impact on development thinking and practice.

The result of the convergence of these two forces may have a major implication on the world’s democratic institutions.

“I think the Internet is a valuable lobbying platform, however I do not think it is quite there yet,” notes Brenda Leeuwenberg consultant with New Zealand communications company Spunk Media.

“As the technology becomes more widespread, more ‘in our homes’ – it will become a more powerful tool for the masses – and subsequently a lobbying platform for developing nations.”

The first Internet-based human rights group, Derechos, uses cyberspace from Argentina to expose human rights violations and collect information. Part of its work includes bringing to trial former members of the Argentine military of the 1976-82 dictatorship accused of human rights violations, genocide and terrorism.

Most commonly used is e-mail which makes communication between NGOs cheap and easy, and allows for better co-ordination of actions. When encrypted, e-mail messages are even more secure from interception.

“Derechos encrypts particularly confidential messages that go between Spain and Argentina, to stop the Argentine intelligence forces from being able to read them and so try to jeopardise the trial,” says the Global Internet Liberty Campaign.

Lobby groups such as the international NGO network “Jubilee 2000” now use e-mail to distribute action alerts calling for letters to be written on behalf of specific issues.

Jubilee 2000 has achieved tremendous global impact, even receiving mention from the Breton Woods institutions in its campaign to rid the poorest nations of their debt burden.

It now boasts the support of Pope John Paul II, pop star Bono and a string of other global luminaries.

“In my country it works very well when launching solidarity campaigns and also issue-oriented campaigns like the Jubilee 2000. The local branches of Green Peace and Amnesty International and other local human rights organisations do work a lot using Internet tools,” says Argentine journalist Dafne Plou.

Argentina has nearly one million of the world’s 180 million Internet users. Cyber-cafes and public booths are becoming popular in a Latin American nation that relatively is new to the Internet revolution.

“I don’t think that organising the support for Jubilee 2000 could have been so fast and successful if it hadn’t been for the new information technologies. It would have taken much longer and it would have been harder to get to the key people.

“Sometimes I find that it’s easier for people to read and answer their e-mails – even if they do so at 1:00 a.m. – than to get them on the phone”, says Plou.

But the biggest show of force of the power of Internet lobbying takes place next week in what is billed as a historic confrontation between corporate rule and civil society at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial meeting in Seattle Nov 30 to Dec 3.

The biggest demonstration against global capitalism is expected to attract tens of thousands of political activists from 70 countries and activists say it is an important milestone in the development of new communication technologies as instruments for change.

Not long ago, trade issues were the preserve of technocrats and economic science gurus but not anymore. The global impact of the WTO trade regimes has come under sharp focus from NGOs all over the world setting up web pages and e-mail campaigns around trade issues.

Teach-ins, workshops, street theatre and debates will further educate and inform those who gather in Seattle.

But either because governments in developing countries are not aware of the power of new information technologies or are ignoring these tools they are still to develop comprehensive policies for their promotion.

The Middle East has only 900,000 Internet users, Africa has 1.1 million while Latin America has 5.2 million – developing regions in desperate need of communication tools. Countries such as Afghanistan and China have actively sought to thwart Internet use by their citizens.

In Haiti, the closure by presidential order of the country’s first and largest Internet service provider, Alpha Network Communications, in September caused an outcry on the Internet citizens in the form of letters to the president and the country’s embassies.

A growing form of Internet protest is the use of electronic civil disobedience systems such as Floodnet.

The Zapatista Tactical FloodNet for example targets an institution or symbol of Mexican neo-liberalism on a particular day, reloading the website several times a minute and inundating it with access requests, rendering it inoperable.

At no other point in history has a communications medium been adopted so quickly and had such impact on society as the Internet.

“Since its political birth in the 1996 elections, the Internet has grown from campaign novelty to a communications tool ready to take its place alongside traditional media as a proven way to reach, involve and sway voters in the 2000 elections,” notes a U.S. political study.

“In 1998, voters looked to the Web for unmediated political information and to participate in local campaigns. Not since the days of the town meeting have voters had as much access to the political process as they do today through the Internet.”

Voters have 24-hour access to candidate information and no longer need to wait for the morning newspaper. They can view what they want, when they want, for as long as they want. They also have the opportunity, at the click of a mouse to directly voice themselves or volunteer campaign contributions.

In Canada, British Columbia, a tiny province of 4 million ushered in an Act in 1996 which, when the Internet becomes as freely as available as the telephone will introduce Electronic Direct Democracy.

The Recall and Initiative Act enables the recall of any member of the provincial Legislature including the premier. It is presently known as direct democracy but in a matter of years will take electronic dimensions.

The Internet offers “an unprecedented opportunity to reconnect people to the political process – by helping people become more informed citizens, by helping our elected representatives to be more responsive to those citizens, and by engaging more people in public policy discussions and debate,” says Steve Case, Chairman of America Online.