The Internet's Equalizing Influence on Political Discourse and Engagement

Connecticut College Digital Commons @ Connecticut College Government and International Relations Honors Government and International Relations Papers Department Spring 5-2-2008 Smart People, Stupid Networks: The nI ternet’s Equalizing Influence on Political Discourse and Engagement Joseph D. Backer Connecticut College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.conncoll.edu/govhp Recommended Citation Backer, Joseph D., "Smart People, Stupid Networks: The nI ternet’s Equalizing Influence on Political Discourse and Engagement" (2008). Government and International Relations Honors Papers. 6. http://digitalcommons.conncoll.edu/govhp/6 This Honors Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Government and International Relations Department at Digital Commons @ Connecticut College. It has been accepted for inclusion in Government and International Relations Honors Papers by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Connecticut College. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The views expressed in this paper are solely those of the author. Smart People, Stupid Networks: The Internet’s Equalizing Influence on Political Discourse and Engagement An Honors Thesis Presented By Joseph Backer To the Department of Government in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Honors in the Major Field Connecticut College New London, Connecticut May 2, 2008 Abstract This study explores the impact and influences of the Internet on formalized political discourse and engagement during the last decade. It traces the traditions and conventions of predominantly top-down and elite-dominated methods of information dissemination and citizen mobilization, beginning with newspapers at the turn of the nineteenth century and progressing to the professionalization and specialization experienced during the twentieth century. These sustained patterns of limited influence for non-elites had a marginalizing effect on participation and understandings of democratic responsiveness. Since the emergence of the Internet as a widespread medium of communication, however, prevailing hierarchies of control over discourse and engagement have been challenged on a number of fronts. This study highlights many such challenges and argues that the Internet is an equalizing force that is counteracting the disproportionate levels of power held by political elites. It further underlines the complementary nature of the Internet to traditional forms of political expression, and the necessity of policies that will equip Americans with the confidence and experience necessary to realize the Internet’s potential as a political forum. ii To my grandfather, Labon Backer, who has lived more American history than anyone else I know, and always inspired me to stay engaged and be heard. iii Contents Acknowledgments v Introduction Watch This Space 1 Methods and Resources 5 Overview 7 Chapter 1 The Top-Down Legacy of Political Discourse 9 Early American Newspapers as the Originators of the 11 Party System 1820s-1880s: Widening Audiences and Increasing Influence 13 1880s-1930s: Urban Consolidation 20 Conclusion 26 Chapter 2 The Professionalization and Specialization of American Politics 28 Interpretive Journalism: Increased Specialization in the 29 News Media The Explosion of Interest Groups, Political Consultants and 37 Television News The Marginalizing Effect of Critical Journalism 47 Conclusion 49 Chapter 3 Internet Use in the United States 52 The Spread of Internet Use 52 Home Broadband Access 55 Lower Rural Broadband Penetration 57 Explaining Lower Access Among Certain Groups 59 Philosophies and Approaches to Widening Accessibility 61 Chapter 4 The Internet as a Forum for Political Discourse 69 Accessing Political News Online 70 Early Worries About Internet Discourse 72 The Internet Facilitates Increased Exposure to the News 75 Making and Discussing News From the Bottom-Up 79 Conclusion 99 Chapter 5 Online Engagement in Political Campaigns and Interest Groups 101 Shifting Power Dynamics in Political Campaigns 101 Hybridizing Philosophies for Internet-Savvy Interest Groups 126 Conclusion Empowering Citizens and Their Communities 138 Works Cited 147 Works Consulted 153 iv Acknowledgments I would first and foremost like to thank my thesis advisor, Professor Bill Frasure, for all his help throughout this process (stretching back to the spring of 2007, in Hanoi). His guidance and critiques were invaluable in approaching this task, as well as crafting the final product – and doing so in a way that overcame my unhealthy fondness for procrastination. I am also deeply indebted to my second reader, Professor MaryAnne Borrelli, for the insightful feedback she provided. Every discussion was as enjoyable as it was helpful, which was a welcome relief during stressful times. As a student scholar in the Holleran Center’s Certificate Program for Community Action and Public Policy, I have benefited greatly over the course of my college career from the advice of many people. Sarah Barr, Professor Audrey Zakriski and Tracee Reiser were especially valuable in helping me to focus my interests and find many opportunities to enrich my college experience. Finally, thanks to my family and my friends for their feedback and support (even when that meant driving all the way to New London with a working computer after all else failed). v Introduction Watch This Space On the morning of March 29th, reports began to trickle out of Zimbabwe that the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), was claiming a substantial victory over the ruling Zanu-PF party in the joint presidential and parliamentary elections that were taking place. The president, Robert Mugabe, has been in power since 1980 and by most accounts has been the driving force behind calamitous economic decline, while simultaneously using state power to repress political opposition and violate the human and civil rights of Zimbabweans across the country. Previous elections during the last decade had done little to weaken his grip on the presidency. I called my friend Andrew, who is from the capital city of Harare and currently studying at Yale, in the hopes of procuring some insider information. He told me that his own sense of what might be happening in Zimbabwe was a mixture of feeling like he had been here before but also that this was the best opportunity in a long time for serious change. But he couldn’t give me much more than The New York Times had, in terms of specifics. “I know as much as you do,” he explained. Tight control of media and information within Zimbabwe meant that those of us reading articles in the United States might actually be learning the news before many within the country did. I wasn’t the first person to ask him about the situation, though, and he had already begun to compile informative and helpful news stories he was finding online, using the “Mini-Feed” on his Facebook account to post articles, blogs and pictures for his friends to read. Each link had a short comment below it, written by Andrew as an interpretation of, or reaction to, what he had gathered. The second item, a story from Bloomberg.com, 1 was accompanied by this: Updates: the MDC is claiming huge wins (67%!), but the long haul is just beginning, and the government is refusing to release results yet. Watch this space. In the weeks since Election Day, as the storylines of the Zimbabwean political turmoil have indeed grown increasingly muddled and frustrating, Andrew’s personalized news feed has been a daily source of news, collected from an international range of organizations: The New York Times, The Guardian, the Associated Press and Reuters, and a whole host of African publications from Zimbabwe, South Africa and beyond. On my own – and even with the processing power of the Internet – collecting and filtering through the thousands of news stories available each day about Zimbabwe would have been a daunting task. Instead, I’ve been able to read the news over the shoulder of a trusted source and someone who knows where to look – with the added bonus of getting to hear his personal (albeit short) take on the information at hand. Andrew’s experience is a microcosm of the dramatic effect of the Internet on political discourse and engagement. The last two centuries in the United States have seen incredible, unbridled change in all aspects of life, but there have been remarkably few shifts in the way Americans learn and interact as political citizens. Through newspapers, radio and television, we are given the news that editors choose to include, with few opportunities for feedback or interaction with the source. Formalized political discourse, then, has always been predominantly top-down and one-way. The motto of the national standard-bearer for modern journalism, The New York Times, is “All the News That’s Fit to Print” – an appropriate summation of the centralized and elite-dominated control over the scope of discussion and debate. “All the News That Fits to Print” would be just as accurate an encapsulation of the simple calculus of print and broadcast journalism: the 2 typical daily newspaper only contains 10% of the available news from that day – and that represents ten times the information reported on a typical half-hour television news program (Smith 1980, 17 & 259). It’s a limitation that has had important implications for political culture in the United States. The Internet, on the other hand, is a massive and two-way network (though the term “two-way” does it very little justice): a vast public square for the essentially unlimited publication and discussion of information. The emergence of such a platform has had an incredible effect on the traditional news media in the United States and their relationship with the nation. During his appearance on The Colbert Report on April 3rd, New York University professor and new media expert Clay Shirky summed it up: Prior to the Internet, if you had something to say in public, you couldn’t. Period. Media was what you didn’t have access to.

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