Unanswered questions

This study is part of a comprehensive research programme on „Participation on the Net“. The literary analysis provides an overview of where research currently stands. It enables the identification of research areas that are, at the same time, fields of online participation. It also shows commonalities and differences between the research areas and more or less established insight into Net participation. Thus we are able to see which insight we currently do not possess and which unanswered questions future empirical studies should address.

These include:

  • How widespread is participation in the different areas of society? Which citizens prefer to participate in which areas?
  • Which motives or attitudes foster or obstruct participation on the Net?
    How important are trust and security? Which general conditions influence their assessment by citizens?
  • What are the socio-demographic conditions for participation in the different areas? What makes them distinct? What does the „participation divide“ look like on the Net?
  • If „empowerment“ is an important element of participation on the Net, how can it be defined? What influences it, and what are its conditions? Does a „participative habitus“ emerge?
  • How can forms and degrees of participation be distinguished? From which threshold of objective or subjective involvement is it valid to speak of actual participation? Is it necessary to draw a line between horizontal and vertical participation?
  • In which forms of participation is there a successful transition from online into the offline world, and in which areas? What must happen for participation on the Net to change established social institutions?

DIVSI will continue to conduct studies to enrich debate on the form, meaning, potential and challenges of participation on the Net by contributing academic insight, and hence will provide the social protagonists with a foundation upon which they may structure the necessary framework conditions.