[open-government] Call for Panelists: Mobile political participation

[emre at mgovernment.net]

Dear Colleagues,

The mobileGov World Summit 2017 (Brighton UK during 7-9 May) is soliciting
speakers, panels & tutorial proposals.

Nominations for the mobileGov Global  Awards is still open. Please show
interest at www.m4life.org or write directly to conf at m4life.org for
specific enquiries.



-------------   Call for panelists   -------------------
_____________________________________________________________________
Mobile political participation: exploring mobility implications for
democratic engagement
mobileGov World Summit 2017,
7-9 May, Brighton UK
____________________________________________________________________________

While mVoting, mPetitioning and other institutional political
participation mechanisms have long been part of mGov related discussion,
the prospects and consequences of mobile technology proliferation for a
wider range of democratic participation haven’t been paid due attention.
In addition, investigation of associations between media and political
engagement are typically approached by researchers with the focus on ICTs
as a whole, while mobile media effects are rarely measured separately.

This panel therefore aims at revisiting unique features of mobile media
and mobile interaction with the perspective of identifying their
implications for democratic engagement. In particular, we invite
participants from various disciplines to present their work and discuss
the following issues:

a) What is the role of mobile media in political participation?
Existing research suggests that different media may have varied
relationships to political interest and behavior depending on the specific
characteristics of the media: exposure to media can either provoke one’s
interest in political issues or reinforce the existing political interest
and engagement. It will be interesting to examine the role of mobile media
in this relation. Will immediate interactivity and information sharing
capabilities of mobile media enable it to stimulate political interest? Or
will these effects be outweighed by personalization and customization
features allowing for content filtering and thus resulting in
communication to like-minded people with limited exposure to diverse
opinions?

b) For what forms of political participation mobile media is used?
Unique features of mobile interaction can suit certain types of political
engagement better than others. For example, one might expect that
location-awareness and “always on” attributes can be beneficial for
mobilization and coordination of political actions, while short
interaction time, lower attention and concentration are more favorable for
news consumption and commenting, rather than writing thoughtful
reflections on political and social issues. In addition it will be
interesting to discuss what forms of mobile political participation can be
considered exclusively mobile.

c) What consequences does mobile political participation have for democracy?
And finally, it is important to examine potential outcomes of mobile
participation in terms of their wider democratic contributions. Does
increased political communication contribute to participatory equality? Or
how does mobile participation, considering its specific attributes- short
interaction time, lower attention and concentration, ubiquity and
interactivity- influence political knowledge, quality of political
deliberation, tolerance and other democratic values?

Submissions: Please initially send us Max 3 A4 pages of  talk / summary
abstract including title, author’s name and position, and short bio. All
submissions should be sent mLife events at via conf at m4life.org by 15
February 2017.


-- 
Emre Simsek
Researcher
MobileGov UK
http://www.mgovernment.net/
emre at mgovernment.org