Israeli Politicians Use of the Internet

Election Campaigns – March 2006

Sharon Haleva Amir

Israeli Governmental System

PresidentCeremonial Head of the State

Judicial Authority Courts SystemLegislative Authority

Parliament-Knesset Executive AuthorityGovernment

Prime MinisterHead of the State

In Practice

Israeli Electoral System

• Israeli Elections are based on nation- wide proportional representation.

• the voters vote for a party list, and not for a particular person on the list.

• the number of seats which every list receives in the Knesset is proportional to the number of voters who voted for it.

• Qualifying treshold is 2%, which means a party must receive at least 2% of the votes in order to be elected.

Israeli Electoral System 2

• The Elections are being held every four years.nevertheless, the Knesset or the Prime Minister can decide to hold early elections, and under certain circumstances can serve for more than four years

• The Knesset – Israeli Legislative Parliament is constituted of 120 members (MK).

• In the last Knesset (16th),13 Lists were elected.

• http://www.knesset.gov.il/main/eng/home.asp

Israel’s exposure Rate to the Internet

• 40% of households in Israel were connected to the internet in 2004 (compared to 28% in 2002)

• http://www.cbs.gov.il/publications/indic-tech_heb.pdf

Israeli Elections Via the Internet –Politicians Side

• Parties Sites.• Internet Campaigns - Electoral Propaganda in

the Home Pages of Leading Sites.• For the First Time :

Candidates publish their own personal Blogs. Candidates all across the political spectrum are using this new medium to reach their voters

Israeli Labor (Haavoda) Party Site

“Kadima” (Ruling Party) Site

Right wing “Likud” Party Site

Internet Campaigns – “Shinui” Party in Ynet Homepage

(the leading Newspaper in Israel)

“Dov & His Friends”Dov Henin’s Blog – Israeli Communist

Party (“Hadash”)

Baruch Marzel’s Blog – Right Wing Extremist Candidate

Hagar Zimmerman’s Blog– “Green Leaf” party

supports legalisation of soft drugs

“Shelly Yechimovitz – the Diary”Haavoda (Labor) Candidate

Blog

“Yahalom in a public mission” – Shaul Yahalom’s Blog – “Mafdal”: A National

Religious Party

Israeli Elections Via the Internet –Citizens Side

• Political Forums

• Talkbacks

• Chats

• Citizens Political Blogs

• Supporters Sites.

• Virtual Support Demonstrations

Politicians appear in a video chat ,talking with members of the political community

in a leading Israeli newspaper

Talkbacks – Internet users respond to

current affairs articles

Citizens Political Blogs : Menora Hazani – a settler

represents Right wing voters, Ilanit Suisa– represents

Left wing votersAbigail Bechler- represents

Mainstream voters

A Private Site of Likud Supporters

A Virtual Support Demonstartion“Kadima” Party

Internet as an Electoral Tool

• The Internet presence in electoral campigns is well noticed.

• Most parties and candidates use the internet to reach citizens without the need to use mediated mass communications media.

Internet as an Electoral Tool – Advantages to the politicians

• The Internet sets no limits of time and space for the political players to lecture their platform.

• The Propaganda Laws which reffers to classical mass media (Radio, TV, Journalism) do not apply to the internet, thus the political players doesn’t have any legal limitations.

More Advantages to the political players

• Politicians use the net to preach their own opinions and platforms.

• Interviews of politicians by opinionated journalists are less important to them;

• Thus, politicians do not need to face profound or prying questions.

• Good for politicians – Bad for Democracy

Internet as an Electoral Tool – Advantages to the citizen/voter

• It exposes citizens to many opinions whenever they want to.

• It lays the foundation to deliberation.• It enables potential voters to interact by

Email, Forum or Chat with the politicians, effortlessly.

• It empowers citizens to become active players in the political game.

Main Disadvantages of the Internet as an Electoral Tool

• Although Internet is very prevalent in Israel, wide scale populations don’t have access to the net.

• Themes published in the Internet reach mostly Israeli natives, middle class, well educated people.

• Thus the Net doesn’t represent equally all the opinions and all the sectors in the population.

Some Critical Insights

• Theoretically, politicians usage of the internet empowers citizens, advances deliberation and opens another communication channel between politicians and citizens.

• However, many of the blogs don’t include talkback / forum options.

Critical Insights - 2

• Election Campaigns motivate politicians to court potential voters. After the elections, presumably most MK will not continue to write their blogs.

• One sided / short termed blogs don’t contribute empowerment or participation on behalf of the citizens but rather constitutes another unilateral communication channel for the politicians.

A Bit About My Planned Research

• A Comparative Research• Content Analysis of MK websites

(Israel).• Content Analysis of MP websites (UK).• The connection between legislators

websites to Participatory Democracy and Deliberation – in theory & in practice.

Interesting Links

• Citizens' Empowerment Center in Israel• english gateway to the knesset website• The Israel Democracy Institute• Israeli Politics Blogspot - A monthly new

sletter• Ynet News Elections Site (Online Englis

h Newspaper)

Thank You

Sharon@trebcon.com