Reading # 5 Jennifer Stomer-Galley

In Com 430z, I was assigned to read Jennifer Stromer-Galley’s article entitled “Democratizing Democracy: Strong democracy, US political campaigns and the inter net.” In this article a focus is placed on various aspects of the Internet and how they could possible contribute to creating a “strong democracy” amongst citizens. “Strong democracy” is a word coined by researcher Benjamin Barber which simply refers to an increased interest by citizens in their political process.(Stromer-Galley, p. 36) In order to support the claims of the Internet having an effect on citizen’s involvement in politics a number of characteristics where highlighted by Stromer- Galley. These characteristics included cost, volume, directionality, speed, targeting and convergence. Upon highlighting each of these characteristics key political examples were used to show how some elements worked and others needed tweaking. In the article Stromer-Galley takes a look at the ability to eliminate the cost of buying television ads by running a campaign strictly on the Internet. The story of an ex-professional wrestler gone politician helped to show how the sole use of the Internet could save a campaign millions of dollars in advertising. (Stromer-Galley, p.44) After focusing on each of these elements it becomes clearer as to how useful it would actually be for a campaign to use the Internet rather then another form of media like television or newspaper. The article continues, pointing out the ineffectiveness of the public using these other mediums during election time and this in return causing many to stray away becoming involved in the democratic process. As the article wraps up, it’s heavily stressed that if candidates/government don’t begin to use the Internet for campaigns they will not gain the support they want from many citizens.

After reading this article I noticed a few things about how useful the Internet could be to political process and citizen’s involvement in their government. One part of the article that caught my attention was when Stromer-Galley discusses the problem of “citizens experiencing government second hand, through the lens of the camera or through the pen of a journalist.” I strongly agree with this idea because all the media is worried about is getting their ratings and they will go to any extreme to do so. However, with the help of the Internet useful information can be unveiled without all the personal opinions and fabricated Hollywood stories.