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| Digital Divide in 2008 Presidential Campaign |
| Will the offline poor be shut out from the vote? |
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Bhumika Ghimire (bhumika1)  |
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Published 2007-04-24 07:30 (KST) |
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Today Yahoo along with The Huffington Post and Slate announced that they will host two presidential debates after Labor Day during the 2008 campaign. It will be hosted by Charlie Rose of PBS. The debate will be available on all three Web sites and will give the audience the opportunity to ask questions to the candidates and evaluate their answers.
This online debate adds to the long list of "new media" campaign gimmicks used by the candidates and their political organization.
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TODAY'S TOP STORIES |
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FROM THE SECTION |
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| Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney all have a MySpace page where you can join in their network of "friends," discuss campaign issues, fundraising and network among the group. Facebook, a networking site like MySpace, which is largely popular among college students, is yet to be utilized for the 2008 campaign. If its reach among voting age college students is any indication, candidates will be flocking to the site pretty soon. Even lesser known networking sites like Gather have attracted attention for campaign purpose.
This trend towards a more grassroots campaign is starkly different from the last presidential campaigns. In the past, apart from the occasional coffee shop stop or the town hall meetings, the constituents really didn't have much opportunity to get closer to the candidate and ask them questions about the issues that matter to them.
From the candidates' side, even they didn't get to know the constituents closely. It is tough to gage the mood of people in the town when you can spend just an evening at the town hall talking to the assembled people. What about people who are not in that hall or who are meeting with the other candidate? The voices that are not heard or ignored can be a liability for the campaign.
Now with the more people centered approach, constituents and candidates are able to connect in a more personal level and voice their opinion and share ideas.
The benefits of campaigning in a technology savvy way are obvious for both sides but what about the section of the population that does not have access to the high tech media? Where do they fit in this changing campaign trend?
According to PEW/Internet report, "Thirty-two percent of American adults, or about 65 million people, do not go online, and it is not always by choice." With the 2008 campaign getting increasingly tech savvy and more campaign related events happening online, 32 percent of American adults are in danger of being shut out from the process. Not only this, but they are also losing out on getting in touch with candidates, and making their voice heard.
This digital divide can also be characterized as a modern version of rich-poor division. While some adults are unable to use the Internet because they not familiar with the technology, there are those who cannot afford to have Internet access, who have difficulty in understanding/reading English and those who are functionally illiterate. The adults in last three categories are by and large are weak economically.
So how can the campaign managers and the candidates make sure that this significant section of population is part of the new style campaigning? One way to do so is to have a community computer center where people who are on the wrong side of digital divide can come in and be a part of the campaign. Well, public libraries have computer centers, why not use them? Yes that would be great but most of them have "members only" policy and not many adults who are functionally illiterate or who don't understand English are members of a library.
Another way is to have outreach personnel on behalf of political parties or local activist organizations who can help get the marginalized adults connected to the larger debate.
In light of changing times, we can safely say that the trend towards a tech savvy campaign is here to stay. We can make best of it by making sure that no one is excluded from the process because they lack certain resources or have a language problem.
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©2007 OhmyNews
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 Comments Note: Kindly refrain from personal attacks and profanity. |
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2. (2)
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Albert , 2007-05-13 05:18
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Max , 2007-05-02 23:11
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