What do you want from researchers?

Social networking is an internet phenomenon which seems to have massive relevance for politics. There have been lots of attempts to create artificial communities by edemocracy practitioners and here we are presented with huge, very active communities that many people enjoy participating in.

If I were a practising politician I would have understanding the political dynamics and potential of such communities at the top of my priority list. It's early days I know, but research into political behavious in social networks would be of great interest.

Both Scott and Ann raise important points about the danger of hyperbolic claims for new media. I agree with both of them that a) we need to be aware of incremental changes and b) researchers need to be supported in conducting long-term studies with a view to drawing major conclusions. I would be very pleased if the opportunity arises for the Centre for Digital Citizenship, which Ann and I co-direct, to move e-participation research forward by conducting the kind of studies that practitioners, policy-makers and other academics can all find useful. The key to doing that, I believe, is a commitment to interdisciplinary research (so that we're constantly having to translate our findings across disciplinary boundaries) and a willingness to adopt a critical distance from the immediate aims of those who have invested (money/time/careers) in particular projects.

This thread is quiet but it would be wrong to make assumptions about lack of interest based on this. Out in the real world the wants and needs of practitioners are being articulated to academics, but the problem is that we as academics find it hard to deliver.
Why is this the case – one simple answer is lack of funding to the Universities.
Carol’s question on whether eDemocracy is advancing also points to this critical lack of funding.
The UK research funding councils have been slow to address the needs of government to engage with citizens in their funding programmes. eBusiness has been relatively high on the agenda of the EPSRC but eGovernment has been the Cinderella programme with eDemocracy near invisible. Hopefully this will change with new multi-disciplinary research programmes being brought forward by all the research councils. In particular the Digital Economy programme seems very relevant – but here again it is the old favourites of health and transport that get support first time round.

To change this situation we as academics need you as government not just to articulate your needs to academia but to actually shout them out to the research funding councils. Only this way will we receive adequate funding for sustainable eDemocracy research.

I have been putting quite a bit of thought into how we make sense of the impacts of technology on democracy/political communication. I believe that many academics are unduly negative when interpreting the findings of their research. This occurs for several reasons. One important issue is that our research is framed by the debates between those who argue technology has revolutionary potential and those that argue it will be normalised (politics as usual). When revolutions don't occur (as is almost always the case), they tend to conclude rather negatively. But it is the smaller, incremental changes that occur where the real benefits exist - and these are often overlooked. I'll give you an example from a survey company, which kinda helps:

http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=879

I think you can make a strong case for saying this is a positive survey about political blog readership - yet look at the headline.... It comes down to what we expect.

I've published quite a few things that are quite critical of government-led e-democracy projects - but you always have to make the point that the government should be praised for (often) leading the way and taking risks. Of course, this also means that mistakes are bound to happen - it's just a case of fairly assessing these and learning from them - as Stephen was saying.

No, I don't think it is - as long as researchers are always expected to deliver critical insights informed by proven research methods and reflexive theoretical perspectives. In some cases, there's little that can be said of a positive nature, even though project managers and funders are desparate to hear good news. My own evaluations tend to explore how various actors originally intended the project to work out. This often (but not always) illuminates inconsistent intentions at the outset of a project, leading to a confused strategy. One might point to evaluations, such as Dunleavy and Margetts' highly critical studies of e-government in the UK, to see how an almost entirely negative account can be very useful indeed.

The lack of comment on this thread would suggest that answering the question ‘what do practitioners want from researchers’ is harder than challenging the role of ICELE. Or perhaps people have better things to do than comment here early on a Saturday morning?

I am mindful that ODPM and then CLG funded a great deal of UK research and evaluation of local e-democracy, initially via the national project and then by continuing to support Bristol, My Society and others through the e-innovations programme.

We should acknowledge this commitment. Not every Government would have funded Bristol to commission a major programme of study into e-democracy or community campaigning.

However, it is also true that different stakeholders require different things from this type of research and evaluation work.

Perhaps researchers underestimate the importance of being able to say something positive (however small) about a project or programme once it has ended, especially when it is attempting to do something new or innovative?

It sounds like I am suggesting that researchers should be compromised – I am not. However, the smart ones recognise that research findings exist in a real world that is full of complicated politics about what does and doesn’t get funded or even listened to.

I believe that we need researchers who are skilled at presenting findings in ways that both chime with the needs of different audiences and at the same time challenge them to think differently - whether they are Ministers or Local Councilors, funders, practitioners or broadcasters.

Is this too much to ask?