The article analyses citizenship that is understood as the activity and participation of citizens in debating matters of public concern. Our conceptualisation follows the politicality of citizenship that is discussed within a dialectic relationship of politicisation/depoliticisation. We first define political citizenship and then move on to discuss depoliticisation trends such as the nationalisation, commodification and mediatisation of citizenship. These trends, i.e. nationalisation, a reduction of citizenship to status, commodification, a reduction to the laws of market fundamentalism and mediatisation, and the triumph of consumerist non-citizenship, are analysed as antagonisms to a political conceptualisation. In discussing the controversies of citizenship, the article develops an attempt to define digital citizenship that follows endeavours to rehabilitate citizenship as a political concept, focusing on media and the digital sphere.
COBISS.SI-ID: 33081181
The article reflects the findings of a quantitative analysis of the websites of Slovenian political institutions regarding three different but related aspects. In accordance with the functionalist model in classical communication theory - "Who communicates what in what way?" - the analysis focuses on the online informational and communication patterns of political institutions. Conducted in March 2014 on a sample of 63 websites, the study included governmental, legislatorial institutions and the sphere of civil society before an election for the European Parliament, and offers a comparative view of the biggest political actors in the Slovenian online political space. By accommodating the Habermasian model of political arenas of communication, the study enables a comparison between weak and strong politics and between individualised politics of personas with institutional politics. The results show that the websites of political institutions are less politically structured and more media-oriented: participatory forms of online behaviour are less present than the expansion of news, video contents and other visual promotional materials. However, the evident move by political actors into online social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, is still not built on the potential for the greater participation of citizens and their inclusion in political decision-making. Such findings demand a critical understanding of political actors and their role in the online construction of "digital citizens" today.
COBISS.SI-ID: 33083741
The article brings the idea of the activist citizen to the forefront, and confronts theories which conceptualise new information and communication technology as a lever for democratisation of the electronic public sphere with theories that accentuate the varying ability of the mass media and personal media to generate political influence. Differences are highlighted on the three layers of the social communication system that consists of infrastructure, distribution services, and content and communication services. The thesis is that those authors who see the development of technology as a relief from the hierarchically-driven production of information do not take the contradictory relationships between the interests of corporate owners and user-consumers into consideration. The author claims that amateur production is thematically fragmented and is taking over part of the labour and equipment costs. Such a form of production is frequently encouraged by political and economic elites without the danger of it being able to generate a considerable amount of political influence.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1537077700