Project description
Why voters trust or distrust internet voting
The internet has transformed every aspect of our daily life. While it has created new paths to government services, the internet has not yet been fully implemented in elections for reasons related to citizens’ lack of trust in internet voting technology. The EU-funded ELECTRUST project will study how trust and distrust are created in relation to internet voting. Specifically, it will explore how constructs shape public discourses around internet voting, using discourse analysis and in-depth interviews to map the emergence of trust and distrust and the elements that sustain them. The findings will shed light on the dynamics of trust and distrust creation that can be further applied to other technologies.
Objective
I-voting has been around for two decades now and yet it still fails to be widely implemented. One of the main motives is the citizens’ lack of trust in the technology and the people deployed to it. By considering distrust as an independent variable from trust, I explore how both constructs shape public discourse around I-voting (both the technology and its promoters), understood as a critical case for the escalation of the very same approach and potential conclusions to the research in e-government.
In order to fulfil this goal, I will be based in Gdansk University of Technology - GUT (Poland), in the Department of Informatics in Management, under the supervision of Pr. Tomasz Janowski, with one secondment to the Fraunhofer FOKUS Institute (Germany), in the Competence Center Public IT, under the supervision of Pr. Peter Parycek. The project will develop 5 case studies, 4 based on 2 week study visits and a long study visit to New South Wales (Australia) under the supervision of Pr. Lemuria Carter (University of New South Wales). The experience in GUT and FOKUS Institute will add technical and legal expertise to the proposed approach; while the development of case studies will give data for the analysis of the process of creation of trust and distrust. Methodologically, I will map the emergence of discourses of trust and distrust in I-voting through discourse analysis and in-depth interviews with sociopolitical actors; later, Q-methodology will be used to understand which discourses the citizenry mostly shares. The project will provide strategic know-how on the dynamics of trust and distrust concerning I-voting’s acceptance.
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Funding Scheme
MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinator
80-233 GDANSK
Poland