Underground Voices: Community Articulation of needs through mobile technology in public participation

Abstract

Public participation in government has gain in popularity among democratic countries. It seems to be the way to go to get to a sort of New Jerusalem where everyone is happy. However in South Africa for instance, despite the implementation of best practices and despite the introduction of ICTs to support and enhance that process (e-participation), it seems that there is still a problem because people seem to prefer violent expressions to peaceful exchanges. In this paper, we look at the use of technology which potential seems has not been understood and realised, towards helping the improvement of the process. The focus is on the first step: “community articulation of needs” and the use of mobile technology (sms) in consultation for a by law to be passed. Frameworks and models (UTAUT, TEF, S&CI) will be used to asses that initiative use of technology and to determine what help or hinder the process from that perspective. The design is qualitative, inductive and interpretivist. The methodology comprehends literature review, semi-structured interviews and focus groups deliberations. As discussion and conclusion, the paper question if the whole problem of e-participation is not just a matter of context