The campaign for the referendum in France, accelerator of the e-participation?

The campaign for the yes vote, the no vote or quite simply for a vote "informed" was sharp during a few months on Internet. As of December 2004 the subject arrived on the Net fathering quickly the creation of many web sites and weblogs, in particular as from March when the e-participation clearly took off.

After a small starting in February, the spaces devoted to the campaign on Internet were mainly weblogs of private individuals or collectives investing themselves everyday while the comments of the visitors remained very few. The subject was also tackled, but to a lesser extent, on the sites and weblogs of politicians with the creation of headings "referendum" or "European Constitution" or, for those who were moderately implied, enrichment of the category "Europe" by some notes on the subject.

The French referendum on the Treaty of European Constitution then caused many debates on line but also a strong frequentation of the web ssites and weblogs tackling the subject, carried out by political parties, collectives making campaign or private individuals. The most outstanding fact of the campaign on line is the mobilization of the citizens who exceeded, on Internet, the official actions of the political parties. The campaign on line thus seems to be more the fact of motivated citizens (as well to promote a particular vote as to simply encourage the voters to inform itself before voting) and the civil society was very active since the sites had a lot of visits. Moreover even if few people left comments and reacted - the contributors being often the same ones - many are the French who went on Internet to inform themselves on the Constitution. In addition, it is interesting to note that the promoters of the no were more numerous to use Internet like means of campaign than the partisans of the yes. That can be explained by the fact that the Web is more a tool of protest and refusal that a tool of validation. Thus the internet sites or weblogs created especially for the campaign in the name of politicians concern partisans of the no almost exclusively.

All the actors of the debate (political parties, trade unions, associations) carried out efforts at the time of the campaign. The web sites partisans, which attempt to explain the contents of the Constitution, often used the potentialities offered by Internet (petitions, newsletter, remote loading of tools of campaign, mailing, etc). Internet was a very important place of expression, debate, campaign but also of information on the TEC and the stakes of the referendum. The implication of citizens enriched and often exceeded the debate launched in the media. Thus the campaign for the referendum in France is an example of the rise of the e-participation, of growing implication of the citizens in the policy thanks to the tools offered by Internet.

This French example joined the English phenomenon where the e-campaign was very animated at the time of the general elections of May. "2005 will remain in the memories like the first election of the bloggers" one could read in Times. In 2007, the campaign which will take place on the Web should be very sophisticated, Internet being from now the third media more used by the French when they want to get information, and the citizens implying itself more and more in the subjects of society and policy via the Net.