Enlisting the bloggers in politics
It is interesting to see that the Conservative Party in the UK is using bloggers to marshall their arguments in response to the British government’s Budget. The idea is, apparently, that the Party has been publishing details of the Budget and seeking support from bloggers in analysing it, thereby allowing the Tories to issue am informed response. I am not sure whether this relies on the active and deliberate participation of bloggers, or whether the party is simply trawling the web to assemble what they need. At any rate it is an interesting idea.
Ever since bloggers appeared as a real influence in US presidential elections, the role of blogs in public commentary has been increasingly a matter of attention. It is clear that this is also becoming a phenomenon in Ireland. At the same time, the visibility of blogs in political debate here is still limited – maybe this will change in the run-up to the next election?
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University Blog 
March 25, 2010 at 8:12 am
Yes, except in the USA the Bloggers were young and idealistic with a profound hunger for change.
In the UK what have we but a flock of the usual suspects, billing and cooing with the occasional outraged squawk at each other, think Delgany. And where in the States you had bloggers that either used the template blog or forged their own. The UK has blog design that feel of the tailormade.
But quite honestly, they would be far better off not doing this, for they will build themselves up to amasing degrees of craziness and like in the 30s convince themselves of their Rightness.
March 25, 2010 at 11:06 am
Enlisting bloggers is analagous to those computing efforts which enlist spare time on people’s pc’s to solve numerically intensive problems like hunting for prime numbers:I recommend World Community Grid.
On economic policy (broadly defined) there is quite a lot out there, the Irish Economy blog being the obvious one particularly if you are looking to criticise the government’s banking policy. Likewise “True Economics”. TASC’s blog offers a different perspective & “Ireland after NAMA” is also useful. For the opposition this is a windfall: research (albeit of variable quality) for free.
March 25, 2010 at 11:23 am
I think blogging can only increase and enhance this ongoing project called democracy.