Digital activism and democratic culture: can digital technologies help save democracy?

Abstract

This study investigates digital activism and democratic culture among citizens of São Paulo, Brazil. It aims to understand: 01. whether digital participation is becoming a surrogate instance of other forms of participation; and 02. whether digital activists share a specific political culture regarding democratic attitudes and behaviors. Drawing on a representative sample of 2,417 interviews, we apply multivariate analysis techniques to characterize digital activists in terms of political participation and democratic culture. Our findings show that digital participation complements – rather than replaces – other forms of participation. We also found that although the levels of democratic culture among digital-only activists were lower than among activists who participate in several arenas, digital-only activists embrace democratic culture more significantly than non-activists. This finding suggests that digital-only participation could be an important first step in developing democratic attitudes in individuals, albeit this form of participation is not sufficient to foster the highest level of democratic culture.