Online public deliberation for a regional transportation improvement decision

Abstract

This paper investigates the potential for deliberation as a means for public participation in shaping public policy. The paper begins with a summary of deliberative democracy and other concepts that recently have motivated an interest for online deliberation. Next, the paper describes a case study in which 133 public participants deliberated over a regional transportation improvement decision. The deliberation occurred entirely over the internet and lasted for 31 days. The participants wrote hundreds of posts (comments) and made thousands of post-ratings (statements of agreement or disagreement). The posts and three questionnaires are analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively to assess the nature of the deliberation and the participants' perception of their experience. A negative binomial regression is used to examine which participant characteristics are associated with writing more posts. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.