wegov project full details
Champion:
Harith Alani
KMi Director
Participant(s):Sofia Angeletou, Matthew Rowe, Miriam Fernandez
Timeline:01 Jan 2010 - 30 Sep 2012
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WeGov
Where eGovernment meets the eSociety
Social networking technology provides major new opportunities for policy makers (eGovernment) to engage with the community (eSociety). WeGov will develop a toolset that allows full advantage to be taken of a wide range of existing and well established social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.) to engage citizens in two-way dialogs as part of governance and policymaking processes. The tools will make it possible to detect, track and mine opinions, behaviour, and discussions on policy oriented topics.
The tools will allow discussions to be seeded and stimulated through injection of policy discussion points into relevant communities in a secure and managed way.
A key feature of our approach is to allow policy makers to move away from the limitations inherent in the current practice of using bespoke and dedicated platforms (e.g. specific opinion soliciting websites hosted by government) and instead make full use of the high levels of participation and rich discussions that already take place in existing social networking communities. In this way, WeGov will develop the tools and techniques for closing the loop between policy makers and the citizens.
WeGov is funded under the EU 7th Framework Programme, and involves University of Southampton (IT Innovation and ILAWS), KMi, GFI, Gov2U, GESIS, University of Koblenz, and the Hansard Society.
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News
03 Apr 2020
KMi News
Wandhöfer, T., Taylor, S., Fernandez, M., Allen, B., Alani, H., Joshi, S., Walland, P., Sizov, S., van Eeckhaute, C., Thamm, M., Bleier, A., Mutschke, P. and Koulolias, V. (2014). Supporting Policy-Makers with Social Media Analysis Tools to Get Aware of Citizens’ Opinions. In: Mahmood, Zaigham ed. IT in the Public Sphere: Applications in Administration, Government, Politics, and Planning. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, pp. 121–156. https://oro.open.ac.uk/51177/.
Wandhöfer, T., Taylor, S., Alanis, H., Zoshi, S., Sizov, S., Walland, P., Thamm, M., Bleier, A. and Mutschke, P. (2012). Engaging politicians with citizens on social networking sites: the WeGov Toolbox. International Journal of Electronic Government Research (IJEGR), 8(3), pp. 22–32. https://oro.open.ac.uk/38156/.
