Archive for 2014

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[ecrea] call for papers: The non-government and voluntary sector, ICT, and democracy

Wed Feb 26 01:35:30 GMT 2014



Last call for papers to special edition of International Journal of
Public Information Systems (IJPIS)

The non-government and voluntary sector, ICT, and democracy


Deadline for extended abstracts: March 1st 2014


The recent award of the Nobel Peace Prize to the Organisation for the
Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has again focused international public
attention on the role and importance of Non-Governmental Organisations
(NGOs) in social and political life.  NGOs, together with other groups
which rely to a greater or lesser extent on volunteers such as Local
Voluntary Organisations (LVOs) often provide services to the community
and undertake tasks which government cannot or will not do. The use of
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in the governance and
activities of such organisations is a topic of growing interest.

The nature, scale and activities of NGOs and LVOs vary enormously both
within countries and across countries. In countries with highly developed
and extensive welfare states, which include many European countries, the
role of NGOs and voluntary or part voluntary organisations will be
different than it will be in, say, countries like the USA or in the
developing world.  Such organisations range from well-funded,
well-resourced and formally structured international organisations such
as the Red Cross or the World Wildlife Fund to small local, even ad hoc,
loose networks of individuals organised around anything from fund raising
for the local school to community gardening or even crowdsourcing.

The field of Community Informatics is one in which the use of ICT by LVOs
and similar organisations is studied, but there has been little research
to date on how and to what extent organisations across this spectrum use
ICT for member or citizen engagement and the promotion of internal
democratic governance. A particularly interesting question is whether,
and if so how, NGOs and LVOs use ICTs internally and externally?  For
example, are there instances of such organisations making extremely
effective use of ICT for (say) lobbying whilst failing to use it
effectively for internal engagement or vice versa?  Are such
organisations better at using ICT to promote their values externally than
they are at practicing them internally?


For this special issue we are seeking contributions from
interdisciplinary research that examines, in different ways, how
volunteer spheres use the tools of e-democracy, i.e. how they use ICT to
strengthen the organisation's internal democratic structures. We are also
calling for applied studies such as usability or design studies of the
development of tools for e-democracy for non-governmental organisations.
A majority of research in this area is carried out in English­speaking
countries and in urban settings, which is why we welcome studies from
other perspectives. As the field of Community Informatics and E-democracy
continues to be an emerging field we especially welcome studies that show
engagement with theory and method.


POSSIBLE TOPICS


Possible themes included (but are not limited to):
·      Studies of the use of e-democracy tools in NGOs and LVOs;
·      Evaluations of commonly used open-source systems in NGOs and
citizen engagement, from a democracy perspective;
·      Technology-enhanced cooperation in NGOs and LVOs;
·      Use of technology for lobbying and mobilizing campaigns;
·      ICT support for knowledge management in NGOs and LVOs;
·      On-line democratic culture;
·      Processes of inclusion and exclusion in e-participation;
·      ICT and gender equality in NGOs and LVOs;
·      ICT supported organization of global democratic movements;
·      Security issues in tools and practices for e-democracy in NGOs and
LVOs;
·      The use of or potential for e-voting in NGOs and LVOs;
·      Use of pseudonyms in e-citizen engagement;
·      Anonymity and e-democracy;
·      The sociology of ICT use in such organizations;
·      ICT impacts on the internal democratic processes in NGOs and LVOs;
·      Comparative studies of NGOs ICT supported communication practices;
·      ICT supported interaction between NGOs;
·      NGOs internal democratic norms and practices in relation to ICT;
·      Case studies of models and prototypes in e-democracy/e-engagement
projects in NGOs and LVOs.


EDITOR

Karin Hansson, Dept. of Computer and Systems Sciences, Stockholm
University&  Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm ((khansson /at/ dsv.su.se))

EDITORIAL BOARD

·      Rowena Cullen, Professor Ph.D. Associate Dean, Research, Victoria
Business School, University of Wellington
·      Johannes W. Pichler Professor Ph.D. Chair Professor for European
Legal Developments. Head of the Department, Dept. for European Legal
Developments, Law Faculty, University of Graz
·      Love Ekenberg Professor Ph.D.
Head of Department
, Dept. of
Computer and Systems Sciences, Stockholm University
·      Jeremy Rose Professor Ph.D. Dept. of Communication and
Information, University of Skövde
·      Frank Bannister, Associate Professor Ph.D. School of Computer
Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin
·      Jakob Svensson, Associate Professor Ph.D. Dept. of Geography,
Media and Communication Studies, Karlstad University and Informatics and
Media, Uppsala university
·      Peter Parycek, Ph.D. Head of Centre, Centre for E-Governance,
Danube-University Krems


IMPORTANT DATES

2014
March 1st                     Submission deadline for extended abstracts
April 1st                       Notification of acceptance of extended
abstract
May 1st                       Submission of full paper
July 1st                        Submission of final versions
September 1st             Planned publication date

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

·      Extended abstracts should be no more than 2-3 pages.
·      Full Papers should be in the range 6000-8000 words. Longer
submissions may be considered in exceptional circumstances.
·      Authors are asked to follow the format guidelines at:
http://www.ijpis.net/ojs/index.php/IJPIS/about/submissions#authorGuideline
s

The International Journal of Public Information Systems is listed in
Cabell's Directory of Publishing Opportunities, The Directory of Open
Access Journals, and EBSCOhost.

Further information is available at:
http://www.ijpis.net/ojs/index.php/IJPIS/index  .





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