Politics and government in the age of the internetLet's start with some statistics and comparisons. Think back to October 1994 when theLabour Party put its conference proceedings on the web, leading the party to claim itwas the first UK political party with an internet presence. Now, ten years on, the onlinepolitical landscape has changed dramatically. In 2005 it is inconceivable that a politicalparty would not have an internet site; in fact, one of Britain's newest political parties(the People's Alliance) actually launched itself online (Happold, 2003). Similarly, MPswith web sites were a rarity ten years ago, so much so that no official statistics exist.Even in 2000, Ward reported that only around 16 per cent of MPs were on the net(Ward, 2000). Today, the results are vastly different. Epolitix.com hosts web sites forMPs and also links to those who choose to host their site elsewhere; currently around63 per cent (416 out of 659) of Westminster MPs have a personal web site.The party breakdown is also interesting:. 97 out of 163 (59.5 per cent) Conservative MPs have a web site;. 258 out of 407 (63 per cent) Labour MPs;. 48 out of 55 (87 per cent) Liberal Democrat MPs;. four out of four (100 per cent) Plaid Cymru MPs;. three out of five (60 per cent) SNP MPs; and. both independent MPs (Dr Richard Taylor and George Galloway) are on the web.(Figures calculated by the editor based on party strengths on December 11, 2004and according to Epolitix web site on that day.)Continuing in this vein, Tony Blair was the first Prime Minister to receive a petition bye-mail. He also appointed the UK's first E-envoy in the E-government Unit at theCabinet Office, charged with improving the delivery of public services by joining upelectronic government services. Local councils now have e-targets and all councilservices (where appropriate) are expected to be online by

the end of 2005, thus making£1.2 billion of efficiency savings for the Government (Arnott, 2005). Citizens can nowlog on to their local authority and submit planning applications, check their benefitentitlement and apply for school places. Oxford University has a professor ofe-democracy and even political consultations are held online (for example, the NorthernIreland Affairs Committee Inquiry into hate crimes gathered evidence at www.tellparliament.net/hatecrime/).These trends in e-politics and e-government are not confined to the UK alone. In2003, 50,000 French expatriates in the US were able to vote over the internet formembers of the Conseil Superieur des Franc¸ais de l'Etranger (CSFE; Upper Council forFrench Expatriots). In fact, commentators in the States have even attributed an electionwin to use of the internet by a candidate: Jessie Ventura's gubernatorial run inMinnesota in 1998 when a third party candidate with a low budget won a presumedtwo-horse race with a huge swing.In June 2000 Bill Clinton became the first President to conduct an internet addressand the first to appoint a press secretary solely to deal with the internet (Mark Kitchens, appointed as Director of Internet News). The Canadian government has wonAccenture's e-government award for the last four years: Ottowa regularly surveys itscitizens to ask what local and federal services they'd like to see online and builds theminto a single e-government portal. All evidence of good progress, but on the negativeside Jessica Cutler lost her job as a junior staffer to Senator Mike DeWine for detailingher (sex) life on Capitol Hill in a blog that was picked up by The Washington Post.But this is only one side of the e-equation. Interactivity, commentators havestressed, is the crux of e-politics and e-democracy. There is clearly no point in parties,councils, governments and political

players using new technology if the population atlarge remains unconnected. However, here too the signs are encouraging. According tothe latest estimates from the Office of National Statistics:In the second quarter of 2004, 52 per cent of households in the UK (12.8 million) could accessthe Internet from home, compared with just 9 per cent (2.2 million) in the same quarter of 1998(Office of National Statistics, 2004).It is highest in the 16 to 24 age group (83 per cent) used Internet in last 3 months (Office ofNational Statistics, 2004).As this applies only to those who have internet access at home, a much greaterpercentage of the population presumably has access either at work or via publiclibraries. Nielsen-netratings.com collates data on internet usage in over 70 countriesworldwide, and the same encouraging trends are evident. Take these examples fromthe US political arena:At home traffic to Democrats.org jumped to 574,000 unique visitors as 43 percent of onlinesurfers flocked to a Web page titled "Take Action: Stop the Right-Wing Smears Against JohnKerry," which asked voters to sign a petition against the Sinclair Broadcasting Group forairing anti-Kerry programming.At work traffic to Democrats.org increased to 1.1 million unique visitors, up from 568,000the prior week, as 41 percent of the viewers also visited the same Web page (Dierkes, 2004).And, during the period of the National Conventions:The Republican National Convention (RNC) boosted at home traffic to the Bush-CheneyWebsite by 50 percent, as compared to a 191 percent jump in home visitors to the John Kerryfor President Website during the week of the Democratic National Convention (DNC).The DNC helped Kerry's Website climb to its highest number of weekly home visitors, or771,000 unique audience, during his campaign, while Bush's Website attracted 438,000unique visitors during the start

of the RNC (see Tables 1 & 2). The Bush-Cheney Websitereached the highest number of home visitors, or 622,000 unique audience, during the weekending June 27 (Fan, 2004).The fact that the Office of National Statistics has only gathered this type of datasince 1998, and that now whole companies exist to measure global internetaudiences indicates how use of the net has grown. This obviously impinges on avariety of political and governmental areas, and the articles within this SpecialIssue, written during the electoral campaigns in the US and Iraq and published tocoincide with the UK general election[1], cover some of these topics in greater detail.Each of the contributors was approached on the basis of their expertise in a specificsphere of e-politics or e-government and it was considered important to havecontributions from abroad in order to reflect the international nature of politics and government on the Internet. Short resumes of our contributors and their articlesfollow.Adrian Cunningham has held the position of Director, Standards and Initiatives atthe National Archives of Australia (NAA) since 1998. Adrian is also Secretary of theInternational Council on Archives (ICA) Committee on Descriptive Standards,Convenor of the Australian Society of Archivists Descriptive Standards Committee,Chair of the AGLS Metadata Working Group and a member of Standards Australia'sCommittee IT/21, Records Management. Adrian was President of the AustralianSociety of Archivists, 1998-2000.Margaret Phillips is Director of Digital Archiving, National Library of Australia(NLA) and managed the development of the NLA's PANDORA Archive of AustralianWeb publications. She is involved in establishing policy, procedures and infrastructurefor ensuring long-term access to Australian Internet publications.Cunningham and Phillips address the key and often overlooked subject of

archivingdigital formats, an area where the National Library of Australia and National Archivesof Australia have made great progress but other countries have yet to catch up. Theyexamine e-government and the role of archives and libraries have in recording andindexing digital formats, and question why this kind of information is so vulnerable.Chris Pond brings a wealth of experience to the journal. An honorary Fellow of theChartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals and an associate Memberof the Institute of Public Relations, Chris is Head of Reference and Reader Services atthe House of Commons Library, where he has worked for 30 years. He lectures andwrites regularly on Parliament and parliamentary history, and government publishingand information. He has a special interest in historical, as well as current, sources inthis area and sits on the Standing Committee of Official Publications. He has beeninvolved in electronic publishing since 1978 and has been keen to explore means ofelectronic information dissemination. As Town Mayor of Loughton, he also takes aninterest in local government publishing and information. Chris's article covers the riseof the end user and electronic information provision in a unique setting - the House ofCommons Library.A Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals,Janet Seaton is a parliamentary reference specialist who worked at the House ofCommons Library for over 20 years. In October 1998 she was seconded to theScottish Office to set up a research and information service for the ScottishParliament. Janet took up the post of Head of Research and Information Services atthe Scottish Parliament on December 1, 2000, and is part of the Parliament's SeniorManagement Team. She is also a member of the Study of Parliament Group. Shehas a degree in political science, and has

written.