Source: Haaretz (haaretz.com)

Here’s another initiative from a country that wouldn’t immediately jump to mind when talking about use of the internet in politics. Isreal’s Knesset (national parliament) has an online shadow, Knesset II – www.knesset2.co.il, which is being used to grab the attention of members of the real Knesset. Although the site isn’t an official project of Israel’s parliament, this is a very interesting way to invite normal people to get involved in the work of the legislature.

Anyone who registers on the site can propose bills, discuss them and participate in voting on them ‘without primaries, without elections and without kissing the babies of central committee members’, that’s according to the site founders. Among existing bill proposals are a proposal to supervise the prices of apartment rentals, and the so-called ‘big recycling law’.

I generally think that projects like this do no harm, and can only help to spark the interest of people who wouldn’t normally be interested in politics. There are naysayers though; Dr. Mike Dahan a lecturer in communications at the Sapir College in the Negev and Bar-Llan University says ‘It works better in the United States because there the political culture is different and closer to direct democracy,’ he says. ‘In Israel, the belief that the Web will strengthen the connection with party leaders is generally dashed because it is not at all certain that most of them actually want this kind of relationship.’ I don’t know Dr. Mike, but I’d say that politicians who ignore the internet do so at their peril, and sooner or later they won’t have much of a choice to engage, that is if they want to win elections.

It would be interesting to see how a project like this would work in a country like the UK, France or America.

Labels: Israel, Knesset, Knesset 2, shadow parliament