Guide to Online Participation/4. Resources/4.3. Glossary

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Contents

A

  • access -- the technical possibility to take part in online networks; the ability to request and receive government information and services.
  • accessibility -- relevance of information or service, readability and ease of use. Also note: a widely cited definition of accessibility coined in 2001 by Pauline Poland defines it as "ease with which one can actually make use of the possibility of consulting government information electronically" (Online consultation in GOL countries: initiatives to foster e-democracy Poland P., 2001, p. 9). Under this definition, there are seven aspects of accessibility: 1. Recognisability and localisability 2. Availability 3. Manageability 4. Affordability 5. Reliability 6. Clarity 7. Accessibility to those with disabilities.
  • active participation -- a category of participation that refers to active engagement or relationship with the public and businesses, with opportunities to define the process and content of policy making and service design/delivery. This category includes transacting with government.
  • aggregation -- bringing multiple content sources together into one interface or application (Source: Future Exploration Network).
  • API; Application Programming Interface -- a generic term for a means by which two programs can interact at the source code level.
  • Atom --Atom is a way to read and write information on the web, and is considered a competitor/alternate format to RSS

B

  • blog, blogging -- A blog (short for weblog) is a personal online journal that is frequently updated and intended for general public consumption. Blogs are defined by their format: a series of entries posted to a single page in reverse-chronological order.
  • broadband -- broadband refers to telecommunication in which a wide band of frequencies is available to transmit information.

C

  • civil society -- on-governmental, non-profit making organisations, networks and voluntary associations.
  • communities -- means more than geographic communities. The term includes traditional associations such as whānau and hapū, ethnicity or occupation, and virtual communities of interest or practice. Definition provided by: Digital Strategy: Creating our Digital Future.
  • click paths -- Click Paths view shows details on a per visitor basis so you can see in real-time who is on your site, what recent visitors looked at on your site and whether they made a transaction.
  • community of practice -- A community of practice is "a diverse group of people engaged in real work over a significant period of time during which they build things, solve problems, learn and invent...in short, they evolve a practice that is highly skilled and highly creative." Robert Bauer, Ph.D., is director of strategic competency development, Xerox PARC, in Customer Inspired Innovation: Creating the Future
  • consultation -- a category of participation that refers to a two-way relationship based on consultation with feedback sought on pre-defined issues. (See also OECD definition)
  • crowdsourcing in mid-2007 a new model entered the mainstream -- what Wired Magazine dubbed 'crowdsourcing', or what author James Surowiecki has termed 'the wisdom of crowds'. This model posits that, enabled by collaborative technology, hundreds, thousands or even millions of people can work together to develop beneficial new knowledge and products -- and even beat the experts at their own game. As proof of concept, proponents of the new model have two striking examples: open source software programming and the online 'user-generated' encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

So, is this sufficient evidence to suggest that government might adopt a crowdsourcing model to share policy development or service design with a relatively disassociated group and hope to get anything of value? Conventional wisdom says, leave it to the experts to deal with complex issues and decisions. Large groups of people are given to mob mentality, agenda-hijacking, group-think and lowest-common-denominator outputs. As the old expression goes: the camel was a horse designed by committee.

It seems clear that 'the crowd' can produce complex and useful products and services. So what does this mean for public policy development and service design? One of this Guide's core assumptions is that there may be massive gains to be made by tapping into the collective wisdom and industry of New Zealanders. There are also risks. More work and experimentation is needed.

The point here is that mass collaboration and knowledge generation is not uncharted territory. Wikipedia and open source programming have blazed a first path from which governments now have the opportunity to learn and benefit.

D

  • decision makers -- refers to senior State servants and government ministers charged with overseeing the direction and management of the State Services.
  • digital divide -- disparities between people arising from lack of access to electronic technologies due to any number of reasons such as skills, geographic remoteness, financial situation or disability.
  • discussion boards/forums -- forums, on the Internet or an intranet, where users can post messages for other users to read and respond.
  • disemvowelling -- this technique entails removing all of the vowels from words in an offensive post. When used by a moderator, the net effect is to mark the original text as deprecated, while at the same time not suppressing freedom of speech.

E

  • e-government -- government agencies working together to use information and communications technology so they can better provide individuals and businesses with government services and information.
  • electronic democracy, e-democracy -- refers to how the Internet can be used to enhance democratic processes and provide increased opportunities for individuals and communities to interact with government, and for the government to seek input from the community. It covers both e-voting and e-participation.
  • embedding -- integrating content or an application into a Web page, while the original format is retained (Source: Future Exploration Network).
  • e-participation -- see entry for electronic democracy.
  • e-petitions -- a system for hosting electronic petitions (where “electronic” signatures are collected online and the petition is traced from its receipt to the central or local government) (Source: Wellington City Council Strategy and Policy 2006)
  • e-voting -- see entry for electronic democracy.

F

  • facebook -- a social networking site launched in 2004. "Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet." Source: Facebook
  • facilitation -- provides the needed structure for meeting interactions to be effective. Facilitators uses their indepth knowledge of group processes to structure and support a meeting so that participants can focus on the substantive issues at hand. There are many definitions to draw from; a particularly useful source is Christine Hogan's "Understanding Facilitation: Theory and Principles," Chapter 5: Definitions and metaphors of facilitation, pages 49-58. In this chapter Hogan compares and critiques the definitions given in several other books. See also The Art of Facilitation by Dale Hunter 2007; Jenkins & Jenkins 2006, Bens 2000, 2005; Justice et al. 1999, Kaner et al. 1996, Ghais (2005), Brian Stansfield, The Art of Focussed Conversation, David Straus, J. Heron, The Complete Facilitators Handbook, and S. Priest et al., The Essential Elements of Facilitation.
  • feedback loops -- commonly, feedback is understood as information communicated from one person in return to another, as in a conversation. When people talk about feedback loops, they are usually describing the construction and design of the information exchange, or the ways and means that the interaction happens. In short, feedback is what you get when you interact. Feedback loops describe how the interaction happens. These ideas of feedback and feedback loops are useful for public participation practitioners because they help to simplify and describe the following various components or 'touch-points' of a participatory process.
    • The overall process of participation can be understood as a feedback loop between citizens and government, initiated by either government or citizens.
    • Citizens in discussion with one another in government hosted spaces and in other social online settings is another, more specific, set of feedback loops.
    • The processes agencies need to undertake to respond to citizen ideas, concerns or criticisms closes the overall feedback loop.

Inviting participation in policy development and service design will require consideration of the needs of agencies and participants at every stage of the feedback loop to be effective. Looking at participation through this 'feedback lens' should help to ensure these needs are met.


  • folksonomy -- rich categorisation of information that is collectively created by users, through tagging and other actions (cf. taxonomy) (Source: Future Exploration Network).

G

  • gadgets -- typically self-contained applications that display information often pulled from a remote source. Gadgets, for example, can report the latest weather and real-time stock prices. Some also display local or system information, including laptop battery levels and "To Do" lists. Source: Ask The Security Expert: Questions & Answers
  • geographic information system -- A GIS (geographic information system) enables you to envision the geographic aspects of a body of data. Basically, it lets you query or analyze a database and receive the results in the form of some kind of map. Since many kinds of data have important geographic aspects, a GIS can have many uses: weather forecasting, sales analysis, population forecasting, and land use planning, to name a few. Source: http://www.whatis.com
  • geographic information system (GIS) mashups -- combining data from multiple sources is central to GIS applications

I

  • IAP2 -- the International Association for Public Participation IAP2 Public Participation Spectrum developed by the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) is widely cited. It overlaps with the OECD typology (see below) but goes beyond to cover five stages: inform, consult, involve, collaborate and empower.

The following image is sourced from : http://www.iap2.org/associations/4748/files/spectrum.pdf


  • ICT -- information and communication technologies, an umbrella term that includes any communication device or application, encompassing: radio, television, cellular phones, computer and network hardware and software, satellite systems and so on, as well as the various services and applications associated with them, such as videoconferencing and distance learning.
  • infomediary -- information intermediaries who act as the link for information and transactions between people and government. Examples include libraries, Citizens Advice Bureaux and community leaders.
  • information-- access to information is a precondition for effective public participation. Information must be relevant and of sufficient quantity and quality to enable people to make informed decisions when interacting with government.
  • information as a public resource -- governments are strongholds of information on a wide range of issues of interest to an even wider array of stakeholders. For now, government produces information services, such as those related to business, conservation, health and parliamentary business for the general population.
However, sometimes this information does not meet the needs of particular niche interests which may benefit significantly from data structured to provide insight into what they do. Imagine portals that surface information about incidences of crop infections for farmers in Wairarapa; or information for small business owners with interests in kiwi export packaging; or information for people wanting to know how their Member of Parliament has voted on an issue that matters to them.
Structuring data using what is known as 'metadata'.
Moreover, people do not necessarily need government to do the sorting and tailoring of information for them. Data interfaces known as APIs (Application Programming Interfaces, also known as widgets or gadgets) allow people to 'mashup' government information on their own initiative to meet their own needs.


Examples of this approach are already emerging in New Zealand. Theyworkforyou.co.nz pulls information about voting habits, interests and speeches of Members of Parliament from the official record of Parliament, Hansard. The site was produced by an expat kiwi computer programmer named Rob McKinnon, coding on his own time. Tourism New Zealand is in collaboration with Google to add a tourist information 'layer' to its popular Google Earth program -- this means Google Earth users from around the world will now have detailed information about things to do and places to see in New Zealand at their fingertips.


Structuring and repurposing government information opens up a wide and powerful new avenue for online participation. Its economic and social benefits could be immense once government is able to open up its information holdings to the public; and New Zealanders are confident in shifting, remixing and repurposing the data at hand.

M

  • mashups -- a combination of different types of content or data, usually from different sources, to create something new. (Source: Future Exploration Network).
  • metadata -- metadata is essentially data about data, (e.g. this piece of website code indicates a place name in the site's text, this piece of website code indicates an image of a person displayed on the site, this piece of website code indicates the beginning of a text of a speech, etc), can help sort information into chunks that government and people can find, use, remix and reformat into something they find useful.
  • microformats -- A microformat is a type of open source data format built upon existing and widely adopted frameworks like Extensible Markup Language (XML)
  • mind map -- A mind map is a diagram used to represent words, ideas, tasks or other items linked to and arranged radially around a central key word or idea. It is used to generate, visualize, structure and classify ideas, and as an aid in study, organization, problem solving, decision making, and writing. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_Mapping
  • multi-touch input screen -- overlays which have the ability to display and receive information on the same screen. The effect of such overlays allows a display to be used as an input device, removing the keyboard and/or the mouse as the primary input device for interacting with the display's content. Such displays can be attached to computers or, as terminals, to networks. Source; Wikipedia.org. See : YouTube 'Crazy Multi Input Touch Screen'

O

  • online consultation -- in this context, online consultation refers to an exchange between government and people using the Internet. It involves using the Internet to ask a group of people their opinion on one or more specific topics.
  • online participation -- the use of information and communication technologies to support public participation with government. The scope of online participation in this Guide does not include electronic voting (e-voting) in elections which is under the responsibility of the Chief Electoral Office.
  • online workbook -- a workbook with entries made electronically by the participants.
  • OECD -- acronym for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. An OECD report published in 2001 defines information, consultation and active participation in terms of the nature and direction of the relationship between government and citizens. The report offers the following simple functional typology.
    • Information: a one-way relation in which government produces and delivers information for use by citizens. It covers both ‘passive’ access to information upon demand by citizens and ‘active’ measures by government to disseminate information to citizens.
    • Consultation: a two-way relation in which citizens provide feedback to government. It is based on the prior definition by government of the issue on which citizens’ views are being sought and requires the provision of information.
    • Active participation: a relation based on partnership with government, in which citizens actively engage in defining the process and content of policy-making. It acknowledges equal standing for citizens setting the agenda, proposing policy options and shaping the policy dialogue -- although the responsibility for the final decision or policy formulation rests with government.

Adapted from OECD (2001), Information, Consultation and Public Participation in Policy Making, Paris: OECD, p. 23

P

  • people -- members of the general public, usually with no formal association other than shared interests and/or activities. Successful online participation rests on people who are prepared to form relationships and work towards a common goal.
  • public participation -- participation means more than consultation. It includes providing government information to people in ways that make it accessible and relevant, and creating opportunities for people to be actively involved in the design and delivery of government policies and services. Public participation is nothing new. Nor are efforts to describe it. Sherry R. Arnstein's seminal article proposing "A Ladder of Citizen Participation" may date from 1969, but is by no means dated. Many variations on the theme have been proposed since then. See also OECD and IAP2 definitions.
  • Participation 2.0 model -- given what we know today about the importance of social networking (both online and offline), what is striking about the image used by the OECD 2001 report in its definition of information, consultation and active participation is its depiction of a set of isolated individuals each relating to government on a bilateral basis (see OECD glossary entry above). The image is silent about interconnected citizens, and the role of these relationships in shaping how individuals access government-held information, services and decision-making processes. It could therefore be considered a Participation 1.0 model.

The defining feature of what many are calling "Web 2.0" is the ability of users to create, share and link content as they develop communities. We need a new visual map of these interactions -- one which takes into account not only online relations between citizens and with government but also how they relate to offline interactions. The image below attempts to portray these new interconnections, or Participation 2.0, as being facilitated by the Internet -- but extending beyond it.

Note that this image simply charts interconnections between the nodes and superimposes them on a picture of the Internet. It does not describe the direction, purpose or nature of the interaction which may vary widely (see below).

Participation 2.0

Several features of this diagram deserve comment.

  • Government is just one of the nodes in the network -- albeit a large one which is well endowed and highly connected. It is obliged to struggle for the attention of those online, prove its relevance and add value in the same way as any other node.
  • People can be either connected to the Internet or not -- if they are offline, they may enjoy strong connections with others who are also offline. Membership of virtual communities hardly discounts the importance of traditional communities.
  • People might be indirectly connected to Internet via others -- who are online (e.g. granddaughters, radio journalists, frontline public service providers) who therefore provide a 'conduit' for the two-way flow of information. You don't have to be online yourself to harness the benefits of the Internet if you know, and trust, someone who is.
  • People may be highly connected online and have little or no connection with government -- bypassing it altogether except for those moments of obligatory contact (e.g. registering births, deaths, paying taxes).
  • People will use their connections to share, compare and verify -- before placing their trust in the information and services provided by a given node (including government).

This paradigm shift from Participation 1.0 to Participation 2.0, its technical underpinnings in terms of Internet programming languages and how this impacts on the range of tools available, can be summed up as follows.



  • podcast-- an audio file which is usually made available on a website. Users can either listen to the file on their computer, or download it onto their MP3 player or other mobile device, and listen to it later.


  • policy cycle -- descriptions of the policy cycle vary, but this guide describes it in terms of five main stages [cf. OECD, 2001 p. 21]: agenda-setting, policy preparation, decision making, implementation and evaluation.

The policy cycle may skip a stage or swing back and forth between successive stages in an iterative manner. Each stage may:

  • involve different sets of actors
  • impact differently upon the final outcomes
  • require a different mix of tools and communication approaches.

Each stage of the policy cycle has a distinct focus. Public participation can take place at any stage of the policy cycle but has a different role and relative weight at each stage.

Stage Focus Role for public participation
agenda setting identifying and defining a problem or a need which can be addressed by public policy can help in defining needs, expressing aspirations, scoping issues and weighing alternatives (including doing nothing)
policy preparation defining the risks, costs and benefits of a range of policy options can consist of providing expert and experiential knowledge to inform policy, expressing preferences on available options
decision making adoption of a specific policy option by ministers consists of subjecting ministerial decisions to public scrutiny and debate
implementation development of supporting legislation, regulations, delivery plans, and resource allocation can help in assessing the potential impact of legislation and regulations, testing the feasibility of implementation plans and identifying resources in the community
evaluation measuring performance against objectives can contribute to defining criteria for success and in reviewing evaluation reports

To date, public participation has been largely confined to the policy preparation stage where the public may be invited to express their preferences when presented with a pre-established menu of options via public consultation. The agenda setting stage has, until very recently, been the least exposed to structured public participation. And yet it is precisely at this stage in the process where the "proto-policy" is most amenable to incorporating diverse perspectives that public participation can deliver the greatest benefits.

  • portal -- a website that is intended primarily to link to other websites.
  • privacy -- the proper handling of personal information throughout its entire lifecycle, consistent with the requirements of the New Zealand Privacy Act 1993. It can also mean the right of an individual not to be identified.
  • pseudonym -- an arbitrary name chosen by an individual to identify themselves (e.g. a username).
  • public sector -- The New Zealand public sector comprises: the State sector ('central government') and all local authorities ('local government'), including local authority trading enterprises (LATEs). 'Public sector' is wider than 'State sector', which is wider than 'Public Service'
  • Public Service -- the Public Service comprises the departments listed in the First Schedule to the State Sector Act; the number has varied between 36 and 39 in the last year. Sometimes described as the first, or inner, tier of the 'three tier State', the other two tiers being Crown entities and State owned enterprises. Narrower than both 'State sector' and 'public sector'.

R

  • reports -- reports can be text, audio or video. When issuing reports on specific engagement activities ensure that the highlights are delivered in an engaging but concise manner. Annual reports by agencies should convey relevant information in a user-friendly manner and make good use of graphics and layout. An award-winning example is Wellington City Council's Annual Report 2005/6.
  • RSS -- Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is a group of formats to publish (syndicate) content on the Internet so users or applications automatically receive any updates. (Source: Future Exploration Network)

S

  • social capital -- attitude, spirit and willingness of people to engage in collective, civic activities. Also defined by the OECD as “…networks, together with shared norms, values and understandings which facilitate cooperation within or among groups”.

http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/sarc/E-Democracy/Final_Report/Glossary.htm

  • stakeholders -- generally refers to non-governmental organised interests with explicit agendas such as businesses, unions, community organisations or lobby groups. Sometimes refers to all the actors with a stake in successful online engagement, which includes people, decision makers and stakeholders -- as defined in the previous sentence.
  • State Services Commission -- the State Services Commission is the Government’s lead advisor on New Zealand’s public management system and works with government agencies to support the delivery of quality services to New Zealanders. To achieve this, SSC has the following leadership roles:
    • overview and oversight of State Services delivery
    • steward of State Services capability
    • set standards of behaviour
    • provide guidance on systems and expectations
    • advise Ministers
    • administer policies
    • enquire and investigate
    • provide services.

T

  • tangata whenua -- a Māori term literally meaning 'people of the land' (from tangata, 'people' and whenua, 'land'). Tangata whenua are those who descend from the first people to settle New Zealand Aotearoa.
  • tag -- In HTML terms, a 'tag' is used for marking-up text in various ways so that it is formatted in a Web document. Also descriptions that are attached to information or content.
  • tag cloud -- a visual depiction of tags that have been used to describe a piece of content, with higher frequency tags emphasised to help content comprehension and navigation (Source: Future Exploration Network).
  • technology neutral -- the need to ensure that a range of technology options are considered, and as far as possible to avoid 'capture' by a single vendor/supplier.

U

  • user-centred design -- any development process or methodology can incorporate a few key activities to make it more user centred. Usability activities can be implemented at different stages of the development process of services and products. Most teams would already have some of these activities as a part of their normal development methodology but may call them a different name or have a different way of conducting them. The following table illustrates some of the user-centred cesign (UCD) activities that can help to make your online participation channel more user-friendly.
Stage User-centred activities
Planning Hold stakeholder meetings, define the purpose of the service/product/system, define user groups and their needs, create personas, determine the user experience, conduct ethnographic studies, review similar sites and incorporate findings into the development strategy.
Analysis and requirements Conduct focus groups, surveys, brainstorming, task analysis, determine the information needs and architecture, card sorting, walkthroughs, prepare story boards, conduct user observation, interviews, frontline and helpdesk research, rapid prototyping and Fagan inspection methods.
Design Low and high fidelity prototyping (ie rough and more precise mock-ups), usability testing, questionnaires, develop content and information architecture guidelines, expert review.
Evaluation Contextual testing, 'think out loud' protocol, explorative and scenario usability testing, post testing questionnaires for users, comparison testing.
Continuous improvement Web log/stats analysis, content and information audits (for accuracy, timeliness and consistency), periodical usability testing, user satisfaction research, user feedback, conducting user journals/diaries, frontline and helpdesk research and analysis, testing new concepts with user focus groups.

V, W

  • Web 2.0 -- every aspect of Web 2.0 is driven by participation. Key characteristics include the use of common standards, decentralised architecture, spirit of openness, extreme modularity, importance of identity and strong user control. (Source: Future Exploration Network).
  • webcasting -- method of streaming data and video via the Internet.
  • wiki -- a wiki is an online platform that allows users to add and edit content directly.
  • Wikipedia -- a multilingual free-content encyclopedia on the Internet.

Open source software powers corporate servers, PC desktops, Internet browsers, wikis, weblogs, discussion forums and many other applications. They are developed not by corporates that sell their software, but hundreds of volunteer coders who use and improve 'open' (rather than proprietary) code. Their guiding principle is, 'many eyes make all bugs shallow'. Their ethos is, 'if you make improvements, make it freely available to be used by others'. They gather on websites such as http://www.sourceforge.net, to develop and improve software being generated all over the world by anyone able to string a line of code together.

To date, their results have been impressive, with many programs rivalling the functionality of corporate software offerings. Programs like the Internet browser Firefox have millions of users, while businesses (including those of major corporates like IBM) are making significant profits by providing services around software products like the Linux operating system.

Wikipedia works on similar principles. Anyone may edit the online encyclopedia, which now boasts approximately 1.7 million articles in English. A good Wikipedia entry will rely on verifiable, cited sources on the way to creating a 'neutral point of view' on a given subject, person or issue. Experts, amateurs and grammar mavens mix to create a knowledge base on everything from abortion, to avant-garde cinema, to New Zealand's prime ministers. A recent study by science news journal Nature showed that Wikipedia is about as accurate as the expert-reviewed encyclopedia, Encyclopedia Britannica, though Britannica has called Nature's methodology 'fatally flawed' -- a charge to which Nature later responded.

Of course, the site's approach is not without weaknesses. There have been many instances of vandalism, inaccuracy and even slander on Wikipedia. As a result, Wikipedia has evolved strict editorial policies that aim to catch and repair malicious contributions. Its strength lies in its community of contributors, who work independently and with one another to spot issues and develop a rough consensus on how to fix them -- often in rapid fashion. And it is not without hierarchy -- there are editors empowered to flag and/or fix inappropriate or wanting contributions. Any disputes that cannot be resolved by article contributors and editors are decided by Wikipedia's founder, Jimmy Wales.

Wherever one comes down on the authority of its contributions, Wikipedia is a phenomenon: a recent study by the Pew Internet and American Life project showed that 36 percent of online American adults consult Wikipedia. Despite the ongoing controversy over its accuracy, many people use it as a starting point for their information needs.


  • Workbook-- a 'workbook' where people absorb concise and neatly chunked information and answer questions that apply specifically to that section. The workbook approach is also nice in that it works just as well offline in paper format as it does online in HTML.

X

  • XML -- eXtensible Markup Language is an open standard for describing data which enables easy exchange of information between applications and organisations.
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