[Singapore] E-engagement and Radical Democracy

Two pieces of facts caught my interest these days.

Fact 1: The recently revived Speaker's Corner in Hong Lim Park attracted two protesters on September 1st, its first day when restrictions were officially eased. Media reported that there were more audience than actors.

Fact 2: Advisory Council on the Impact of New Media on Society released a consultation paper on August 29th, urging the Government to interact with Singaporeans via new media.

When I watched news on Fact 1, I cannot stop thinking of Fact 2 and say, come on, because we have the Internet. Our speaker's corner nowadays is the cyberspace.

Here is a commentary on the consultation paper.

TODAYonline:Can Radical Also Be Right?



In other words, if the Government wants to engage citizens in the new
media as the report envisions, it cannot always set the agenda. This is
quite radical, given that the Government’s prerogative to set the
agenda has remained one of the fundamentals in Singapore since
independence.


The quote above is very interesting because it triggers my mental link between e-engagement and radical democracy. Radical democracy, according to Cohen & Fung, embraces two ideas: Participation and Deliberation. The news author is right to say e-engagement is radical because he realizes that e-engagement gives citizens direct roles in policy-making. The officials will have to respond to citizens' concerns rather than setting the agenda for them.

However, the author more or less used radical as a negative word considering that he doubted the co-existence of radical and right. Cohen & Fung's definition implies that radical democracy definitely can be right because it is based on deliberation. So I think the real concern here is not whether e-engagement is radical or not. It is the problem of the tension between participation and deliberation. How does a public decision-making procedure become widely participatory and highly deliberate at the same time? Especially when the Government disagrees with its citizens on what is considered as deliberate. And when the citizens disagree with each other.