Making sure that people actually show up at the ballot boxes is the main concern of candidates planning to run in the European elections as turnout has dropped significantly in recent years. It reached an all-time low in 2004, when only about 45% of the European electorate voted. In the ten new member states that joined in 2004, turnout was even as low as 26% (see our Links Dossier).
The internet could "reinvigorate and rejuvenate" European politics, the panellists said, referring to the campaign of US presidential hopeful Barack Obama, who was especially successful in mobilising many young voters via the Web.
German Liberal MEP Alexander Alvaro, who moderated the event organised by I-COMP, a forum for organisations and policy makers involved in the online marketplace, told EurActiv that EU politicians have to "overcome their fear of new technologies". "Sometimes one has to take a chance," he pointed out, even suggesting conducting a campaign "without any of those boring election posters".
European election campaigns could become "more vivid" without turning into a "campaign circus" like in the US, Alvaro said.
However, the Internet should neither be seen as a substitute for traditional media nor as the "ultimate weapon" for getting people to vote, said Mark Penn, who managed Bill Clinton's successful US presidential campaigns in 1991 and 1995 but failed to repeat these successes with Hillary Clinton in this year's presidential run-off. In the internal Democratic selection process, she was defeated by Obama, who is now competing against Republican candidate John McCain in the elections on 4 November.
"It is not only about going online, but having a message that gets people involved," Penn told MEPs. "You need to have a cause."
Equally important, according to the election campaign experts, is the need for politicians to listen better to citizens and involve them more. Asked about the failure of the Lisbon Treaty by former European Parliament President Pat Cox, Danish expert in online campaigning Jacob Boetter said that rather than simply "pushing out messages," politicians should have told the people what was happening beforehand: "We are creating a new treaty. How would you like it to be?"
He added: "People do not like to listen to authoritarian messages."
Politicians also had to focus on addressing "real problems" such as the conflict between Russia and Georgia or the international financial crisis, Penn pointed out. "Relating elections to peoples' everyday problems is generating a higher turnout."
Penn believes the Internet can help to deliver these messages and greatly improve exchange between candidates and citizens. Despite noting that Europe still lags far behind the US in terms of internet campaigning, he said he was confident that would change soon.
"I have no doubt that ten years from now campaigns in Europe will be so much more online and in many ways the internet campaigns will become a lot more of an extension of the EU," he told EurActiv. Europe is "later in the [technological] curve" but able to learn from the way online campaigns are being run in the US right now. "Most people, when they innovate later, do it better," said Penn.
