Blogging a master’s thesis

The full proposal is in Norwegian, and I am too lazy to translate everything, but here’s the abstract:

My research question is: “What types of web 2.0 technologies can be used for e-participation?”

In order to answer the question the thesis will identify and describe different web 2.0 technologies and define the are of e-participation. further, the study will measure each technology’s usefulness for e-participation by using Sæbø, Rose and Flak’s (2008) model of e-participation  and Tambouris, Liotas and Tarabanis’ (2007) framework for identifying e-participation tools.

A secondary objective is too get youth from the Lister region to participate in an e-participation/web 2.0 project aimed at identifying what youths want for their local communities. The study is attached to the project listerportalen 2.0. The Listerportalen part of the project fell through, and I am in stead focusing on the upcoming Norwegian election and how political parties are using social media to communicate with voters.

Data will be collected through interviews with local politicians and government officials, research of web 2.0 technologies and observation of how web 2.0 is used for e-participation.

The study will be conducted as a master’s thesis at the institute of Information Systems, University of Agder, from January to May 2009.