University of Bergamo

The team of UNIBG involved in the activities of Demo-net is composed by sociologists with a variety of research experiences on participation and e-participation issue (participation/e-participation and social inequalities, deliberative democracy, gender issues, young people, innovation policies, participation policies), with expertise on qualitative and quantitative research techniques. The group, coordinated by Anna Carola Freschi, is affiliated to the Inter-universities Center of Political Sociology based at the University of Florence, and to Cambio-The Research Lab on social transformation, based at the Faculty of Political Sciences of the University of Florence.

The research approach to e-participation adopted by the Group is characterized by a strategy of empirical research integrating quantitative and qualitative instruments, applied to online and offline participation processes. The theoretical frame is done by contemporary sociological thought about the transformation of social and political participation in the context of globalized, networked and knowledge-economy based societies.
Within the frame of Demo-net the group has focused its activities particularly on the problems of e-participation evaluation (Booklet 13.3), on the political contexts of e-democracy (forthcoming Demo-net Booklets, from WP 14 - task 14.1, 14.2 and 14.4) and on the problem of political inclusion/exclusion. These activities have been carried on also through workshops (Demo-net Workshop on e-participation public policies and implications of e-participation for decision making, University of Bergamo, 12 March 2007 - see report on the Demo-net website -; National meeting of the Italian e-democracy projects, Pole of the Social Science, Florence, 17-18 December 2007).

White papers and articles for the Demo-net Workshops (Leeds 2006, Bergamo 2007, Bremen 2007,
Örebro 2008).

• Freschi, Anna Carola
• Balocchi, Michela
• raffini, luca
• Tizzi, Giovanna