analyse des sites web

http://ejc.sagepub.com/
Communication
European Journal of
http://ejc.sagepub.com/content/25/1/25
The online version of this article can be found at:
DOI: 10.1177/0267323109354231
2010 25: 25European Journal of Communication
Darren G. Lilleker and Casilda Malagón
Levels of Interactivity in the 2007 French Presidential Candidates' Websites
Published by:
http://www.sagepublications.com
can be found at:European Journal of CommunicationAdditional services and information for
http://ejc.sagepub.com/cgi/alertsEmail Alerts:
http://ejc.sagepub.com/subscriptionsSubscriptions:
http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navReprints:
http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navPermissions:
http://ejc.sagepub.com/content/25/1/25.refs.htmlCitations:
at Universite du Quebec a Montreal - UQAM on September 15, 2011ejc.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Levels of Interactivity in the
2007 French Presidential
Candidates’ Websites
Darren G. Lilleker and Casilda Malagón
Bournemouth University, UK
Abstract
Amid many discussions of disengagement between the public and political sphere, the Internet is offered
as a potential solution capable of bridging the gap between elected and elector. E-communication tools
have been increasingly prominent during recent election campaigns, and much attention was given to
the 2007 French presidential candidates’ use of the Internet. It was suggested they had moved beyond
simply providing information and were opening up a dialogue with the electorate. This interactivity
has the capacity to reduce disengagement and revitalize democracy. However, in defining interactivity,
the trend online is to think of participatory open dialogue as opposed to closed sender–receiver
feedback loops. In order to assess the role interactivity played within this contest, and to gain some
sense of the future use of interactive tools, this study tested a sample of pages from the websites
of Nicolas Sarkozy and Ségolène Royal, the two main challengers in the contest, against a six-part
interactivity model, and analysed the discourse and language in terms of its encouraging interaction.
While some shifts in behaviour were found, the campaign retained the caution that is normal for
electoral candidates, which reduced the extent to which participatory interactivity took place.
Keywords
elections, interactivity, Internet, political campaigning, Web 2.0
In 2001, Manuel Castells opened his book The Internet Galaxy with simple news: ‘the
internet is the fabric of our life’ (Castells, 2001: 1); this comment hints at two important
issues raised in this article. First, it is argued that the Internet has a potentially revolution-
ary impact upon society and its communication. Second, the Internet has the capacity to
also reshape political communication and campaigning. However, while the citizens
explore the virtual world of the Internet as nomads shaping the contours as they surf;
political communication remains fixed within boundaries and parameters prescribed by
Article
Corresponding author:
Darren G. Lilleker, The Media School, Bournemouth University, Fern Barrow, Poole BH12 5BB, UK.
Email: [email protected]
European Journal of Communication
25(1) 25–42
© The Author(s) 2010
Reprints and permission: http://www.
sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermission.nav
DOI: 10.1177/0267323109354231
http://ejc.sagepub.com
at Universite du Quebec a Montreal - UQAM on September 15, 2011ejc.sagepub.comDownloaded from

26 European Journal of Communication 25(1)
electoral goals. Perhaps because of the differing goals of elected and electors, studies of
the Internet offer highly mixed predictions (Bimber and Davis, 2003; Margolis and
Resnick, 2000); and often these prove unfounded. However, incrementally we find the
Internet playing an increasingly important role within political campaigning and possi-
bly demonstrating a shift towards a more interactive, multidirectional form of communi-
cation taking place within both candidate and media websites during elections in order to
try and adapt to social developments in Internet use.
The majority of studies focus on Anglo-American campaigners’ use of Internet tools
during election campaigns, with less focus being given to other democracies. While
French politics has not seen new media strategists become an integral part of campaign
planning and execution, as in the US in 2004 (Howard, 2006), French parties were quick
to build websites in time for the 1997 general election and it became a necessary elec-
toral tool. While Villalba’s study of the use of the Internet before and during the 2001
presidential election found that the majority of parties offered a range of information to
visitors to websites, true interaction was limited and most communication was unidirec-
tional (Villalba, 2003). This is fairly common of Internet use by political parties, and is a
trend mirrored across most of northern Europe (Jankowski et al., 2005).
However, facilitated by the use of video sharing sites like YouTube and social networking
tools to communicate with voters, it is suggested that we have reached a turning point in
political communication (Castells, 2007: 255). The French presidential campaign of 2007
seemed to offer evidence to support Castells’ claim. While public interest and participation
remained high throughout the contest, the aspect that seemed to set this campaign apart was
the use of ICT (XiTi Monitor, 2007a, 2007b). French, UK and US media commented on the
use of blogs, embedded videos and Second Life, suggesting a different style of campaigning
was emerging. While there was some retreat as both candidates found themselves the victims
of user-generated content posted to YouTube (King, 2007), their use of ICT was still vaunted
as encouraging participation of a previously unseen level and extent (XiTi Monitor, 2007b).
While it remains impossible to accurately predict what ICT use by candidates or the public
can do for democracy, as evidence thus far seems equivocal, using France as a case study we
wish to provide some assessment of the role of ICT in campaigns and assess how the use of
technologies in a political context can encourage participation, discourse and interaction, so
strengthening what Dahlgren refers to as ‘the character of democracy’ (Dahlgren, 2005: 147).
What we assert is that, because the success of political parties and political candidates
is so linked to their reputation (Haywood, 2005), they are both the main benefactors and
most at risk from new technology; hence they attempt to harness the Internet communi-
cation tools, while also showing caution regarding the extent to which visitors can upload
content and join in open dialogue (Stromer-Galley, 2000). This latter form of interaction
has traditionally been lacking from political web use. However, as the presidential can-
didates competed over use of tools that allowed them to reach out to the voters in a way
previously unseen (see Benhold; 2007; Scott, 2006), interest increased. The blogosphere
began asking if this was an effort to enhance democratic life or just another campaign
gimmick; were both candidates striving to interact with their voters and was interaction
possible, appropriate and actually desirable (Uther, 2007)?
At a more theoretical level, however, we can suggest that interaction among voters,
and between voters and political candidates and elected representatives, is crucial for
at Universite du Quebec a Montreal - UQAM on September 15, 2011ejc.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Lilleker and Malagón 27
reinvigorating democracy. France shares similar trends of political disengagement with
much of Western Europe, although there is unsurprisingly the highest level of participa-
tion in lawful public demonstrations (European Social Survey, 2002). A frequently
offered solution to disengagement and political apathy is civic engagement within a dis-
cursive arena: a political public sphere. While we have moved a long way from a society
where the bourgeoisie discuss public affairs in salons, the Internet is argued to facilitate
participation in political debate. Though Papacharissi (2002: 16) is ambiguous regarding
the potential of a virtual, electronic-based, public sphere, he makes a key point that ‘The
widening gaps between politicians, journalists, and the public will not be bridged, unless
both parties want them to be.’ We argue here that a significant factor in bridging the gap,
and building a political public sphere, would be for political candidates, parties and
elected representatives to show a willingness to engage the public in open debate. This
entails engaging in a conversation, one that new technologies facilitate but has been a
hitherto underused feature within political communication.
Employing a model for measuring the extent to which interactivity is encouraged and
allowed, this study examines how the two main French presidential candidates, Ségolène
Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy, approached the opportunities that new media technology
had to offer in France in 2007. While a single case study only, given the lesson-learning
between nations and election, our findings could give strong indications of the direction
that political use of the web may take.
Conceptualizing interactivity
While it can be argued that the inclusion of an email address offers the potential for dialogue,
there must also be reasons for clicking on the address to send a message; thus interactivity is
a function of both the inclusion of interactive tools as well as of the language used when
offering that tool. While there is academic consensus on the importance of studying the levels
of interactivity in political websites, there is less consensus surrounding what interactivity is
and how it can be recognized (Bucy, 2004; Sundar, 2004). Interactivity often appears to be a
perceptual concept, contested, underdefined and undertheorized (Bucy, 2004; Kiousis, 2002;
McMillan and Hwang, 2002). The classic definition suggests that for a message to be interac-
tive it has to be transformed by the exchange of communication: in other words, a conversa-
tion. Kiousis (2002) offers a more complete definition of interactivity as: ‘the degree to
which a communication technology can create a mediated environment in which participants
can communicate (one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many), both symmetrically and
asymmetrically, and participate in reciprocal message exchanges (third-order dependency).
With regard to human users, it additionally refers to their ability to perceive the experience
as a simulation of interpersonal communication and increase their awareness of telepresence’
(Kiousis, 2002: 372). For Kiousis, interactivity refers to any communication technology,
considers time without excluding asymmetrical communication (like email) and stresses the
value of content modification by the user and the author. Therefore, interactivity is not simply
a function of technology, or the ability to interact with a website through hyperlinks or wid-
gets, but a dialogic process between users of a website including the creator.
Jennifer McMillan (2002a) captured the essence of the Kiousis definition in her model
combining an information traffic model with Grunig and Dozier’s (1992) model of
at Universite du Quebec a Montreal - UQAM on September 15, 2011ejc.sagepub.comDownloaded from

28 European Journal of Communication 25(1)
public relations practice to develop the four-part model of interactivity. The model
depends on two variables: direction of communication and the level of receiver control.
In this model, interactivity is not a binary concept, it is a progressive continuum. At the
highest end of it, what McMillan calls mutual discourse, we find that the roles of the
sender and the receiver are interchangeable.
This model, combined with the McMillan’s typology of interactivity, as summarized in
Table 1, proves useful to measure the presence of interactive technical features of websites.
However, when used as an analytical tool, there are drawbacks. First, the continuum is
rather simplistic (high or low control). To reduce this limitation, and offer a more sensitive
tool of measurement, Ferber et al. (2007) enriched the model by adding three-way com-
munication (Figure 1), this now encompasses communication where any number of par-
ticipants can interact via comments boards or chat-rooms. When linked to content and
discourse analysis of language, risks of limitations and subjectivity are reduced (Liu, 2003).
Language and the internet: enabling interactivity
The dynamic nature of language in the Internet with its ever-increasing set of variations
(Crystal, 2006) has prompted many studies. However, the link between language and
interactivity has not been fully explored in the context of political websites. The domina-
tion of the field of study by feature-based analysis means there is a lack of language- or
subject-based studies that analyse a ‘range of communication forms’ (Mayer, 1998).
Rhetorical and discourse attributes can affect perceived interactivity and desired user
engagement (Wood and Kroger, 2000).
Thus the power of language should be emphasized. Fairclough (2001, 2003) and van
Dijk (2001) have made clear links between language used and the construction of reality.
While identity is not made up solely of discourse, it is the public embodiment of identity
that constitutes website text. Therefore, following Fairclough’s definitions, discourse
refers to language used in a particular way to communicate specific values, and ulti-
mately refers to ‘a social construction of reality’ (Fairclough, 1995: 18). Thus, the
One-way Two-way Three-way
Feedback Mutual discourse Public discourse
S R PP
Level of
receiver
control
High
Low
PPP
Monologue Responsive dialogue Controlled response
S RS RS R
P
Figure 1. Ferber et al.’s six-part model of cyber-interactivity
Source: Ferber et al. (2007).
at Universite du Quebec a Montreal - UQAM on September 15, 2011ejc.sagepub.comDownloaded from