The uptake of e-Democracy and e-Participation in the Swiss Federal administration

This paper presents the findings of a PhD research that aims to evaluate the processes of electronic participation (e-Participation) and electronic democracy (e-Democracy) introduction in Switzerland. The choice of the Swiss case study can be explained by a seeming paradox between, on the one hand, highly developed system of direct democracy, which determines the character of the Swiss policy-making process, and, on the other, the current lack of e-Democracy initiatives. The empirical part of the project consists in semi-structured interviews conducted in different departments of the Swiss federal administration. The first important findings from the interviews are three-fold: economic logic seems to play an important role in public sector digitalisation; federalist system causes the uptake of initiatives to be highly fragmented; and public actors' attitudes and beliefs are decisive for the success of e-Participation and e-Democracy initiatives.