The Use of ICT by Swiss Cantonal Parties for Their Communication With Party Members and in Election Campaigning Marianne Fraefel 1 , Alessia C. Neuroni 1 , Stefanie Knocks 2 , Reinhard Riedl 1 1 Bern University of Applied Sciences, Business and Administration, Public Management and E-Government 2 University of Berne, Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, Institute of Communication and Media Studies marianne.fraefel@bfh.ch alessia.neuroni@bfh.ch stefanie.knocks@ikmb.unibe.ch reinhard.riedl@bfh.ch Abstract This paper focuses on the Swiss cantonal and subcantonal parties’ use of websites in their communication with the party base and citizens during elections and party politics in general. The authors present preliminary results from a current research project on the communicative structures and practices of Swiss cantonal parties, focusing on the relation between traditional and new media here. The paper provides a short overview of research activities in the field and outlines the potentials of ICT for political parties as discussed in literature. Based on available approaches for analyzing parties’ online activities, the authors develop a framework for analyzing political websites that considers the dimensions of political parties’ communicative goals as well as different forms of communication that are relevant to citizen participation. The presentation of preliminary results focuses on unique participatory elements inherent to cantonal and subcantonal party websites in the everyday context as well as in the context of (cantonal) campaigning and relates them to other functional dimensions of online communication. First results show that the parties examined do not tap the full potential of modern communication technology and techniques. Later, discussion of the content analysis will include the findings of interviews conducted with party officials and campaign volunteers, and the results of a survey of party members and supporters. Keywords E-Democracy, Political Parties, Communication, Participation, Web Campaigning 1. Introduction E-Democracy addresses the question of how the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) may change democratic processes and institutions, such as how transparency can be increased in the political process, how the process of political opinion formation can be improved and how citizen participation can be strengthened. Within the range of actors involved in democratic processes this paper focuses on Swiss political parties and their use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the interaction with citizens. Political parties are intermediaries between citizens and the state. They represent the core beliefs and interests of their supporters, fulfil the functions of aggregating and articulating political problems and contribute to recruiting the political personnel (Linder 2005). Fulfilling these functions means communicating, externally toward government and citizens in the processes of opinion formation and interest mediation and internally toward their members, supporters and volunteers with regard to party organization (Römmele 2003). ICT provide parties and other voluntary associations with communication channels considered to be particularly important to them, as they support vertical as well as horizontal communication flows and provide greater independence from temporal, spatial and social restrictions (Geser 2006). The aim of this paper is to present preliminary results from a current research project that examines the communicative structures and practices of Swiss cantonal and local parties with regard to communication with members in general and volunteers in particular during elections for cantonal governments. As a distinct part of the overall project, our research focuses on the relevance of ICT as opposed to more traditional modes of communication in today’s work of Swiss parties. In this paper we specifically focus on party websites as one of many communication channels open to political parties. While accounting for the mediums’ potential for election campaigns that in turn may work as a driver for the innovation of party communication strategies, we also focus on its function with party politics during non-election phases. For Switzerland specifically, this includes looking at how parties use ICT to strengthen civic engagement in institutionalized direct democratic processes.