Web Democracy and Digital Rhetoric

The relationship between communication and politics has always been a  tight one,  but information technologies have taken this relationship a step further: in many cases they are no longer just  a mean through which political parties or movements disseminate policies, slogans and values processed off line.  This process now seem to have been reversed: they have become the means and the place where policies, decisions slogans and positions are discussed, elaborated and voted. They have turned into a milieu  of political organization as the Taharir Square movement in Egypt and the 5Star Movement in Italy have shown us, contributing to a wide spread rhetoric over the democratization power of the Internet. But while it is indisputably true that Computer Mediated Communication allows an easy access to political discussion and participation virtually to anybody, we cannot disregard that it also carries the seeds of disengagement, self-consolation and amusement which could have the counter-effect of enhancing citizens de-democratization levels. The paper will analyze both aspects of information technologies’ impact on political processes.