Lazy voters look no further

by S.N. | Amsterdam,London 

Should the EU impose sanctions on Russia? Is Islam a threat to society? These and 28 other questions will help inform which political party is your best match at the upcoming European elections, claim the makers of a new online tool launched today. As the elections for the European Parliament in May come closer, similar apps and gizmos are springing up all over the internet. But does this form of e-democracy lead to more participation in politics or just to the meaningless minimal-engagement that has become known as “slacktivism” or armchair activism?

The EUVOX voting tool is the brainchild of a group of academics whose original “Kieskompas” has become a staple in the Netherlands and Sweden, where a quarter of voters used it at the last national elections. The group has since created tools for elections in 40 other countries, including Egypt, Mexico and Israel, and now the European Commission has subsidised one as well. Questions are tailored per country but the themes are similar: the economy (for example should funds be redistributed to poorer areas), society (should gay marriage be allowed) and Europe (should immigration be restricted). Along with the "match", the user can then click on what each party has said about each question and can filter according to the issues they care about.

“One advantage of our method is that we can push parties to clear up positions they’ve purposely left murky” says Andre Krouwel, who oversees the project. A party which has dodged taking a position on sensitive subjects, such as abortion, can be pushed into clarifying it for the sake of a more complete profile on the site. And for those who resist, that in itself exposes their inconsistencies.

But does reducing the democratic process to five minutes not damage it? “In such a second-order election, it certainly won’t do any harm” says Jamie Barclay, who runs the operation in Britain. The steady decrease in voter turnout shows just how lukewarm the Europeans have come to feel about these elections: in 1979 62% went to the polls; in 2009 only 43% did so, with a mere 35% of Brits and 19% of Slovaks bothering. Only the parties on the extreme wings, like Le Pen’s FN and Wilders’s PVV, appear to have reduced their European message to something voters can digest, which is why they are expected to mobilise many to vote. Tools like EUVOX can help counter the idea that populist parties have a monopoly on clear views.

The wealth of data that users leave behind is the real treasure. Groups that would normally not take part in consumer surveys, such as young people and extremists, are overrepresented in these online surveys, says Mr Krouwel. Thanks to this he is currently analysing the behaviour of Le Pen and Wilders voters, based on their previous visits to his site. And by also putting the European tool up on widely read national media sites (in Britain Buzzfeed, the Daily Mail and the Guardian), the volume of data generated will be invaluable. Perhaps the next step is not needing to take a test at all, but simply being told who to vote for based on your online shopping, dating and media consumption. /economist