The Use of Party Web Sites and Effects on Voting: The Case of the European Parliamentary Elections in Germany in 2009

摘要

Content analyses have shown that German political parties make use of party Web sites in different ways, leading to unequal levels of mobilizing, informing, interacting, and participating features. This article examines whether or not the use of party Web sites has an impact on voting by using individual-level data from a representative survey of Germany in the European parliamentary elections of 2009. Although voting behavior was primarily influenced by well-known factors such as party identification and issue competence, evidence suggests that the use of party Web sites could have positive effects on voting for the Greens and the Social Democrats.