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Policy debate on the Internet: panelists evaluate the process

The 2001 North Carolina Citizens' Technology Forum provided a unique opportunity to study policy deliberation by average citizens using the Internet. Loosely based on the Danish-style consensus conference, all group work was conducted entirely online. Nine of the 13 citizen members responded to an open-ended questionnaire about their experiences. Four members of the content expert panel also offered their impressions. Despite some of the drawbacks of online communication, overall, citizens had favorable reactions. The average rating was 7.9 on a ten-point scale. Ratings provided by the experts were lower; the average score was 6.5. This may be related to the difficulty of presenting scientific information online. Both agreed that Internet forums have the potential to open up the policy debate by increasing opportunities for citizens to participate in the process. Findings of this evaluation will assist in the design of future online citizen panels.