Whither Digital Equality?: An Empirical Study of the Democratic Divide

Beyond the access and skills divide, ICT-advanced countries pay attention to the divide in political participation online. Analyzing the Pew Internet & American Life Project's 2008 pre-election survey, this paper empirically examines the existence of the democratic divide in American online politics. The study tests whether demographic characteristics make a divide in online political involvement in campaigns. The pattern of the democratic divide varies with the type of political activities on the Internet. The crossgroup difference tests disclose the participatory divide by education and gender in campaign engagement. Instead of an educational gap, activities on social networking sites reveal a generational gap. Political efficacy of the Internet as an avenue to involvement in and connection to campaigns and a new, reliable source of political information is a strong predictor for the probability of political activities online.

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