Using Technology, Building Democracy
Digital Campaigning and the Construction of Citizenship
Jessica Baldwin-Philippi
Reviews and Awards
"The strength of Jessica Baldwin-Philippi's book lies in the rich ethnographic observations that she draws from her experience working in a campaign office. Through her fieldwork analysis and particularly through her innovative mapping of campaign microtargeting strategies she shows how the technological breakthroughs of 2008 have been adopted successfully at the local level. Her book will be required reading for anyone interested in the impact of technology on U.S. elections." -Philip N. Howard, author of The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Information Technology and Political Islam
"Baldwin-Philippi's book fills an important gap in political communication scholarship by showing how political campaigns in practice construct a role for citizens to play in electoral politics. Her careful ethnographic analysis of state-level races in 2010, the revealing interviews with campaign staffers between 2010 and 2011, and the content analysis of a multitude of campaign materials allow her to share the real practices and genuine challenges that confront campaigns as they structure political participation in the digital age." -Jennifer Stromer-Galley, author of Presidential Campaigning in the Internet Age
"In this ambitious book, Jessica Baldwin-Philippi analyzes digital communications in political contests far from the spotlight of presidential campaigns. The result is a rich and nuanced picture of the strategies and values of campaigners and new practices of citizenship that shape democratic life in the digital age." -Daniel Kreiss, author of Taking Our Country Back: The Crafting of Networked Politics from Howard Dean to Barack Obama
"If you want to move past the hype and learn how social media tools are actually changing American campaigns, this is the book for you." -David Karpf, author of The MoveOn Effect: The Unexpected Transformation of American Political Advocacy