Virtual Hyde Park Corner' : an evaluation of New Zealand political party web sites

Abstract

This research has attempted to determine how effectively New Zealand political parties use the Internet. In a very short time a Web site has come to be regarded as a vital campaign tool by political parties around the world. Therefore, it was important to evaluate what political parties in New Zealand were doing online, and how they compared with parties overseas. This research used a methodology adapted from political science, which was designed to provide a quantitative evaluation of party web sites, and allow for longitudinal comparisons and comparisons between countries. It evaluated the functions that the parties were performing online, and then how effectively they were delivering these functions. Overall, this research has found that New Zealand political parties were not using the Internet effectively. This was mainly because most of the parties were using their sites for information provision, yet were not providing the tools required to make this information as accessible as possible. The research also found that the major parties were using their Web sites more effectively than the minor and non-parliamentary parties, but the most effective web site belonged to the Green Party.