‘Gentlemen, all aboard!’ ICT and party politics: Reflections from a Mass-eParticipation experience

•We study mass eParticipation initiatives through the case of the Italian Five Star Movement.•A balance between a centralised core and a dynamic peripheral use of ICT is needed.•Technology plurality is required for stability in mass eParticipation initiatives.•ICT uses in mass eParticipation changes the role of members and representatives.•Mass eParticipation leads to huge contents hardening sense-making.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) use is becoming an ever more popular way to involve citizens in political decision making. And yet, despite their recently increasing number, few eParticipation initiatives have achieved their intended aims. If nothing else, this shows that the internal processes, challenges and opportunities of using ICT to engage citizens in politics deserve further examination. The present paper attempts to undertake such an investigation by analysing Italy's Five Star Movement, a mass-eParticipation-based political organisation recently founded by private citizens. Using an interpretive case-study approach, this paper assesses the goals, participation, technology use, internal governance, external consequences, and challenges endemic to employing ICT in citizen engagement, to answer the following question: what consequences, challenges and opportunities does mass-eParticipation present to organisational stakeholders? Results of the study bring to light several additional research questions whose answers will surely advance the current discourse on eParticipation, and they also provide practical guidance and direction for those launching eParticipation initiatives.