Representative logic versus embodied logic

19The first stage in the “democratization” of the Socialist Party was the fractious 1990 congress in Rennes, marked by the open combat between Jospin and Fabius. For the first time since Épinay, the competition between factions failed to produce the election of the party’s leader and, therefore, the one who would be its candidate in the presidential elections. [36] What’s more, the party’s internal voting rules were completely discredited following efforts by various candidates to manipulate them to their own advantage. [37]

20The party’s democratization thus appeared as a means of sorting out its internal functions, and especially of introducing a new way of legitimating partisan leadership. The first step was to introduce the principle “one person, one vote ”, reversing the Socialist Party’s historical and organizational foundation as a mass party. The PS was effectively structured around “interlocking mechanisms, with indirect election at various levels (congress, directory committee, national secretariat) [:] this system gave all legitimacy to the party instrument and guaranteed the superiority of the collective over the individual, by privileging a delegated democracy ”, [38] as the reliance on a mandated system of voting indicated. The principle “one person, one vote” leads to a rapprochement with the foundations of liberal democracy, according to representative logic, instead of the socialist form of democracy, which assumes an embodied logic of the social body. [39] This “shift in representation” brought about an initial disruption in forms of participation: it turned the member into an individual and, therefore, a mirror of the electorate. This then implies a relaxing both of internal rules and, in particular, of the party’s boundaries since the goal is to promote greater accessibility in order to improve the party’s representativity.

21This principle was accompanied by practices related to deliberative and participatory democracy: an activist “right of initiative” was created and, although the rule of mandated voting was maintained, the results were henceforth calculated solely on the votes of those present. In addition, an annual individual membership card was created, and the principle of the secret ballot ratified. At this stage, the recognition of individual rights for members did not call into question the party’s organization according to factions. These factions remained a source of obstruction however in a party that was becoming more and more presidentialized. [40] The parliamentary factional logic and the presidential logic contradicted one another, as the confrontation between Fabius and Jospin demonstrated, previously members of the same faction.

22However, it was already clear that democratization, although favoring a renewal of the participation of socialist members, also had as its objective the redefinition of internal procedural rules. This “instrumentalization of the instrument” is even more visible in the growing atomization of members and the weakening of party boundaries that had previously been extremely rigid.

The introduction of the direct vote

23The second phase of the democratization process was spearheaded by Laurent Fabius in 1992, then by Michel Rocard in 1993. It enacted the principle of “one person, one vote ”, in order to limit the influence of factions. Daniel Vaillant observed:

24“The party’s renewal must be founded on democracy. That is to say, a greater participation by activists [notably] in the nomination of leaders at all levels, and of candidates to stand for elections; only in this way can we put an end to co-optation. Only election bestows democratic legitimacy. ” [41]

25Confronted by the decline in membership [42] and its shrinking electorate, socialist leaders chose to make direct election a systematic tool for internal selection. But although an enlarged space for expression would be granted to supporters, [43] only members retained the right to participate in the internal selection process.

26These reforms tackled a central point in the “democratization” of the PS. Similarly, for socialist leaders the idea of the election as the purpose of their professional activity became the yardstick for distributing power within the PS. In this sense, members enjoyed formally reinforced decision-making power: henceforth they directly designated (federal or national) party delegates, who then elected the party’s First (national or federal) Secretary by a uninominal majority ballot with two rounds, while the national council and the federal councils continued to be selected according to proportional representation. Consequently, this second wave of democratization was aimed specifically at overcoming the factions in order to better implement the party’s presidentialization.

27Here the statutes were an instrument of political action. At the same time, the mechanisms of internal selection and the boundaries of the organization were being reconsidered. These two movements were still not combined: the boundaries of the organization were certainly more flexible, but supporters still only enjoyed limited rights within the party. At the same time, the necessity of gaining majority support in the nomination of leaders gained the upper hand over the proportional method, rather than actually replacing it. In other words, if affiliation to a faction was no longer as central in the acquisition of positions of power, it still remained an unavoidable fact of party life. [44]

28The search for a new internal order was expressed therefore by the introduction of democratized procedures for member participation. The incremental process at work demonstrates how the PS adapted to individual-member representation, thus embracing an atomistic conception of engagement and of internal voting.

The individualization of political engagement

29With the reforms initiated by Lionel Jospin in 1995 this third stage of democratization came to a close. These reforms definitively confirmed the individualization of membership; effectively renewing forms of political participation and definitively enacting the personalization of internal competition.

30Although he no longer enjoyed the support of any faction, Jospin emerged strengthened by his score in the presidential election of 1995 and rose to head the party, replacing Henri Emmanuelli. This transition illustrates the transformations underway: Jospin used a questionnaire submitted to members to legitimize his assumption of leadership, closely associating this takeover with the democratization of the PS. [45]

31This new mode of allocating leadership was definitively ratified and was applied at all levels of the party. In the questionnaire, Question 5 proposed electing the First Secretary, the heads of the federal councils, and Section Secretaries by direct, secret ballot of the party members. This direct link with members was further reinforced by two additional measures. Federal representation was first calculated on the basis of the number of members who were up to date with their dues, a condition that ended the practice of delegated mandates. Then, the six-month waiting period before new members could vote was suppressed (temporarily), thereby formally challenging the distinction between members and non-members, and hence the party’s boundaries themselves.

32What had up until then not been possible became feasible thereafter through the knock-on effect of the presidential election. Thus, through these measures, Jospin established the foundations of inner party workings based on interlocking procedures of direct and representative democracy. The party’s electoral tropism was confirmed: the presidential election would determine who would be the First Secretary.

33These reforms did not put an end to the factions, however, since a proportional system of voting was retained for the composition of the leadership group. But they definitively reconciled the individualized promotion of internal leaders and the redefined role of the party’s leadership.

34This third phase in democratization thus very directly affected the ways in which members participate in the party: the notion of individualization is encouraged, and the procedures of direct democracy are definitively inscribed in the party’s operations, whereas the costs of engagement are reduced. In other words, the move by Jospin aimed to make the PS a party “for” activists and no longer a party “of” activists: the representative dimension is privileged, demonstrated by direct communication with members.

35This cycle of democratic reforms came to an end in 1995. The phenomenon of imitating representative democracy was obvious; in its concrete manifestation, the act of voting; in the methods deployed (secret ballots of individuals), or the instruments through which the action was expressed (installation of polling stations, transparent ballot boxes, and individual voting booths). [46] The intent of these reforms was less, for the time being, to yield to the demands of socialist members to participate “differently ”, and more to establish new modes of internal legitimization and regulation. The easing of voting restrictions nevertheless attests to the individualization of membership and its corollary, the blurring of party boundaries.

36With the de facto abandonment of the mass-party model, the first barrier to the relaxation of political constraints on engagement was lifted. These reforms, therefore, represent the foundation on which individualized forms of participation would be able to develop later on via the internet – but still as a function of the organizational necessities to which they must respond.

Simplifying activist practices

38During the 2005 congress, a group for the “development of the party” through the use of new technologies of communication was formed around Jack Lang. He envisioned creating ex nihilo socialist e-activists, renewing the party’s website for this purpose. The right to vote of these activists was central to the program: the objective was less to increase the mobilizational capacity of the PS and more to organize the upcoming presidential primary. [49] In other words, the reform aimed less to promote the organizational pluralism that the party had established at Épinay, [50] and more to favor pluralism within the internal competition generated by the presidential elections. [51] This was about increasing the organization’s size via a strategy that was focused entirely on the electoral process. [52]

39Lang favored, however, a representative logic – instead of a participatory logic – seeking foremost to change the structure of the socialist electoral corps. Indeed, as a “candidate for the candidacy” in 2007, but lacking a faction of his own, Lang knew that he could not win this internal competition without new members. Buttressed by his popularity, he wagered that he could break through the “perimeter ” [53] that encircled the PS as an organization. To accomplish this objective, it was necessary to circumvent the registration of members within local sections: for a potential member, the difficulty resided less in their willingness to join the PS than in overcoming the practical obstacles to doing so.

40In the first place, the Lang reform thus aimed to simplify activist practices by promoting the right to nominate the socialist candidate for presidential elections. The question was no longer: how can I join the PS? [54] Rather, the question became: what must I do to “choose the candidate in 2007?” The primary objective of Lang’s reform was to grant new members the right to vote on the socialist platform and, especially, to nominate the socialist presidential candidate in 2007. Thus, the new member was at the center of a party that no longer considered itself the product of the interplay between the party’s different territorial layers. Instead, the party was an entity defined by the presidential question.

41The internet was to provide a means of circumventing the federations and, to a lesser degree, a means of overcoming internal factions, by creating a national section without any direct link to the geographic implantation of the PS. In contradistinction to those French political parties that accept looser relations with the overarching national party apparatus [55] and use the internet to spread a non-hierarchical political culture, [56] the PS uses online membership to recentralize its political brand, relying on the software program that it recently developed – the ROSAM system.

42Thus, the presidentialization of the rules of the game in the PS favors the homogenization of a socialist “partisan milieu ”, which is reduced by the primary to the status of a single, large electoral district, instead of just existing over and above the regional framework. [57]

Becoming a member for 20 euros

43Yet, with the approach of 2007, the party with the highest number of activists, in terms of absolute numbers, was no longer the PS. The UMP led by a wide margin here. [58] In addition, the UMP permitted online membership, whereas the PS did not. The PS thus lost the battle of modernity. We will therefore consider the reform of the ways of joining the PS and the makeover of the socialist website in conjunction with one another. [59]

44At the beginning of March 2006, the possibility of allowing political engagement from a distance and without intermediaries was enacted by the national secretariat. From then on, socialist supporters could join for 20 euros “if they wish to benefit from the right to vote for the socialist candidate who will run in the presidential elections ”. The membership recruitment drive was short (it lasted two and a half months) and temporary, ending on 1 June exactly, or six months before the nomination of a candidate for the presidential elections, a period of time which also happened to be the minimal waiting period to earn the right to participate in the PS internal election. The goal, therefore, was not so much to prepare the party in anticipation for its contest with the UMP, but rather to transform the structure of the Socialist Party’s electoral corps. On 9 March 2006, the PS revealed its new internet site on which it was now possible to join the party. The impetus for organizing the nominating primary was directly connected to the presidential ballot since the new Socialist Party member was simultaneously invited to vote on the party platform, nominate its candidate, and to defeat the right in the process.

45Beyond the matter of joining the PS, [60] the website’s makeover therefore shows that, as for the debates regarding the Treaty on the European Constitution, [61] the party no longer considered the general repertoire of its relations with activists as disconnected from electoral questions. The internet is the key element in this strategy. It was less important that it facilitated membership and more significant that it created what had previously been rejected – a national PS section. While the membership recruitment drive of March 2006 was clearly presented as a campaign with three pillars – joining by mail, by telephone, or by the internet – it was the third pillar that garnered the bulk of the attention. The reason was simple: only e-membership permitted the centralization of new members entering the PS. Whereas memberships obtained through the mail or by telephone could be forwarded to federations, e-membership delocalized the activist’s connection to the party, and also thus circumvented the filters of factions, and local strategies for recruitment.

46Thus, even if the socialist membership card accorded an equal right to validate the 2007 platform, it essentially represented a means for changing the rules of the game for the November 2006 primary ballot.

The denunciation of “delocalized activists”

47The membership recruitment drive became a strictly internal issue. The Fabius faction denounced it vigorously, less for the principle of using ICT than for the ways in which it could be used. Thus, the internet was perceived as the means for multiplying fraudulent cards since it was impossible to verify the identity of new members. [62] It would especially threaten the party’s character as a party of activists. Writing in Le Monde, Henri Weber noted:

48“There exists the risk that within the PS two categories of members would co-exist: the traditional activists in the local section or company […] and the individual members, ‘delocalized’ socialists who possess voting rights and act as supporters during electoral campaigns.” [63]

49This denunciation of upheaval in the repertoire of activist practices shows that it was precisely the ways in which members formed local alliances, which up to then had enabled factions within the party to form, that the internet called into question. From now on, two rationales for the affiliation of members co-existed within the party (delocalized/presidentialized and localized). Both require a re-examination of the nature of Socialist political engagement in the internet age. Jacques Salvator has observed that:

50“2006 was an auspicious year: we saw the vote on the party platform and the nomination of the candidate for the presidential elections. It was the perfect window of opportunity to launch a membership recruitment drive. We organized a superb campaign: an attractive offer with membership for 20 euros as a loss leader for the first year. […] The problem is that we cheated people. We told them that they could join online, while in reality, what they completed was a request for membership. But they believed that they had joined. We oversold the product, you could say.” [64]

51Ségolène Royal’s rapid emergence as the major beneficiary of this membership drive would “restore order” to the internal competition: cutting off access to the party for new members became a rational means of prolonging the traditional repertoire of activist practices. The Fabius faction thus obtained an amendment: in order to validate their membership cards, twenty-euro members would have to physically attend a section meeting before the date of the primary vote. In short, the virtual member would have to meet the real local party chapter. This hybridization remained, however, very theoretical, as demonstrated by the fact that only 40% of new members had their say on the socialist platform compared to 47% of all members. [65] The new arrivals therefore exercised their voting rights specifically during the nomination of a candidate for the presidential elections and transformed this electoral moment into a unique trial period, which all factions had to adapt themselves to: on the eve of June 1, their websites thus relayed the details of the process. [66]

52The creation of the e-member, therefore, required the party to rearticulate what was ‘in’ and what was ‘out’, a process that was as problematic as it was rapid. In so doing, it also permitted the development of a socialist internet activism.

Online activism

53One of the major novelties of this internal campaign was that it permitted new members to express directly on the website what led them to join the PS. In fact, the PS internet site was conceived from the outset as a tool generating its own content, simultaneously mixing the party’s framing of impressions and the recognition of subjective particularities. [67] It did this by on the one hand favoring new forms of viral activism by promoting membership via co-optation (mailing e-cards); and on the other by publishing a blog carrying promotional podcasts developed by PS leaders and especially by e-members. Each new member is welcomed by another internet member who recounts, in a written testimonial or a filmed interview, the reasons for his or her involvement. Then, in turn, the member can also explain why he or she joined the party. Thus, the PS transferred one part of its communication strategy to its members, who themselves promote the benefits of the new membership recruitment system for the PS. [68] This revamping of the personal testimonial makes private political speech partisan; whilst partisan discourse is nourished by private speech. [69]

54This process also permits new members to campaign on behalf of the PS from the moment they join the party. This is accomplished, not by distributing leaflets or sticking up posters, but by turning new members into spokespeople for the PS membership recruitment drive. For these newly enrolled members, stating that they had just joined the party already represents a form of campaigning for the PS. The act of writing is transformed into engaged writing since the power of this form of communication is that it “is accomplished by spelling out what is in the process of taking place ”. [70] With the internet, getting out the party’s message is no longer the sole domain of professional politicians and consultants, rather everyone can participate in this role.

55The adoption of these promotional podcasts also permits the party to avoid the criticism that they are creating “delocalized” activists because the website is itself transformed into a section of the PS. If the localization of the e-member is virtual, their incarnation is very real since podcasts make flesh what at the outset was only a political media tool. Finally, by focusing the party’s development campaign on members, it is no longer the nomination of the future candidate which is at the core of the process; rather, the focus becomes a socialist voter committed to “becoming his own official cause ”. [71]

56The introduction of 20-euro memberships by the PS confirms that “political parties made the internet into an opportunity to revitalize, and in particular to reinforce their central apparatus ”. [72] In addition, it allows the PS to make forms of engagement more flexible because the physical boundaries of the party no longer pose an obstacle to membership, and the figure of the member-voter, sketched out at the beginning of the 1990s, can become a reality. From this perspective, the defection of two-thirds of the 20-euro members by 2008 was a problem for the party: it gave credence to the notion that sociological boundaries existed, coupled with a fossilized organizational structure, while the urgency for opening up the party grew all the more pressing. Confronted with this situation, party leaders chose to validate the proposition made by the committee chaired by Arnaud Montebourg, national secretary for renewal, to organize “open primaries ”, and a new statutory right was created which allowed all French citizens [73] to select the PS nominee for the 2012 presidential elections. Only two conditions were stipulated for the entire population’s participation in the electoral process: first, it would be necessary to sign a declaration promising to support the values of the left. Second, voters would have to pay one euro to defray campaign costs. [74] What was, before 2007, the exclusive privilege of PS activists, and the privilege of PS membership in 2007, became the right of all voters in 2011. As a measure of how much members’ own conception of what it is to be a socialist activist has shifted, the PS’s project for renewal was approved on Thursday 24 June 2010 by a large majority of 76.9%. This score is all the more significant in that it completely stripped party activists of the exclusive right to nominate socialist candidates. But it also translates the members’ acceptance of the ways in which the party boundaries had been transcended. Henceforth, engagement via the internet and physical engagement could be syncretically combined and generate the appearance of an unheard of political activism within the PS: political commitment without membership. The final phase in the restructuring of the PS’s links with its activists is the emergence of new forms of e-activism out of the more interactive nature of Web 2.0.

From the virtual community to physical activism

58In practice, party political attempts to make use of the web have fallen short of political parties’ stated objectives, up to now. [76] As Coopol illustrates, the emergence of Web 2.0, with its easily accessible technical features, favors the creation of party political sites that can be seen as shaping the interaction between the party and citizens.

59In the first place, this site fulfills a deliberative imperative; it emphasizes “exchanging, informing, co-producing, and sharing ”. [77] Thus, it is a site whose members freely produce its content. One crucial distinction between this and the real party: a priori, Socialist Party officers do not have control over these exchanges, nor over the course that they take. Managing the website in this way attempts to foster the conditions needed to revive enthusiasm for Socialist activist commitment, by contrasting it with the actual ways in which the real party functions, which tends to engender disappointment and disengagement. [78] A virtual community, accessible to all and based on hypertext and video has thus been created. Coopol promotes a digital egalitarianism between “friends” [coopains, a pun on Coopol], a term that evokes proximity, in a manner intended to transcend physical party boundaries to the benefit of the larger community of supporters.

60This does not mean that the PS is dissolving into a nebulous community, blurred around the edges. If the site is supposed to reveal a virtual Socialist community to itself, its purpose is also to organize physical mobilization of its supporters through the medium of the web. The welcome message on its homepage recalls this dual function:

61“Use Coopol to discover a new generation of tools for organization and political mobilization, helping you to share ideas online, and to act together in the real world. Whether you’re a PS activists or supporter, or elsewhere on the left, everyone can join! Now it’s your turn to get involved!”

62This deliberative imperative does not constitute the site’s entire purpose. But devoting the site to debate allows it to solicit the subsequent participation of activists in real world political activities. Significantly, in the age of Web 2.0, activist practices on the internet are thus associated with a technical use of the web that aims to organize physical activism.

63However, if Coopol promotes an individualization of activist practices by calling on its members to make themselves “self-starters in political mobilization ”, this apparent freedom does not hide the fact that the political skills or legitimacy for proposing such actions largely determines their success. The most popular “events” are those that deal with the regional election campaign where the distribution of leaflets, meetings, and poster mounting are the predominant suggested activities. [79] Yet, these most classic forms of political participation are most frequently solicited by party officials (section secretaries) or by members in charge of coordinating activist initiatives. In other words, Coopol perpetuates the real world party hierarchy in the virtual space of online activists.

64Party organizers thus currently control the site and its material ends. Moreover, the site can easily function in top-down mode by coordinating actions proposed by site administrators, and therefore under the party’s direction. [80] In so doing, and while still developing a new mode of participation, the PS is redefining the criteria for how socialist political activism identifies itself.

"Friends” first

65Studying the way in which the internet was introduced into the PS leads to a re-examination of the classic paradigms of party affiliation. Political scientist Maurice Duverger envisioned four circles of participation (the voter, the supporter, the member, and the activist); each circle illustrating increased proximity to the party. Proximity was interpreted as increasing personal commitment that deepened the closer one drew to the nucleus, which was represented by the political party. [81] The activist, then, is the one who participates most in the party’s activities and is also the one who identifies with it the most. The activist combined two elements that have since been dissociated by Coopol: the intensity of political activities corresponded to the intensity of engagement. Thus, with the internet, the dematerialization of membership leads to a rupture with “Duverger’s other law ”: the decision to participate is disconnected from the obligation to join the party, which was automatically assumed previously. The only goal of political mobilization, then, is the support that it can muster: it seeks to be temporary, part of a network, sporadic, and focused on certain issues. The hierarchical relationship that Duverger established is inverted: the party no longer commands the member; submitting oneself to a party disappears. The objective elements of different levels of engagement, linked to the intensity of practices, disappear when engagement is determined subjectively by each “friend ”.

66Coopol accounts for a novel form of engagement: commitment without membership: ‘membership’ in the strict sense of the term, since belonging to the party is no longer “officially” necessary to participate in and to organize activist actions. Nor is there membership in the figurative sense, since the links between “friend” and party are placed under the sign of reciprocal independence. Coopol is a type of marketplace for socialist political activity, whose goal is, beyond the (re)creation of a virtual community, to offer opportunities for potential involvement to “engaged” individuals who will exploit the opportunity as they see fit. In other words, Coopol enlarges the pool of possible activists while still permitting each “friend” to put together their own degree of political activism. But this individualization of modes of engagement is based on the weakening of activist links that are all the more strained because the partisan community is formally limited.

67The instability of the party link, as well as its reversibility, leads to an engagement that, while it still embodies political proximity, is closer to a form of action whose means are its own ends. [82] Thus, it is also significant that, with Coopol, the PS gave itself a tool for political mobilization that institutionalizes the dichotomy between joining the physical party and the repertoire of activist activities. From this point of view, Coopol can be interpreted as the practical translation of naturalized representations of contemporary political engagement. On the one hand, the politically engaged individual takes a rational step (even if it’s a gut reaction translated into a mouse click) based on a dissociation between political issues and political activists; on the other hand, the site allows you to ‘commitment hop’, [83] something that is made even easier by both the dematerialization of political activism on the internet and its low cost. Furthermore, it’s no longer a matter here of social embodiment, as would be the case for a mass party, nor of truly representing the electorate, [84] since the “friends” are barely known to the party itself. Thus activism loses its physical status: an activist is no longer necessarily someone who pays membership dues to the party, but can be anyone who calls themselves one.

68Stripped of its party political finery, of its most visible external signs of belonging, this form of political engagement reveals a distant relationship to political parties. It also reveals the reconstruction taking place in the division of political labor.

Not taking sides

69Yet, far from being problematic for the PS, this evolution fits with both the reality of its organization and its internal functions. The PS is now run by a professional elite for whom the party is a tool permitting them to carry out their roles successfully; the socialist organization is becoming a provider of mobilizing services by and for its leaders. [85] In this perspective, Coopol appears as a functionally neutral tool: it organizes activist mobilization through enlarging the partisan community; it does not aim to upset the party’s internal equilibrium.

70Coopol demonstrates the externalization of the organizational costs of political engagement. “Blurring the lines between supporters and members ”, to use the expression of Coopol’s creator, Benoît Thieulin, thus comes down to functionally disassociating the party’s internal operation and partisan mobilization. Since it’s no longer necessary to be a party member in order to be a party “activist ”, it’s also no longer necessary to physically take part in the workings of the party. Thus, partisan boundaries will continue to exist as long as the party’s physical boundaries are reinforced. This paradox is linked to the fact that, in the end, digital egalitarianism only reproduces the inequality of actual status between party members and non-party members. If each “friend” can participate in the party’s actions, then the only ones whose opinions count are those who have a status within the party; in other words, those who possess the official title of members. The socialist activist in the “classic” sense of the word is not disappearing, nor are activist practices disappearing.

71The organizational cost of engagement – in other words, the statutory counterpart to membership – is in this way reduced for the PS: only one segment of the members belonging to the enlarged community created on Coopol enjoys actual membership. In this way, the physical community of supporters and the virtual community of supporters are not one and the same, although the latter does encompass the former. Consequently, Coopol permits the party’s leadership to retain a “reserve force of activists ”, without them being called upon to “shake up” the party’s real membership numbers. Significantly moreover, there have been no further confrontations between factions over the internet members’ right to vote on the presidential nomination during the development of the Coopol website. [86]

72Simultaneously, while methods of selecting socialist elites remain “partisan-centric ”, the repertoire of activist activities is largely open to outsiders. The division of political labor deepens as positions are attributed within the party on the basis of modes of participation within the party organization. While party elites are physically recruited, activists self-select online. In other words, the introduction of the internet to the Socialist Party, far from provoking a digital dilution of the organization, has been adapted to the party’s internal management. [87]

73Coopol proposes a unique combination of political activities that are simultaneously online and outside the party. This combination is based on the effective dissociation between the category of activist, which has become extremely flexible, and the opportunities for activist activity. Basing itself on the individualization of activist practices, this combination promotes a virtual blurring of partisan boundaries, which in the end reinforces the efficacy of internal selection methods by concealing them, to the advantage of a federative representation of a virtual community. Thus, by redefining the meaning of socialist engagement, Coopol transforms the representation of activist roles, erasing their meaning, privileging practical action to the detriment of political identity that becomes more opaque even while it is more vibrant.

74*

75* *

76With Coopol, the PS acquired an internet tool whose official objective is to facilitate the mobilization of a socialist community expanded beyond the physical boundaries of the party and the limited circle of its members. The transition of the PS to the internet required the integration of the practices, usages, and principles permitted by this technology. Coopol is supposed to offer technical solutions to the party’s limitations, which include functioning within a network, proximity, procedures for discussion, and flexibility. In so doing, the site favors a “looser” connection to the party, without which engagement 2.0 would not find any real practical outlet. In addition, it permits a hybridization of action repertories: by developing a new organizational tool for mobilization, Coopol encourages the PS to rationalize its own range of activist practices and makes efficiency a determining criterion for evaluating political participation. According to this measure, Coopol demonstrates the emergence of a new expression of physical and virtual political activities, rather than the replacement of the former by the latter.

77For the time being, socialist engagement in the age of web 2.0 does not imply a dilution of party political organization into a virtual community that would transcend it. On the contrary, the expansion of activist activity within the PS illustrates how much forms of engagement depend on the political conditions of its production. To be an activist in the PS without being a member requires that the party organization’s members accept, manage, and regulate this “usurpation” of their prerogatives. In this sense, the party boundaries have certainly been relaxed, but have in no way been toppled. In the occurrence the party’s democratization in the 1990s constituted an indispensable foundation, making possible the introduction of the internet into the party nearly a decade later.

78Facilitating partisan engagement required the development of organizational outlets for the individualization of activism. Reconciling the individualism of (e-)practices by activists and the organization’s collective functioning presumed registering and legitimizing the individualization of membership and the blurring of party political boundaries. It was only at the end of a long period of maturation that the PS recognized the individuality of activists in its statutes. This occurred during the 1990s as the PS progressively abandoned delegated mandates, introduced 20-euro memberships, and finally created its online community, Coopol, today. The individuation of activist practices was assimilated into the individualization of partisan representations of engagement. In this sense, the internet is merely the technological extension of an earlier transformation, which is visible in parties’ processes of democratization.

79The apparent freedom enjoyed by socialist “friends” online requires, first of all, the conjugation of the singular activist experience with the plural (collective) experience, and then the shaping of the move to ‘self-assumed accountability’ by political activists. Thus, Coopol encourages activist “empowerment” with party officials serving in the end as the principal architects and beneficiaries of the process. “Activist empowerment” highlights how much the techniques for individualizing engagement are in fact a technology for deploying power. The new socialist organization that is developing, the Socialist e-Party, aims to renew the modes of internal regulation by domesticating the political effects of technical innovation. With the internet, the party’s functional autonomy is called into question because, for the leaders, it is a matter of guaranteeing organizational continuity beyond the desired permeability of social space. This continuity is permitted in the first place by incorporating technical changes inspired by a party political culture reinvigorated for the occasion. It is especially predicated upon the physical territorial logic that continues to unite the party. The fact that local registration of members is not a central aim of Coopol consequently means that internet members inevitably seek material integration into the party on the local level, and it begs the question of the “compatibility” of new members with the routine practices or customs already existing within the PS.

80If partisan boundaries have been lifted online, their physical maintenance represents a guarantee of the maintenance of internal positions acquired within the party. Similarly, political involvement will be all the more free on the internet if it is “controlled” offline in the physical world. The perpetuation of a partisan community based on the physical engagement of individuals allows socialist leaders to ensure relative control of the internal workings of the party by excluding any “new” members who do not wish to embrace these territorialized and material rationales for engagement.

81In these conditions, a new partisan division of labor is arising. We can only speculate about its growth because the conversion rate of e-members into physical members and their activities are still unknown. At this point in political engagement 2.0, answering this question is all the more important because the virtual and the real are coalescing. A new research agenda is thus opening up in which the sociology of members, their modes of engagement, and contemporary forms of political participation are all intimately interconnected. Investigating the mechanisms, processes, and actors in this evolution will allow us to reassess the resilience of political parties – the “democratic phoenixes” that are all the more firmly anchored in the real world because they have successfully expanded their presence onto the web.