Developing the “Good Citizen”: Digital Artifacts, Peer Networks, and Formal Organization During the 2003–2004 Howard Dean Campaign

Abstract

ABSTRACT The 2003–2004 Howard Dean campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination is often heralded as the prototypical example of peer-driven politics. Building from an emerging body of literature on the Dean campaign, through interviews with key staffers and a survey of public documents I complicate this view by analyzing the interplay between the formal campaign organization, digital artifacts, and citizen networks. I demonstrate that from the earliest days of the primary the campaign developed strategies and innovative organizational practices for convening and harnessing citizen networks. Drawing on analytical perspectives that combine Foucauldian “governmentality” and actor-network theory, I argue that this was facilitated through the deployment of a set of artifacts that realized and leveraged “networked sociality.” Finally, I argue that while the Internet Division of the campaign adopted many “postbureaucratic” practices, it was embedded in a formal organizational hierarchy that shaped its technical work.