When does digital democracy work? How policy domains shape government responses to online petitions in Taiwan

Governments around the world have implemented digital channels of participation in recent years, but the policy effects of these new forms of participatory democracy remain unclear. Focusing on a well-known online petition platform in Taiwan, I ask: when, and under what conditions, can citizens influence the government’s policymaking process through digital democracy initiatives? By analyzing a dataset of 262 petitions, conducting interviews with government officials and citizens, and examining publicly available documents and meeting transcripts, I argue that the policy domains in which petitions are situated significantly shape policy outcomes. Specifically, citizens are more likely to succeed if their demands are located within relatively ‘open’ policy domains – those characterized by the constant emergence of new issues – or within ‘collaborative’ policy domains, where major interest groups share a common policy agenda with the government. Conversely, in ‘adversarial’ domains marked by conflicts between the government and social groups, or in ‘technocratic’ domains where decision-making is dominated by experts, citizens are unlikely to influence policies even within the context of innovative digital initiatives. These findings illuminate the potential and constraints in novel forms of digital governance, contributing to the research on government responsiveness and participatory democracy in the digital age.