Karlstads kommuns medborgardialog på Facebook

Sammanfattning: The possibility and the right to be able to communicate with municipalities or other state companies and politicians are natural for the Swedish citizens. However, they may be unaware that this communication process is called citizen dialogue. Today there are so many ways to communicate; one-way communication is not possible in the same way as before. It is above all social media such as Facebook, which has opened the gates one could only dream of.  Via a medium such as Facebook creates a strong citizen dialogue in which the municipality and citizens communicate openly and ask questions and give response. The purpose of this study is to find out how Karlstad’s municipality uses, and maintains, citizen dialogue on Facebook. What are the guidelines and how do the municipality use these? In this paper a qualitative expert interview and a qualitative content analysis has been used to answer the purpose of the essay. We have over the course studied how the municipalities and state companies uses guidelines for Facebook and how they appear. The results of the study show that the municipality of Karlstad has a very good relationship with its citizens. However, we can see that there is room for improvement in some areas. Karlstad municipality remains true to the guidelines they have implemented and they care about their dialogue on Facebook. In Sweden we have a representative democracy with elements of direct democracy; the study provides a picture of how Karlstad’s municipality is working to increase citizen participation and engagement.