Abstract
The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of the Internet on the political process in Japan and Korea. We conducted a web based questionnaire survey on voters (n=930 Japanese, n=1013 Korean) to analyse the effects of citizen's use of participative tools on the Internet such as BBS, blog, SNS on voting behavior and it's political polarization. The significant predictor of participation in voting in Japan was age, income, political interest, time spent reading newspapers, but the participative tool was not. when it comes to Korean sample, it was age, political interest, time spent using internet (-) and the frequency of reading political information through the participative tool on the Internet. Although we hypothesized that posting on the participative tool on the Internet can enhance civic qualities, the frequency of this behavior was not a significant independent variable for predicting voting behavior. Furthermore, We suggested there was a certain political polarization in using participative tool on the Internet. The more conservative they are, the higher the frequency of reading and posting on anonymous BBS in Japan. However in Korea, the more progressive tendency the people have, the higher the frequency of reading and posting on anonymous BBS, blog and SNS.
