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David Runciman:ÌýÌýÌý I think the web threatens the nations state with irrelevance, it threatens to give people a resource to communicate with each other to inform each other, to entertain each other that can bypass nation states c, cross an, national boundaries and level this is the perceived fear leave national politicians floundering always trying to keep up. It's that kind of threat it's not a rival to state power but it does threaten to bypass state power.

Intvr:ÌýÌý ÌýÌý It does create communities of identity with a separate identity, it's an allegiance if you like to the an, to the state is that in a sense what, the web is doing the web is kind of not .......... there aren't countries on the web what there are are different communities that have a live of their own outside the nation state?

David Runciman:ÌýÌý ÌýI think there are, I think there are multiple communities out there but the difference between those communities and national communities is that they are, their, sorry going to use a pretentious word there, evanescent they, they're short lived their superficial nothing that the web has produced can rival the kind of depth of identity that nation states have produced over time. The other feature of web communities is that they're simply are so many of them, there is so much choice, nation states don't provide their citizens with a choice, nation states are compulsory organisations you have to belong to at least one and only one. Web communities you can move in you can move out you can belong to all sorts of different ones at different times. If you tire of them you're gone and that kind of community doesn't have any of the hold that nation states have over their citizens and that means so far there's no evidence they can rival that hold.

Intvr:ÌýÌý ÌýHow do you think you nation states are responding to the threat of irrelevance proposed by you know.

David Runciman:ÌýÌý ÌýWell I think where politics makes nation states very anxious I think the main reason that states are anxious is because we politics is primarily negative.Ìý It's this whole world out there of complaint of anxiety, criticism reaches states much faster and it produces this kind of fire fighting response. What states tend to do in the face of the web, is try and put out the fires, the scandals the criticisms the complaints. I don't think that states have found in the web anything that makes them fear that they're power is being threatened by an equal. So what states tend to do I think is see the web as this giant irritation and it's something that they have to deal with and they're always looking for the resources to deal with it. but what they're not doing I think is seeing the web as something that they have to compete with on it's own terms.

Intvr:ÌýÌý ÌýChina is an interesting example in China you've got the irritation factor, censorship, use of the web for that but there's also the sense they are engaging the web an interesting line because they're engaging nationalists are, being encouraged I, know this but it seems likely that national scripts are 50% down on the blog. Tell us a bit what you think the Chinese are doing playing the game of the web.

David Runciman:ÌýÌý ÌýYeah I think the Chinese have noticed that the web is this, potential threat and it's also this potential resource and so far the threat hasn't really been realised and therefore what you have in the web is something that can fight fire with fire.Ìý I think what the Chinese government have noticed is that the kinds of uprising of complaint of anxiety also these little loyalties that are being created can be channelled just as easily by national politicians as against national politicians.Ìý The National politicians have the huge added advantage that they have already centralised the power. Web complaints against nation states have to cross that barrier they have to somehow pool their resources, pool all of this complaint together nation states have already got the centralised institutions. So if they can harness some of this energy some of the dynamism they maybe have the advantage.

Intvr:ÌýÌý ÌýJust going over this Iran do you think that was it us getting excited?

David Runciman:ÌýÌý ÌýWell it's early days but that looked to meÌý like a kind of emblematic internet revolution not just because it fizzled out and it looks like for now that it has fizzled out but what you had on the one hand was this kind of social networking dynamic explosion of anger and popular discontent, but it was a socially networked phenomenon it wasn't political it was social.Ìý It did get channelled through gossip sites it got channelled through face book it got channelled though slogans and then one got the feeling that the real politics was happening elsewhere. Iranian politics is still and incredibly elite business a small group of clerics who've known each other and been fighting each other for 20 or 30 years, were carrying on playing out the real game of politics far away from any of this and the connection was never made that's the one thing that's missing with this kind of internet politics. The connection between this incredibly dynamic but essentially social form of politics which is individuals communicating with, with the other individuals sharing their feelings their emotions. And elite politics which if anything is narrower more closed off and harder to access than it ever was. And that gap is still there. nothing about the web has closed it, so far.

Intvr:ÌýÌý ÌýTell me more about the web has created it's a western democracy has the web created an information overload of changing news the elites running the counties are more immune to pressure?

David Runciman:ÌýÌý ÌýWell there's much more information out thereÌý are many more distractions. The web is a huge diversion from all sorts of central political activities and the evidence I think of the last 20 years is that while the web has democratised all sorts of aspects of our lives, it's democratic celebrities as a easier and quicker to become a celebrity people have much more access to sites to express their opinion anyone can have a blog. Politics in the west, has become less democratic, the elite have become narrower. It's husband and wife teams it's Bill and Hillary it's the Milliband brothers you find that people who were at university together 20 years ago are now sharing power in Washington or in London. So there's a narrowing of political elites at the same time as there's this huge democratisation of all sorts of other aspects of our lives.Ìý Is the web responsible for this, no but is the web, the kind of distraction, creator of endless diversions huge amounts of different stories fast turnover of news that makes it easier for the politicians just to carry on with that private games yes.

IntvrÌýÌý ÌýExample Gordon Brown as being about to resign or cut out three or four times in the last year? Is that a specific example, where people are clinging onto power.

David Runciman: Well I think the best example actually is Berlusconi. Silvia Berlusconi is the kind of politician that the web should have swept away. He's an old style media magnate, his business is based on newspapers and TV these are the, the old media and he's still there and he's still there despite a constant rumble of scandal. How can he still be there I think two reasons, first because the scandals flare up and then they die away there are too many of them, there are too many sources where you can see the pictures of the girls at his villa there's no focus for it, and then the other reason is that elite politics has carried on regardless. It matters who you know there are these contacts that determine who remains in power that are impervious to this kind of pressure and Berlusconi is the master of that. So you have a politician who seems to have been finished for the last 10 years an old man awash with scandal clinging onto power in the age of the web.