Crabtree suggests that the Internet provides new platforms which exhibit extensive potential to promote an engaged politics connecting “ordinary people with ordinary people.” There is contrasting research regarding the ability for the Internet to increase political awareness, particularly among Gen Y. I personally feel that the opportunities made available through social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, demonstrate great potential to instigate political engagement.
Firstly, social media has the ability to engage groups previously detached from political affairs. This contention is exemplified through the success of political campaigns with the strategic inclusion of online social media. The recent Youth Electoral Study found that many of those aged between 15 to 25 years of age, ‘claimed to be bored by politics and disassociated from democratic participation’ (cited by Ward, 2008). Scholars also maintain that social networking sites are used by youth as a source of political newsgathering, and it is apparent these sites have drastically modernized young adults’ methods of learning about and engaging in political activities (Baumgartner and Morris, 2010). For example, Ward contests that the Labors 2007 election victory was largely due to the significant number of under 35 year olds swapping to the ALP when it promoted Kevin Rudd to the leadership (2007). Eltham terms the operation as “The Young Voters Theory” (2007), as Labor undoubtedly made a determined pitch to the younger generation, through “creating a Kevin.07 website and utilizing Web2.0 social networking tools such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook in its campaign” (Ward, 2007, p 11). Interestingly enough, Labor exercised the Web2.0 campaign as a means to generate mainstream media publicity and build Rudd’s brand as being a generation leader with fresh ideas who is in tune with Australia’s youth. However, the campaign failed to exploit the potential of Web2.0 technology, ignoring the benefits of interactivity and engaging youth in dialogue to involve them in the creation of campaign content (Ward, 2007). The prevalence of social media use by young adults is enormously high, therefore the exploitation of this medium has great potential to educate and engage a generation previously disconnected from mainstream politics.
Secondly, with youth growing up in an environment where social media is commonplace, political knowledge has the potential to be learnt incidentally and could result in an increase in future political engagement among the masses. Scholars suggest that entertainment-based media that incorporates a small amount of news (political or otherwise) contributes to democratic discourse by providing information to people who might otherwise not be inclined to follow current affairs (Baum & Jamison, 2006). Evidently, use of social media eliminates the effort and time expenditure it takes to follow traditional news and to stay informed, because political learning occurs as an “incidental by-product” of seeking entertainment (Baum, 2003, p7). Conversely, there are scholars who disagree with this incidental by-product learning model. Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are largely used to connect individuals with like-minded people (Boyd, 2008). Since the Internet adheres to the uses and gratifications school of thought, political information will only be ‘incidentally’ exposed to the online social networks of those who share an interest in politics. Similarly, because the dominant networked publics are structured around personal networks, new media may only promote political engagement among already engaged groups, because “just as politically engaged people know one another, alienated and uninterested people mainly know people like themselves” (Boyd, 2008, p 115). Consequently, communities that share little-to-no interest in politics have limited potential for exposure to political information minimizing the potential for incidental learning and therefore minimizing political engagement (Baumgartner and Morris, 2010).
Additionally, citizen journalism promotes political engagement as news is no longer just a product of consumption, but is now fostering participation in conversation where opinions on political issues can be published and distributed. For example, The controversy surrounding the delays of releasing the 2008 election results in Zimbabwe saw citizen journalism contribute to the circulation of public opinion. While Zimbawbe citizens were anxiously awaiting the 2008 election results, they were consciously aware of the corrupt alteration of results taking place, but were almost powerless to do anything about it. Citizen journalism provided an outlet for a commentary on the situation as it was occurring. Blogs sprouted expressing dissatisfaction, some trivialized the situation, jokes were being circulated and information was distributed to inform citizens of the corrupt happenings (Moyo, 2009). This event displays a rise in citizen engagement in the production and dissemination of information, and that the emerging “horizontal network of communication” (Moyo, 2009, p 555) contributed greatly to the public debate around the contested election. Therefore, citizen journalism presents an abundance of opportunities for individuals to exercise participation in the national political discourse.
Overwhelming evidence confirms that new media platforms including Facebook and Twitter possess great potential to promote an engaged politics. The high prevalence of social media use by young Australian’s provides an outlet for political promotion to reach segments whom have previously been detached from mainstream politics. This notion has been confirmed through campaigns like Rudd’s ‘Kevin0.7’ crusade, which engaged youth on a broader level and resulted in an election success. Additionally, the ‘incidental by-product’ learning model to the use of social media will continue to inform and encourage political participation among those who grow up with social media as commonplace.
Baum, M 2003, “Soft news goes to war: Public opinion and American foreign policy,” Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Baum, M & Jamison, A 2003, “The Opera Effect: How soft news helps inattentive citizens vote consistently,” The Journal of Politics, Vol 68, pp 946-959
Baumgertner, J & Morris J 2010, “MyFaceTube politics: Social networking web sites and political engagement of young adults,” Social Science Computer Review, Vol 28, pp 24-44
Boyd, D 2008, “Can social networking sites enable political action,” Rebooting democracy, New York: Personal Democracy
Crabtree, J. 'Civic hacking: A New Agenda for E-democracy.' [URL: http://www.opendemocracy.net/media-edemocracy/article_1025.jsp]
Eltham, B 2007, “Federal Election: The Young Voters Theory,” New Matilda 169, November 19, accessed 23.9.2011, http://www...newmatilda.com/election07/index.php/2007/11119/the-young-voters-theoryl
Moyo, D 2009, “Citizen Journalism and the Parallel Market of Information in Zimbabwe’s 2008 Election,” Journalism Studies, Vol 10, Issue 4, pp 551-567, accessed 22.9.2011, Taylor Francis Online
Papic, M & Noonan, S 2011, “Social Media as a Tool for Protest,” Stratfor Global Intelligence, weblog, accessed 22.9.2011 http://ey9ff7jb6l.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:journal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=Egypt%27s+Facebook+revolution&rft.jtitle=American+Diplomacy&rft.au=Radwan%2C+Abeer+Bassiouny&rft.date=2011-02-21&rft.pub=American+Diplomacy+Publishers&rft.issn=1094-8120&rft.externalDBID=n%2Fa&rft.externalDocID=250580098
Radwan, A 2011, 'Egypt's Facebook Revolution', American Diplomacy, pp. 1-3, Political Science Complete, EBSCOhost, viewed 22 September 2011.
Ward, I 2007 “Kevin07: Labor’s pitch to generation YouTube [Paper in: The Australian Election 07. Williams, Paul (ed)],” Social Alternatives, Volume 27, Issue Number 2, pp 11-15, accessed 20.9.2011, Informit database,
No comments:
Post a Comment