The Impact Of Facebook On Citizen Engagement

D., Brooke L. & Yan J. 2012) Today, more than ever, this is true, as social media can act to calm the public and disseminate helpful messages, or aggravate public opinion and create a backlash against leaders and

Social Media has become a huge part of our lives. It is a way to connect to those far away, or to share things that we find interesting or exciting and can be a very personal presentation of who we are. But in both positive and negative ways we can share our opinions and our view on certain events in the world. These can lead to rallies, protests, uprisings or in some cases revolution, the internet has become one of the most influential forces in this world and a large part of that is due to social media. In the case of the Michael Brown shooting, social media focused on the positive and negative relationships between minorities and cops in the United States of America. Sites such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Vine were all used to show

Social media today is a very free place. We are allowed to post whatever we like and comment on whomever’s picture. However, social media can be a very dark place too, because of this freedom. Hate across the world can be seen, different accounts are made only for bringing down others, and the arguments of the small things are formed every single day. Although these problems are seen on social media they are not related to the topic I am concerned about. I want to discuss all of the hidden powers social media websites like Twitter and Facebook have along with the idea that our government should have those powers.

The view of social media is all in how you perceive it and your perspective. Malcolm Gladwell argues in "Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted", that social media has weakened the nature of social revolutions and I have to say that I agree but disagree. Social media plays a huge part in our lives now and there is so much you can find out by a click of a button; it is a very revolutionary invention but it also has a negative impact on our lives.

As a middle eastern, I did not realize how much Facebook was considered a main role in these uprising and how it was reported here in the U.S. and the west. These uprisings were not just a result of a “Facebook revolution,” but the thousands of people who took to the streets and protested against dictators and demanded change. As someone who lived there, I believe that the political, religious, and economic problems were there already and Facebook was a tool that happened to be accessible to help protesters organize. It certainly was not a main factor in these revolutions. As a matter of fact Facebook was also used and still being used by governments to spread propaganda. In the Syrian conflict Facebook, twitter, and video platforms like YouTube are being used by terrorist groups like ISIS to spread their radical ideology and even reach like-minded people in the west. This was not possible few years ago and is definitely an example of how social media could play a negative role in

Social media has transformed social movements by creating a more heterogeneous mobilization and departing from the ideas of identity politics from the 1960s where identities were mainly group based (minorities, women, or immigrants). This has generated a rise of personalized politics, where the focus is on individual preferences over group preferences. Social media facilitated such transformation by “involving communication technologies that allow individuals to activate their loosely tied social networks.” Furthermore, in the 21st century the use of social media has affected the complexity of protestors and police relationship. Social media provides a platform where people organize in a more spontaneous and rapid manner, leaving police agencies with a question of how to react and maintain law and order under these circumstances. These conditions produce violent encounters between the police and demonstrators due to lack of readiness police agencies possess. This brings into question how social media changed the organization of protesters and police agencies, and how it is providing the necessary conditions for the use of force by police agencies.

Politics can make people blind by ignoring crucial issues; thankfully, social media is now giving us the ability to exchange information. The government is only going to show you what they want for you to see, and not what is essential in order to ensure that our rights are not being infringed upon. For this reason news covers so many problems hoping we never find out. According to sociologist Zeynep Tufekci “Nowadays, a network of tweets can unleash a global awareness campaign. A Facebook page can become the hub of a massive mobilization.”(2014, October). Basically, Tufekci is saying that social media is encouraging us to make a move in order to make a difference, especially

In an article on CNN.com, the impacts of Facebook on the Egyptian revolution are explored. Five anonymous activists in Egypt created a Facebook event for the protests, calling it “The Day of the Revolution Against Torture, Poverty, Corruption and Unemployment.” Many people were skeptical at first, questioning the fact that support was being garnered for the protest by way of a social networking website. However, despite the initial apprehension, the rebellion was successful and president Hosni Mubarak was overthrown (Sutter, 2011).

Iosifidis starts the article by discussing in detail his first topic- social networks as a new public sphere. His main argument is that while social media spaces create new public spheres of both “democratizing and empowering functions” (2011), the Internet is also capable of both informing individuals and manipulating them. He argues that the public sphere is still a strong analytical instrument in today’s societies, as it “helps us help us make sense of the relationship between the media and democracy (civic engagement)” (2011). Iosifidis brings up several interesting and debatable reasons why social media is mostly overstated and represents hopefulness in the ability to be a public sphere. His six reasons are: open participation of social media may turn

With the advancing globalized society that we live in, social media has become a political outlet for civilians of the interconnected world. Through this technological circuit, citizens are able to speak freely about the issues that concern them, giving them the ability to connect with others who share the same perspective. Looking through a development perspective, it is evident that social media outlets, for example twitter, have lead to major political uproar, such as the Arab Uprisings of 2011, or as popularized by the Western media, “The Arab Spring”. At this time, the demands of the protestors in the Arab region indicated their desire for greater social and economic justice and were made as a response to the growing concern regarding the Egyptian economy’s tie into the capitalist world market (Haynes, 2013). The Arab Spring was not solely a revolt against authoritarian regimes but also expressions of a crisis caused by the imbalanced social order brought upon by neoliberal policies (Bogaert, 2013). During this time, citizenry relied heavily on social media to spread information and promote insurgent agendas. Globalization and the technological facets of our hegemonic society have allowed for regular civilians to become part of the political system as exemplified through the use of social media during the Arab Spring.

Facebook was used to agent networks between groups that were disconnect previously, to share information about shared complaints beyond the little community of activist leaders, and to reach out to the whole world to show there is a demonstration going on. Social media, particularly Facebook, assisted a large group of people for civic engagement and eventually political change, particularly by extending towards the unemployment of the country (Lim, 2012). Facebook was not the only or even the most important component of information of political mobilization or civic engagement, which eventually led to the fall of Mubarak, but it fit well with other information networks that were beyond the control of the authoritarian government (Lim, 2012).

From hieroglyphics to the printing press, the concept of communication has been an integral part of society in order to express and spread ideas. However, through technological advancements and the prevalence of social media, communication has become faster and easier than before, allowing for greater involvement in activities globally. This has allowed for social media to become a method of political action because of its accessibility and speed. With the advancing processes of social media as a political force, there have been arguments on the effectiveness and different ways to take advantage of it. Clay Shirky, in “The Political Power of Social Media: Technology, the Public Sphere, and Political Change,” has addressed the various ways in which countries, especially the United States, has attempted to utilize social media to incite freedom of speech and build a broader public sphere. He listed the instrumental approach, where anti-censorship and “western” websites are encouraged, and the environmental, where local conversations among the residents of the country are encouraged. Shirky argues that inciting local conversations within people is far more effective in the long run in order to make true change and create a public sphere. However, there have been criticism against the use of social media as a way of creating political activism, especially from Malcom Gladwell in his article “Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted.” Gladwell argues that social

Does social media affect people? If we are connected to any social media, the platform has been a slacktivism at one point or another. Social activism is a good thing because it helps you have wealth, opportunities, and other privileges. The power of social media is hard to dismiss. What once seemed like a trivial way to keep in touch with friends, sharing photos and jokes, has become a force for societal change, shining light on subjects previously unknown, deepening conversations and empowering citizens of the world to unite and effect change in a number of ways. Interestingly, social media as a medium for connecting, organizing and communicating is powering and spreading democracy.

With the increasing number of protests mobilised through social networks, the Internet is coming to be seen either as a force of liberation or as the new generation’s “cyber-utopia”, creating unfounded optimism and hopes of emancipation. The former view claims that social networks play a key role in shaping debates about protests and in spreading democratic ideas around the globe (especially in the case of Arab Spring).The latter view advocates that the role of internet has been exaggerated in the narratives of these protests because the very working class which fuelled the revolution did not have access to these technologies. This view suggests that it is not Facebook or Twitter that has brought about these revolutionary changes but

Although some people have become weary of social media, there is also an overwhelming amount of people who believe social media has improved society. Social Media has definitely made society aware of a lot of global issues along with social movements going on across the US and world. The Arab Spring’s uprising that took place in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya owe most of their credit to social media (Roesler). This played a huge role in organizing protests to highlight the corrupt government they were facing. When posting about upcoming protests across social media as a public event, it made it easy for people outside of the warzone to become aware of what was happening. This led to donations and humanitarians to flood the middle east with help (Roesler).