Harriet Fuller
Title:
Social Movements and Governments In The Digital Age: Evaluating A Complex Landscape by Zeyneb Tufekci
Introduction – What are the main points of the reading?
When discussing social media and the power of the digital world, it is common to have a positive understanding in the overall influence it has within our wider community. This is particularly the case within politics and social movements. This is because we typically associate access to social media as an enhancement in allowing freedom of speech as well as providing the ability to select and consume the media we desire. Often, we also understand that social media enables us to connect with a wide variety of people, encouraging us to form relationships with a more diverse community. It is important to acknowledge these positive beliefs in the role of the digital world within social movements is the reflection of the environment we live in. For example, citizens from totalitarian states such as North Korea, Turkmenistan and Eritrea are unlikely to have the same positive understanding of the role social media has within social movements, due to the “government monopoly on means of communication” that exists within their state. (Referenced below).
These commonly held beliefs towards the presence of the digital age are thought provoking, particularly after looking into this piece by Zeyneb Tufeki.
Social Movements and Governments in the Digital Age discusses ideas surrounding the effects of a digital presence and the impact social media has on social movements within governments around the world. Importantly, this piece brings into question these positive assumptions stated above. Tufeki dives into a core theme that despite social media empowering protests on countless occasions and providing a large source of power, there have been “disempowering side effects” according to an Egyptian Activist. Interestingly, some activist groups believe they had more influence prior to the involvement of the online world. Tufeki states the article “discusses the ways in which online social media empowers protestors and dissidents, as well as some of its weaknesses and the evolving responses to governments.”
As mentioned, there are many important key points within this piece. I will discuss how there can be positive and negative impacts from social media within social movements, resulting in a wide variety of outcomes. These outcomes extend from the Tahrir Square protests in Egypt to the Occupy movement occurring around the world. These significant events occurred in 2011. I will then conclude on a final key point discussing government responses to social media usage, illustrating their struggle to use historical repressive methods of control within the digital age. As I will discuss, the digital age has forced governments who seek control to join the digital age, or risk falling behind. This creates a complex and versatile environment.
The Positive Impacts of Social Media in Social Movements:
Zeyneb states that “digital infrastructure empowers protest movements in specific ways, and recent uprisings and large protests around the world have provided indications of this power.”
The peace has found that social media has had a positive impact in three main areas within social movements. This includes “gaining public attention, evading censorship and coordination of logistics.” A key point discussed here is that governments can no longer “gate keep” in the way they have previously done. The very nature of the digital environment allows for people to reach media the government does not wish to provide. I have personally experienced this interesting idea in 2017 when I visited China. We were told we would not have access to Facebook, Instagram and other sources of media we typically use in New Zealand. After receiving this information, we were then told (by a different group) using a VPN would allow us to restore the websites and apps we wish to read from. This illustrates the power social media has in an environment where the government has control over the distribution of media.
Zeyneb discussed the Turkish government has increasingly controlled the distribution of their information due to pressure from politics and finances. Freedom of the press has been significantly lessened in contentious areas such as corruption or violence. These issues of course have a negative influence on the way citizens view the state, hence why the government want to control the narrative. Following a bombing within Turkey, killing 34 people, the government were ensuring they had given permission to the media outlets to provide a summary of events they had approved. “This story, however, broke after a single journalist Serdar Akinan, decided he would no longer wait for government approval.” Serdar told this story through his own lense via Instagram, without government censorship. Not only did this truth allow for people within Turkey to ascertain the truth, but it also allowed for the mainstream media to understand the magnitude of the event as well.
Zeyneb also discusses an interesting idea regarding why in some circumstances the impact of the internet within a social movement can be much larger. According to Zeyneb, in states that have gone from extreme control to more freedom, the impact of social media can be seen to make a more significant difference. Whereas the impact of the internet within nations already experiencing freedoms is much smaller.
Negative Impact:
Significantly, this piece points out the influence of the digital environment has also had the opposite impact, causing a detriment to those advocating on a variety of issues. Consequently, those involved in these social movements have experienced disempowerment in various ways.
Zeyneb stated “By itself, social media does not automatically facilitate easier organizing of logistics and can lead to confusion as well.” An example of this could be seen in Tahir Square in 2011 where social media was enabling people to organize supplies and volunteers but others did not know if this organization had been done. Ultimately, this caused issues and creation confusion amongst those trying to help.
A core weakness of social media within social movements stems from the sudden growth a movement can have from gaining a large following through media. Protestors gaining momentum quickly results in a lack of appropriate time to prepare and organize the most efficient ways to present their message. “Without years of preparation, digital infrastructure acts as a scaffold to movements that mask other weaknesses collective, especially collective capacities in organizing, decision making, and general work dynamics that only come through sustained periods of working together.” There are, as mentioned some major benefits of social media within social movements. Here, we can see a detriment that has the potential to harm the movement. This is because when a group comes into conflict with the authorities, due to the shortcuts allowed by the ease of social media, they have spent little time building trust within each other as well as methods of conflict resolution. Zeyneb found that over a period of time, this has become an issue for many movements.
Governments and Social Media:
Although today we understand social media to be a useful tool in countries like New Zealand for the government to communicate with citizens, the piece discusses the initial impression of social media in many areas was disruption. There was an initial sense of “ignorance and misunderstanding.” Zeyeb then discussed over time governments were forced to learn about the benefits of the digital age as well as its downfalls. To understand how social media would challenge a government, they had to learn how it worked and how to utilize or prevent it.
The piece goes on to discuss that many governments have realised they cannot fully combat the power of social media as another source of news. There are two core approaches governments take. They either chose to be a part of it and try to control elements of the information being dispersed, or they ban it. The issue with banning certain forms of media is that motivated individuals with the aim of being activists will often find a way to get around restrictions. This has resulted in controlling governments finding new and modern ways to repress citizens, despite the old methods no longer working due to the extensive power of the digital age.
Conclusion:
Ultimately, it has been interesting to look back on the assumptions I had regarding the positive effects of social media on social movements, prior to completing this reading. I believe it is fair to conclude the positive attributes I could see in the digital age were purely subjective and lacked an understanding and consideration of the difficult and complex nature of social movements and conflict between many states and their citizens. This reading took a sensitive, mindful and insightful approach to explain to the audience how something so commonly understood as beneficial had the potential to cause detriment.
Other Sources:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/totalitarian-countries
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