New Social Media – Global Activism or Narcissistic Contemplation? A raw reflection
Listening to a lecture on the New Social Media by Goldsmiths’ lecturer Natalie Fenton, I want to share a few thoughts and outline some assumptions and highlight some presuppositions that underlie the discussion.
It seems an inherent trope of western, European society to ascribe progress taking place in the field of technology to a change (often positive, i.e. into the “right” or correct direction (no political affilitation with the term here)) of the condition of humanity. What do I mean by that?
The emergence of new media, i.e. the internet, web 2.0, twitter and mobile phones for that matter, seem to signal the establishment of participatory platforms, where individuals can meet and group according to their own tastes, agendas and preferences. Thus, the space that has opened up in a kind of third dimension, the internet, for example in Facebook, can bring people from different geographical, local settings together in a kind of global space and context.
It can. But does it really happen? Does the emergence of a global space, the internet allow for transnational exchange of ideas and activism or, rather does this space merely mirror, or less drastically a term, reflect local (not necessarily national though) interests and affiliations? How does a person act when entering the cyberspace? Does s/he leave their physical contextualization behind? By that I mean, in how far does the background, political conviction and personal preferences determine the way people act in the cyberspace?
I do not dispute that new social media allow for an easier, faster and more effective way of communication and, indeed, mobilization. But, I think, the crucial step, the activism, has to take place in another space (trying to avoid using the term real world), outside of cyberspace, in order to actually achieve something. Or does it?
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I agree with you. I’d say that if you looked closely at social networking sites the stuff that is going on there probably mirrors what is happening in ‘real life’. As I said yesterday, the three guys meeting in the back of a pub to talk about conspiracy theories will also talk about in on Twitter, and the millions who watch X-Factor also talk about it on Twitter (never, ever go on Twitter on a Saturday night).
In a sense I think social networks represent ‘the world’, not a nation as someone suggested yesterday. Within Facebook there will be a Spain, a UK, a Kenya and so on.
I think social media can be useful for political activism though. One example is mobilising a lot of people to take action. Although it’s nothing new (it’s just replacing/complementing handing out flyers), you can potentially reach a lot of people quickly. Check out the Wave for example: http://www.the-wave.org.uk/
I agree that we have to stay away from technological determinism, that the Internet mirrors, if not perpetuates ‘real life’ but n reaction to your last paragraph, I also think that the Internet, and not just through social media, allows for what Ester and Vinken, in ‘Debating Civic Society’, call “new, alternative and innovative forms of solidarity, connectedness and civic, and political engagement”, particularly in repressive political contexts.
In China, for example, roughly seventy percent of the online population is under the age of thirty; the Internet is this generation’s primary communication tool; and, as Zixue Tai argues in ‘The Internet in China: cyberspace and civil society’, “the Internet is likely to be the ultimate tool for particularly younger generations to gain and advance social capital, to build and take part in communities, and to contribute to the common good and their personal identity.”
What I think the Internet CAN do is shift the definition of civic or political (or insert any other word here) ‘engagement’- just because we are not engaging in what are considered traditional manners, does NOT mean we are not engaged.
As Natalie Fenton suggested last night – perhaps the Internet is changing our sociopolitical habits rather than challenging politics per se.
Hey Marina,
I think we can not forget that the Internet (sorry Pontus!) and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are limited in their spread and reach. While a mind boggling number of people use them, a bigger and far more significant number doesn’t have access to these tools of communication. The lack of education, poverty and in some cases ignorance mean the Internet and social networking are limited in their reach, to a certain class or bunch of closely related classes (what we in India like to call the lower-middle, middle-middle and upper-middle classes, as well as the elites). It might be useful to study the word ‘networking’ and its uses, might have something interesting their.
If we work with this understanding, the Internet’s significance has already shrunk! The same strata or similar stratas of society have just found a new way of reaching out to each other.
And while I am tempted to buckle under cynicism and label the Internet as a new ‘hegemony’, I think its importance will certainly grow with its expansion, not in the least because the more we participate from ‘below’ the more will we be able to democratise it!
:S
I think one important point left out from the debates on political action in the notion of corporeality; that is, not of corporate reality but of the material reality of the body that cannot be separated from knowledge. When you have only online petitions and social media interactions, you very seldom confront the brute force of power directly.
My gut feeling increasingly is that while social media etc can act as a novel way of communicating, we cannot talk about power without this reflecting to some kind of a bio-political political confrontation and experience. It is one thing to sign a petition; it is other to confront a menacing police officer with a baton on your face.
As Pontus said, these, of course, are not contradictory or mutully excluding. Social media is the extension of the politics but it is not separate from non-computerised engagement. I have a gut feeling that separating these two dimensions only reflects the middle class origins of the research looking at social media: as if, in some utopiann middle class pluralistic environment, merelu words could change the complex matrix of politics of society.
Perhaps, this just reflects a more profound body/mind dichotomy in Western society.
Hungry.
Very incisive points, Marina.
Like every invention in human history, the New Social Media has been using in various ways and by many means. Some of them are positive and some are negative or even worse.
I agree with you and believe that nobody doubt that the New Meidas are changing our society dramatically, but many of us are questioning the ongoing consequence of the New media. This worrying on New Media can be extended to nuclear tech, genetic tech, etc.
I would tend to agree with Matti (not simply because I want some extra credit for my essays) but simply because I have seen this in action back in Malaysia. Not to generalise the entire world, or even the global South from my experience in this lil nowhere of a nation-state, but the work that was/is done on Facebook etc, is merely tapping into what are siege or herd mentalities and creating a group jerk.
It has been real bio-political activity that has really shaken Malaysian politics in terms of attendance in demonstrations and rallies.
One might go so far that social media, is just simply that – a technology, and technologies are enablers. What it enablers can be both nefarious and well, empowering.
To extend Matti’s point, it is probably the fact that the sort of political activism we tend to talk about is always vis-a-vis the state, and the state plays a heavy role in regulating its members rather than its culture (it definitely tries in this respect but usually fails).
So a sort of counter-regulation is nearly necessarily a physical one.
This is not necessarily a criticism of Fenton, who did make many points about how Web 2.0 is not as flattening and participatory as it may appear to be.
However, there are many things about it which give us hope to find “cracks in the wall.” In as much as Pontus very aptly stated that there are “nations” on the Internet, it is very much easier to gain information – not always necessarily accurate information – about these Others than it was before.