- 28/12/2017
- Category: Commentaries
Early this November, representatives from Google, Facebook, and Twitter faced allegations by the United States government regarding their roles in the spread of fake news and its impacts on democracy.[i] These allegations were thrown not long after the CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg regretted the dismissal of his earlier remarks on the power of Facebook in affecting electoral decisions. In his latest comment, Zuckerberg spoke upon the disclosure of a Russian-based influence operation which had purchased $100,000 in ads to promote divisive political and social messages during the presidential campaign, thus prompting the company to agree last week to provide the contents of 3,000 ads to Congress.[ii] This event is concerning since Facebook is the most popular social media platform, according to research conducted by Pew Research Center in 2016. The popularity of Facebook is more than double of Twitter (24%), Pinterest (31%), Instagram (32%) and LinkedIn (29%).[iii]
In that case, social media held out the promise of a more liberal politics. According to Pew Research Center, social media comes out to provide accessible information and effortless communication that triggered more political engagement to tackle issues such as corruption and bigotry in the political realm.[iv] Moreover, it familiarizes the general population with the stance of its candidates, direct interaction, and it allows people to see their initial responses to ongoing issues. However, it must be understood that social media also operates under other companies to seek profit. Profits which often come from ads and content that can be managed by the companies, coming from the social media algorithm of the users.
Davenport conceptualizes this as ‘attention economy’,[v] and it creates a politically dangerous bubble of selectivity of information and ads which adheres to one’s personal views. Aside from targeting a specific market by using big data, the danger of this preference-based system creates political polarization, which drives the behaviour of people to react in accordance to their political ideologies and could deny the existence of another. In fact, according to a recent survey conducted by Reuters, consumers are happy to have their news selected by algorithms, with 36% saying they would like news to be chosen based on what they have read before, and 22% who are happy for their news agenda to be based on what their friends have read.[vi] The research also accounts for 22 other countries respondents aside from the ones coming from the United States, which depicted a bigger portrayal of social media’s capability to influence.
Hate the Player, Don’t Hate the Game?
Social media has become a unifier by creating room for those who share similar political beliefs to connect since debates and engagement are the building blocks of a healthy political environment that sustains democracy. There are claims that Obama’s popularity on Twitter was one of the leading factors which won him the US election in 2014.[vii] During that time Twitter was not seen as a political platform but rather a casual micro-blog to interact with people. Not long after that, more and more political figures started to become active on Twitter and Facebook, since people began switching to social media to seek political enlightenment.
In the case of the United States, the Congress tried to create a framework for dealing with social media through transparency. Companies were urged to answer the question of social responsibility in their information monopoly.[viii] With a large number of users, social media could not be categorized as the mere enabler but rather leading factor in driving public’s preferences and also particular influences. Nevertheless, the argument delivered by the Congress only draws half of the picture, as new social media trends should look upon how information multiplies and spreads through users sharing barely credible sources among each other. With that in mind, the power of social media has become a public concern in the United States.
New Form of Digital Disruption
According to Gentzkow, politics has become increasingly personal. People stopped seeing those on the other side as well-meaning people who happen to hold different opinions or to weight conflicting goals differently.[ix] By attaching ourselves to social media, these personal views got us to think that people on the opposing side are unintelligent and selfish. For a while, social media and the Internet have become echo chambers where partisans will hear their own opinions, biases and prejudices endlessly reinforced due to the programmed algorithm. Nonetheless, this idea becomes a subject of discussion as the government demands companies’ responsibility in regard of these changes.[x]
Digital disruption has always been the discourse for economic changes and competitiveness, while in reality the disruption is more multidimensional as it creates alteration on how humans consume information. In a nutshell, social media disrupted the nature of current political dynamics, providing many opportunities as well as challenges. Politics and the notion of democracy transformed even more as it became public goods which are easier to reach and captivate the masses. As a way to revive social media to its glorious purpose of people connectivity without killing public’s enthusiasm for politics, new strategies should be formulated. These strategies should be collaborative and involve all the actors namely the government as the subject of politics, private companies as the proponents to social media, and the people. More research on the topic of democracy and social media is a sign of better understanding that could bridge the two.
Picture : pexels
References :
[i] Naughton, J. (2017). Facebook is not listening to the fake news furore | John Naughton. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/05/facebook-not-listening-fake-news-furore-us-senate-hearing-mark-zuckerberg [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[ii] Levin, S. (2017). Mark Zuckerberg: I regret ridiculing fears over Facebook’s effect on election. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/27/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-2016-election-fake-news [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[iii] Greenwood, S., Perrin, A. and Duggan, M. (2017). Social Media Update 2016. [online] Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech. Available at: http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/11/11/social-media-update-2016/ [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[iv] Duggan, M. and Smith, A. (2016). The tone of social media discussions around politics. [online] Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech. Available at: http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/10/25/the-tone-of-social-media-discussions-around-politics/ [Accessed 6 Dec. 2017].
[v] Davenport, T. and Beck, J. (2005). The Attention Economy: Understanding the New Currency of Business. 2nd ed. Boston: Harvard Business School.
[vi] Wakefield, J. (2016). Young using social media to access news. [online] BBC News. Available at: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-36528256 [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[vii] Bogost, I. (2017). Obama Was Too Good at Social Media. [online] The Atlantic. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/01/did-america-need-a-social-media-president/512405/ [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[viii] Economist (2017). Do social media threaten democracy?. [online] Economist.com. Available at: https://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21730871-facebook-google-and-twitter-were-supposed-save-politics-good-information-drove-out [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[ix] Gentzkow, M. (2016). Polarization in 2016. [online] Web.stanford.edu. Available at: https://web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/research/PolarizationIn2016.pdf [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
[x] Parker, E. (2017). In praise of echo chambers. [online] Washington Post. Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/democracy-post/wp/2017/05/22/in-praise-of-echo-chambers/?utm_term=.38158fda6700 [Accessed 7 Nov. 2017].
