Clay Shirky’s article, The Political Power of Social Media, discusses how social media tools, like texting, have made the world’s communication landscape much denser. Since the rise of the Internet in the early 1990s, the world's networked population has grown from the low millions to the low billions.
Due to the increase of those in the networked population, people have much greater access to information, more opportunities to engage in public speech, and an enhanced ability to undertake collective action. Shirky shows this reality through the impeachment trial of Philippine President, Joseph Estrada.
Thousands of Philippine citizens, angry at their corrupt president, converged on Epifanio de los Santos Avenue, a major crossroads in Manila. They protested because, loyalists in the Philippine Congress voted to set aside key evidence against Estrada. The protest was arranged, in part, by forwarded text messages reading, "Go 2 EDSA. Wear blk." The crowd quickly swelled, and in the next few days, over a million people arrived, choking traffic in downtown Manila.
Due to the public’s ability to coordinate a massive group of people, they got what they wanted; the evidence against Estrada was presented to the public.
It’s crazy how social media has become such a powerful tool to not only network with others, but also to create social change. Because of this fact Governments need to beware of how their actions can be challenged and they need to know how to handle such situations.
Shirky raises the question: How does the ubiquity of social media affect U.S. interests, and how should U.S. policy respond to it?
U.S. policy needs to embrace social media and take into account the power it does have.
You make a good point when you talk about how dense the networking population has become. A few years ago, i would have never though my grandma would have Facebook, but now she does, and this is happening everywhere.
ReplyDeleteThis denseness is really shown in the protest by the philippine citizens, it is really impressive how a simple text was able to rally so many people, and with that, they were able to change the minds of the legal system.
I also agree with your final statement, i think everybody needs to embrace social media and take into account the power it holds.