In the age of slacktivism
Mar. 25th, 2012 06:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nairiporterSilicon bracelets, virtual ribbons on the personal FB wall, and campaigns promising to feed the starving children through a single click of the "Like" button. Getting concerned about the suffering people at the other side of the globe has become so easy nowadays. Even too easy according to some, who are now calling this new phenomenon "slacktivism".
In recent years there is hardly a profile in the social networks without at least one invitation from an e-friend to join some life-saving campaign or to at least copy-paste a touching message of social concern on your wall. Probably there isn't a single Web user who hasn't already heard of the Kony2012 phenomenon, this 30-minute video that drew attention to the crimes of Joseph Kony, the rebel leader in Central Africa. It was watched by millions of people on YouTube alone, just within a few days. Kony is now #1 in the list of most wanted people at the Hague Tribunal, he and his Lord's Resistance Army being responsible for many kidnappings, turning children into soldiers and sex slaves, and many other crimes against civilians. Although probably the loudest example of the so called digital activism so far, this campaign is far from being the only one. And its worldwide success promises even more provocative ideas coming up in the future.
Internet, Twitter and the social networks are the powerful megaphon that has revolutionised the world of NGOs. A campaign that until very recently would require months and even years to create committees, to persuade the broad public and accumulate signatures and donations, now with a single click of the "Share" button can spread around the world within days. Now we are entering the ages when public opinion, no matter how limited its understanding of complex situations, does profoundly affect the political debate. This is seen as a matter of concern by the professional experts in international relations. But on the other hand, it wasn't so long ago that scientists with PhDs used to tremble at the idea of an online encyclopedia that is collectively maintained by a horde of laymen. And yet now it is a fact, and many students use it to navigate across references in their studies.
At the opposite side of the barricade are the vocal advocates of digital activism who believe it accesses the public directly and broadly, and pushes people to action, getting people involved who otherwise are seldom moved by issues concerning the world outside of their most immediate surroundings and every-day life. They are prepared to swallow the simplified narrative, the sloganeering and the often shocking messages for the sake of raising maximum awareness on the issues that concern the largest possible public. Their opponents believe the online causes are full of dangerous naivety because of the notion that if a problem is being talked about a lot, then some cure for it would inevitably come out of all that talking. To add to that, the popularity of the marketing tricks creates a sense of a temporary fashion. And indeed, not all campaigns should be put in the same category. There are those among them that could be counter-productive and even unethical to the very cause they are allegedly supporting.
Long before Kony2012 had flooded the Internet, another campaign made history with its instant effectiveness - that of the Sudan Divestment Task Force, whose purpose is to provoke an economic boycott against Sudan because of the Darfur crisis. The campaign leaders seem to be very well versed in PR strategy. They have even put a picture of a very sweet little child from Darfur on their website, her eyes making you want to donate immediately to the cause. Everything started in 2005 when a student from the California University, Adam Sterling used a traditional form of digital activism to promote the idea of organised pressure on the largest inernational companies to stop doing business with the Sudanese government and help stop the genocide in Darfur.
Using emails and postcards, blogs and media attention, the campaign led to the passing of a special order of the US government that encouraged the states and the federal services to stop using the services of those companies who are too close to the regime in Khartoum. The initiative was adopted by more than a dozen big industrial countries. Thousands of private shareholders, including prominent US politicians, used the online filter created by this movement, to "purge" their investment portfolios, and nine large companies were forced to press Khartoum for a change of policy. The whole situation very much reminded of the international boycott against the apartheid regime here in South Africa. And it had a tremendous effect. In just a few months the Sudanese government complained that it was under siege, and it bought some pages of space for ads at the NY Times, worth a million dollars. But this counter-attack only had the opposite effect, causing more pressure to stop the genocide.
This campaign for economic boycott of Sudan shows what a great potential the social activism can have in a globalised and digitalised world. It was so effective because it used a clear message, but without simplifying a complex ethnic conflict too much. It was focused, but it didn't have the pretense to seek the absolute cure to the problem, and it did not claim to see itself as the ultimate sollution but only a small first step out of a long series of long-term measures for pacifying the region. In other words, it was everything that Kony2012 is not.
We all know how Kony2012 started. It was created by a previously obscure NGO called Invisible Children from San Diego. The video aimed to spread the word about the crimes of the rebel leader Joseph Kony and to call for the viewers to support the efforts for his capture and putting to justice. In fact Invisible Children had been carrying out this activism for years around the US universities and schools, giving lectures about the conflict in Uganda and collecting donations for the children who were victims of abduction by Kony's army. They even made a few videos that circulated around various websites, they were being presented on various TV shows and via Hulu.com, but the public attention was always minimal. And then finally, the emotional Kony2012 video struck the right chord. And people suddenly heard about a conflict they had previously never heard about.
The problem is that the complex political context and the history of Central Africa were kind of sacrificed for the sake of a message that was as simple and easy to memorise as it could be. For instance the call to support the US program that last year sent a hundred military instructors to Uganda has created the impression that a foreign intervention and pressure was the only necessary means of capturing Kony. But in this case the jungles of Central Africa and the spreading of the conflict across borders is not the only issue. The local army itself is known for its human rights abuses and is partially responsible for the rise of the rebel leader. Although it is great that the US schoolchildren now know who Joseph Kony is, we cannot expect that the effect of the campaign would end there. They might, and probably should, feel a necessity to contact their local representative in the House and insist to "do something", i.e. press for measures some of which might turn out neither desired nor too productive (as Yevgeny Morozov writes in The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom).
Digital activism is strongest in the US exactly because of the open and dynamic character of the US political system. Apart from the traditions in participating in charity and voluntary initiatives, the letters and calls to the offices of the congresspeople are also taken seriously and are quite many, so this tends to prompt the respective actions. And because of its superpower status, in the US the effect could be really enormous. This is why the skeptics are warning about possible errors of large magnitude, if politicians become too carried away and do something stupid without knowing much about the local realities in the place they are meddling into. And some of the societies in the developing world (which is often the target of this activism) are even less enthusiastic about such interventions. When the Kony2012 video was first shown in front of Ugandan public, the audience was first confused, then angry with the way the story was presented, and eventually they started throwing stones at the screen. The blogger Rosebell Kagumire even called it "Another video kind of glorifying somebody saving African children". And meanwhile many of the more efficient efforts of the local activists remain unnoticed and under-appreciated, she bitterly added.
In his book Yevgeny Morozov also warns that the digital activism cannot be a solution to every situation. He draws a parallel to his country Belarus, where the online campaigns of the recent years have probably even weakened the opposition. Instead of building an effective political organisation, it discusses strategies how to create groups in Facebook, a thing that Lukashenko's regime can only be happy about. Provocative online campaign by itself cannot bring change, it is only an element of the picture. Because change usually is a result of many political, social, economic and cultural factors and a lot of offline struggle IRL. For example during the Arab spring the opposition was organising its meetings via the Internet, but the protests themselves were happening day after day on the streets and squares.
But despite all the flaws and valid criticism and the negative reactions that caused a nervous breakdown in one of the Kony2012 creators, Jason Russell, everything shows that the online campaigns are yet to gain speed and real influence. And Kony2012 has obviously raised the bar very high, and hundreds of NGOs around the world will be looking for far more creative approaches and solutions to online activism. Because otherwise it could turn into just another temporary fashion like iPods and Nintendo. And the label its detractors are putting to it, "slacktivism", could become a derogatory but very real depiction of the phenomenon. And that would be a terrible waste. It's an opportunity that shouldn't be missed.
In recent years there is hardly a profile in the social networks without at least one invitation from an e-friend to join some life-saving campaign or to at least copy-paste a touching message of social concern on your wall. Probably there isn't a single Web user who hasn't already heard of the Kony2012 phenomenon, this 30-minute video that drew attention to the crimes of Joseph Kony, the rebel leader in Central Africa. It was watched by millions of people on YouTube alone, just within a few days. Kony is now #1 in the list of most wanted people at the Hague Tribunal, he and his Lord's Resistance Army being responsible for many kidnappings, turning children into soldiers and sex slaves, and many other crimes against civilians. Although probably the loudest example of the so called digital activism so far, this campaign is far from being the only one. And its worldwide success promises even more provocative ideas coming up in the future.
Internet, Twitter and the social networks are the powerful megaphon that has revolutionised the world of NGOs. A campaign that until very recently would require months and even years to create committees, to persuade the broad public and accumulate signatures and donations, now with a single click of the "Share" button can spread around the world within days. Now we are entering the ages when public opinion, no matter how limited its understanding of complex situations, does profoundly affect the political debate. This is seen as a matter of concern by the professional experts in international relations. But on the other hand, it wasn't so long ago that scientists with PhDs used to tremble at the idea of an online encyclopedia that is collectively maintained by a horde of laymen. And yet now it is a fact, and many students use it to navigate across references in their studies.
At the opposite side of the barricade are the vocal advocates of digital activism who believe it accesses the public directly and broadly, and pushes people to action, getting people involved who otherwise are seldom moved by issues concerning the world outside of their most immediate surroundings and every-day life. They are prepared to swallow the simplified narrative, the sloganeering and the often shocking messages for the sake of raising maximum awareness on the issues that concern the largest possible public. Their opponents believe the online causes are full of dangerous naivety because of the notion that if a problem is being talked about a lot, then some cure for it would inevitably come out of all that talking. To add to that, the popularity of the marketing tricks creates a sense of a temporary fashion. And indeed, not all campaigns should be put in the same category. There are those among them that could be counter-productive and even unethical to the very cause they are allegedly supporting.
Long before Kony2012 had flooded the Internet, another campaign made history with its instant effectiveness - that of the Sudan Divestment Task Force, whose purpose is to provoke an economic boycott against Sudan because of the Darfur crisis. The campaign leaders seem to be very well versed in PR strategy. They have even put a picture of a very sweet little child from Darfur on their website, her eyes making you want to donate immediately to the cause. Everything started in 2005 when a student from the California University, Adam Sterling used a traditional form of digital activism to promote the idea of organised pressure on the largest inernational companies to stop doing business with the Sudanese government and help stop the genocide in Darfur.
Using emails and postcards, blogs and media attention, the campaign led to the passing of a special order of the US government that encouraged the states and the federal services to stop using the services of those companies who are too close to the regime in Khartoum. The initiative was adopted by more than a dozen big industrial countries. Thousands of private shareholders, including prominent US politicians, used the online filter created by this movement, to "purge" their investment portfolios, and nine large companies were forced to press Khartoum for a change of policy. The whole situation very much reminded of the international boycott against the apartheid regime here in South Africa. And it had a tremendous effect. In just a few months the Sudanese government complained that it was under siege, and it bought some pages of space for ads at the NY Times, worth a million dollars. But this counter-attack only had the opposite effect, causing more pressure to stop the genocide.
This campaign for economic boycott of Sudan shows what a great potential the social activism can have in a globalised and digitalised world. It was so effective because it used a clear message, but without simplifying a complex ethnic conflict too much. It was focused, but it didn't have the pretense to seek the absolute cure to the problem, and it did not claim to see itself as the ultimate sollution but only a small first step out of a long series of long-term measures for pacifying the region. In other words, it was everything that Kony2012 is not.
We all know how Kony2012 started. It was created by a previously obscure NGO called Invisible Children from San Diego. The video aimed to spread the word about the crimes of the rebel leader Joseph Kony and to call for the viewers to support the efforts for his capture and putting to justice. In fact Invisible Children had been carrying out this activism for years around the US universities and schools, giving lectures about the conflict in Uganda and collecting donations for the children who were victims of abduction by Kony's army. They even made a few videos that circulated around various websites, they were being presented on various TV shows and via Hulu.com, but the public attention was always minimal. And then finally, the emotional Kony2012 video struck the right chord. And people suddenly heard about a conflict they had previously never heard about.
The problem is that the complex political context and the history of Central Africa were kind of sacrificed for the sake of a message that was as simple and easy to memorise as it could be. For instance the call to support the US program that last year sent a hundred military instructors to Uganda has created the impression that a foreign intervention and pressure was the only necessary means of capturing Kony. But in this case the jungles of Central Africa and the spreading of the conflict across borders is not the only issue. The local army itself is known for its human rights abuses and is partially responsible for the rise of the rebel leader. Although it is great that the US schoolchildren now know who Joseph Kony is, we cannot expect that the effect of the campaign would end there. They might, and probably should, feel a necessity to contact their local representative in the House and insist to "do something", i.e. press for measures some of which might turn out neither desired nor too productive (as Yevgeny Morozov writes in The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom).
Digital activism is strongest in the US exactly because of the open and dynamic character of the US political system. Apart from the traditions in participating in charity and voluntary initiatives, the letters and calls to the offices of the congresspeople are also taken seriously and are quite many, so this tends to prompt the respective actions. And because of its superpower status, in the US the effect could be really enormous. This is why the skeptics are warning about possible errors of large magnitude, if politicians become too carried away and do something stupid without knowing much about the local realities in the place they are meddling into. And some of the societies in the developing world (which is often the target of this activism) are even less enthusiastic about such interventions. When the Kony2012 video was first shown in front of Ugandan public, the audience was first confused, then angry with the way the story was presented, and eventually they started throwing stones at the screen. The blogger Rosebell Kagumire even called it "Another video kind of glorifying somebody saving African children". And meanwhile many of the more efficient efforts of the local activists remain unnoticed and under-appreciated, she bitterly added.
In his book Yevgeny Morozov also warns that the digital activism cannot be a solution to every situation. He draws a parallel to his country Belarus, where the online campaigns of the recent years have probably even weakened the opposition. Instead of building an effective political organisation, it discusses strategies how to create groups in Facebook, a thing that Lukashenko's regime can only be happy about. Provocative online campaign by itself cannot bring change, it is only an element of the picture. Because change usually is a result of many political, social, economic and cultural factors and a lot of offline struggle IRL. For example during the Arab spring the opposition was organising its meetings via the Internet, but the protests themselves were happening day after day on the streets and squares.
But despite all the flaws and valid criticism and the negative reactions that caused a nervous breakdown in one of the Kony2012 creators, Jason Russell, everything shows that the online campaigns are yet to gain speed and real influence. And Kony2012 has obviously raised the bar very high, and hundreds of NGOs around the world will be looking for far more creative approaches and solutions to online activism. Because otherwise it could turn into just another temporary fashion like iPods and Nintendo. And the label its detractors are putting to it, "slacktivism", could become a derogatory but very real depiction of the phenomenon. And that would be a terrible waste. It's an opportunity that shouldn't be missed.
