Slacktivism vs. Helping out

The project intervenes in the academic debate about the changing nature of activism through social media. On the one hand, it is argued that online activism results in what is called ‘slacktivism’: minor offline engagement with little impact on the situation of the people who need help (Schumann and Klein 310). This kind of activism is usually motivated by a sense of belonging to a group, rather than personal interests, and it decreases the likelihood of offline engagement such as signing a petition or joining a demonstration (Schumann and Klein 317; Kristofferson, White and Peloza 1151).

 

This sense of belonging through social media activism is illustrated by the Danish scholar Colding-Jorgensen who did an experiment in 2009 where he started an online Facebook group to petition against the tearing down of one of Copenhagen's most famous tourist sites: the Stork Fountain. The removal of the fountain was entirely fictional however, and Colding-Jorgensen made this up to see how many people would join his Facebook group (Morozov 179). In a very short time the group reached 27.500 members and this is where Colding-Jorgensen ended the experiment. He later explained the outcome of his experiment to the Washington Post as follows:  “Just like we need stuff to furnish our homes to show who we are, on Facebook we need cultural objects that put together a version of me that I would like to present to the public” (cited in Morozov 186).

 

On the other hand, it is argued that social media has a strong connective quality, which can help mobilize potential activists (Shirky 29; Fatkin and Lansdown 584). Also, it is noted that the proof for less offline engagement as a result of activism through social media is not substantial (Christensen; Fatkin and Lansdown 581). Social media increasingly become a tool for coordinating activism (Shirky 30). Although social media users cannot click (or ‘like’) their way to a better world, this does not mean that social media cannot be used effectively (Shirky 38).

 

This is where the project comes into play. HelpOut aims to connect people to official institutions on a platform where users can substantiate meaningful offline impact through their online activity.

 

Setting up a crisis platform

Creating an online platform for crisis management however, poses major challenges which HelpOut cannot ignore. For instance, ‘noise’, or spoofing of parody accounts that misinform users and helping organizations, can lead to confusion and a weaker link between those organizations and people who actually want to help out (Wan et al. 383). The threshold of spoofing on social media however, is quite high because of the so-called ‘lo-so’ (location-social) characteristic of social media. A social media user leaves his digital fingerprint (IP-address) and is part of a community with social behavior regulating capacities (Goolsby 7).

 

Another challenge that will arise within the project HelpOut concerns the politics of platforms which are described by the communication scholar Tarleton Gillespie. Within Web 2.0 platforms different constituencies (users, advertisers, legislators, shareholders etc.) with different interests have to be kept satisfied (Gillespie 352). The careful positioning of Web 2.0 platforms between these different constituencies is where the politics come into play. Facebook for instance, positions itself to its users as a social network where you are always connected to your friends. Towards advertisers Facebook positions itself as a platform of data capturing, perfect for target marketing. It must be noted however that Gillespies critique is mainly focussed on large commercial Web 2.0 platforms such as YouTube and Google.

 

HelpOut is a non-profit platform which focusses on helping out in humanitarian crises. However, also a non-profit platform like HelpOut has to carefully maneuver between the different constituencies that take an interest in the platform. The two most important constituencies that are present on the HelpOut platform are the users and the NGO’s. As for the users, HelpOut does not have to obscure data capture from users that is sold to third parties (like Facebook for instance) and therefore it can be pretty straightforward about its intentions. As for the NGO’s, it is a bit more difficult. The NGO’s have to trust the intentions of HelpOut and believe in the organizing quality of the platform. If this is not the case, NGO’s will feel that they put their reputation at risk. Another important constituency is the (local) government. Providing assistance to in HelpOuts case refugees is a delicate matter in the sense that everything that concerns refugees is also a political matter. If HelpOut is to succeed, it must take into account the political attention it will generate. This is also why HelpOut connects to NGO’s, because these organizations already have credibility, therefore it is easier to convince (local) governments of the value of HelpOut.  

 

Reference List

Christensen, Henrik Serup. “Political Activities on the Internet: Slacktivism or Political Participation by Other Means?” First Monday 16.2 (2011): n. pag. 16 Sept. 2015.

Fatkin, Jane-Marie, and Terry C. Lansdown. “Prosocial Media in Action.” Computers in Human Behavior 48 (2015): 581–586.

Gillespie, Tarleton. "The politics of ‘platforms’." New Media & Society 12.3 (2010): 347-364.

Goolsby, Rebecca. “Social Media as Crisis Platform: The Future of Community Maps/crisis Maps.” ACM Transactions on Intelligent Systems and Technology (TIST) 1.1 (2010): 1-11.

Kristofferson, Kirk, Katherine White, and John Peloza. “The Nature of Slacktivism: How the Social Observability of an Initial Act of Token Support Affects Subsequent Prosocial Action.” Journal of Consumer Research 40.6 (2014): 1149–1166.

Morozov, Evgeny. The net delusion: The dark side of Internet freedom. PublicAffairs, 2012.

Rotman, Dana, Vieweg, Sarah, Yardi, Sarita, Chi, Ed, Preece, Jenny, Shneiderman, Ben, Pirolli, Peter, Glaisyer, Tom, Tan, Desney, Begole, Bo, and Kellogg, Wendy, A. “From Slacktivism to Activism: Participatory Culture in the Age of Social Media.” Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI '11 Extended Abstracts (2011): 819-22.

Schumann, Sandy, and Olivier Klein. “Substitute or Stepping Stone? Assessing the Impact of Low Threshold Online Collective Actions on Offline Participation: Substitute or Stepping Stone?” European Journal of Social Psychology 45.3 (2015): 308–322.

Shirky, Clay. “The political power of social media.” Foreign affairs 90.1 (2011): 28-41.

Wan, Koh, Ong, and Pang. “Parody Social Media Accounts: Influence and Impact on Organizations during Crisis.” Public Relations Review 41.3 (2015): 381-85.