Social Media’s Role in the Recent Venezuelan Elections

In October of 2012, Venezuela experienced one of its most imperative elections in history. Due to the approval of his amendment to the Venezuelan constitution that abolished term limits, the Socialist president Hugo Chávez was able to run for reelection. His rivaling opponent, Henrique Capriles Radonski, lost by 11 points, but mounted one of the fiercest challenges during the late president’s 14 years in power. The elections showed a historically high turnout, above 80% of the electorate, in a country where voting is not mandatory. Playing a huge role in the voting turnout, and in the ultimate outcome of the elections, was social media.

The article “Social Media Brings Changes to the Venezuelan Election,” (http://tinyurl.com/Social-Media-in-Vzlan-Election) presents evidence pointing to the widespread use of social media by both candidates to garner support for their respective campaigns. According to the piece, “12 million Venezuelans, or 47% of the population, surf the internet, making it one of the most connected countries in Latin America.” While Chávez maintained his historical control over the state media and used it to secure a third term, he also expanded his electronic reach to Twitter, with 3.3 million followers—2.2 million more than Capriles. Because Capriles’ campaign was mainly targeting youth middle class votes, however, he used social media more aggressively, expanding his presence “by using Facebook, YouTube and the photo-sharing website Instagram.” He even went as far as to create a Blackberry smartphone App for his campaign. While the article claims that Capriles managed to get more re-tweets than Chávez, his opponent still won the election.

Personally, I believe that while social media may have played a larger role in increasing voter turnout and widening the support networks of both candidates than it has in the past, it still could not orchestrate the final outcome of the election. After all, Chávez was infamous for his massive following made up of predominantly poor, lower-class citizens; and these citizens were most likely not the ones deciding who they were going to vote for based on their Twitter feed, because, quite frankly, they probably do not even have Twitters, or mobile phones for that matter. Nonetheless, the explosion of social media in the Venezuela’s historic October election definitely indicates that leaders around the world have taken notice of the power that this medium holds.

Jared Cohen: Top 40 ICT4D Professionals Under 40

Devex is the world’s largest community of aid and development professionals. The organization, which delivers business information and recruitment services to the international development community, recently released its list of the Top 40 International Development Leaders Under 40. The selection criterion for the list was based on each individual’s impact on the development agenda along with his or her impact on development results. In order to receive a nomination, the professional had to have been based out of Washington DC, and each had to be under the age of 40. Despite their youth, these leaders have made significant advances in the ICT4D world and deserve to be recognized for their contributions to society. Among these leaders are some that we have encountered over the course of the semester, like Wayan Vota, and many more that we have not. One leader that caught my eye was Jared Cohen, a public policy expert, social media adviser, and director of Google Ideas.

Jared Cohen was born in Weston, Connecticut. As a child, Jared’s family vacationed in Africa, which is when Cohen’s interest in development first began. Cohen took a 5-week service trip to Tanzania during High School and went on to receive political science and history degrees with a minor in African Studies. Cohen later studied as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University where he received his master’s degree in international relations. During college, Cohen held an internship for the US State Department that landed him a full time position as the youngest Member of the Secretary of State’s Policy Planning Staff- he was only 24 years old. After being kept on the Policy Planning Committee by Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, Cohen began to shape counter-radicalization strategies while advising on US policy in Iran and the Middle East. Cohen traveled extensively throughout the Middle East, where he interviewed Hezbollah and al-Qaida terrorists to better understand the nature and root causes of radicalization.

In April of 2009, Cohen started leading technology delegations that focused on connecting technology executives with local stakeholders in countries such as Iraq, Russia, Mexico, Congo, and Syria. Shortly after undertaking this position in technology delegations, Cohen played an instrumental role that marked the turning point in technology’s role in disrupting the status quo. During the 2009 reelection of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, thousands of Iranian were taking to Twitter to protest. At this time, the Twitter server was scheduled to be shut down for scheduled server maintenance. However, Cohen changed that with one phone call to Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey, in which he requested that the popular micro-blogging site stay running. Cohen argued that because many other outlets had been blocked or shut down by the government, Twitter was one of the few ways for people inside of Iran to get information to the outside world. He considered it an important way for people around the world to join the protests and convinced Dorsey that this was the proper decision. This phone called essentially changed the course of the Iranian election.

After working for the State Department for a number of years, Cohen left the position to take on a new task as the director and founder of the new think/do tank, Google Ideas. Says Cohen: “We need to move towards providing tools and creating space for local people to develop local solutions.” Google Ideas focuses on places in the developing world where challenges are significant, technology solutions are underexplored, and Google can make an impact. The focus areas include counter-radicalization, illicit networks and fragile states.

In addition to his professional roles, Cohen has authored numerous publications and has appeared on different media outlets. Cohen’s book, Children of Jihad, won a spot on the “Best Books of 2007” list. He has appeared as a guest on CNN, BBC, The Colbert Report, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, and many more. It will be interesting to see the impact that Cohen and Google Ideas will have on the world in the years to come.

Crowd-sourcing and the Ukrainian Elections

After learning about crowd-sourcing from our guest lecturer I began to research other ways in which it can be used for development. I came across an article from the Washington Post titled, “Can crowd-sourcing keep corruption at bay?“

The article discusses how high corruption rates in Ukraine are threatening to affect the country’s upcoming parliamentary elections. The fairness of this election is going to help other nations decide whether or not Ukraine has a democracy, and it will determine many agreements, like trade, between Ukraine and the European Union. The country was dropped down to a ranking of “Partly Free” by the democracy organization Freedom House in 2011. Freedom House has also stated that corruption is the number one threat to Ukrainian democracy.

According to an OSCE Election Observation report, as of October 19 there had already been abuse of administrative resources, violent threats towards campaign workers, and several more reports of other campaign violations. In order to reduce corruption during the campaign, one organization has created a plan to use everyday citizens to make a most honest election.

The organization is ElectUA, and they have created a crowd-sourcing system that allows citizens to submit reports of violations. As you can see on the map in the article, there have already been over 1,000 reports submitted. The red dots on the map represent confirmed cases of violation, and the blue dots are reported cases not yet confirmed.

I think this is an incredible way to use crowd-sourcing as a means of fostering development. If Ukraine can have a fair election with little to no corruption, they have the potentially to be raised to democratic status. This would mean a lot for the political development of the country and its international relationships. This is another great example of how a crowd-sourcing technique is fostering development.

The Revolution Will be Micro-blogged

I joined twitter in the summer of 2009 for one reason: the protests in Iran. Go ahead, check my profile @JoelTurman. My profile picture still has the green shading I gave it as a show of solidarity with the Iranian people. Since then I’ve tweeted a few things a followed some funny and interesting people, but the social media platform was never as fascinating as when it documented a national movement in real time.

If you do not recall Iran in 2009, Ahmadinejad had just “won” reelection and many, especially the younger generation, accused the regime of corruption and election rigging. Crowds took to the streets in droves well into late summer, and unrest continues to linger today. What became so enthralling about the protests besides the bravery and dedication of the people in standing up to their government was that they were documented in real-time by young students throughout Tehran who posted to Twitter. Some of the more prolific bloggers include @oxfordgirl and @persiankiwi.

As I mowed lawns that summer, I recall checking my phone often to see what was happening on the other side of the world. I could be on the front lines of the movement, witnessing the struggle and perseverance of a people without relying on the television to tell me how to feel about it. Twitter has a lot of potential to be a microphone for narcissists, but it aslo can be a platform for those outside of the state and the media to make their struggle known.

Social Media and Revolution

One of the most interesting aspects of ICT4D to me is the effect of social media on development, especially political movements and development.  Personally, I am not a big user of social media and am not very fluent in it.  For that matter, I’m not very good with technology in general.  However, I still think that examining the role of tech, including social media, today is a crucial aspect in understanding development processes and in creating effective programs for the future.

I think one of the most obvious, as well as the most intriguing, examples of social media and its role in development is the case of Egypt and its 25 January revolution.  It’s known around the world that much of the organization and collaboration that was necessary to create such a huge crowd in Tahrir Square, the center of Cairo, was achieved through Facebook and Twitter.  Especially for the youth in Cairo, it was much easier to spread messages and plan events over Facebook and other social media outlets.  As an example of just how large a role social media played in the Egyptian Revolution, it is interesting to look at the most common words and phrases that were posted worldwide on Facebook and Twitter in the first quarter of 2011: Egypt, January 25, Libya, Bahrain, and demonstration.

Even before the mass realization that social media had such a huge cultural and political influence both domestically and worldwide, there have been been many studies, forums, and conventions about social media and its effect on today’s global climate.  Cairo itself has a yearly convention called Cairo ICT Summit.  One of their main focuses for the 2012 summit, which will occur on 26-29 April of this year, is social media and how it has affected (and will continue to affect) politics and development around the world, and especially in Egypt and other Arab countries.

The Cairo Summit this year will have many groups and individuals speaking and answering questions.  Two individuals in particular, Ahmed Sabry and Ahmed Rayan, both Internet experts, have much to say about Facebook and other social media outlets and how they played such a large role in both Egypt’s and other Arab countries’ recent uprisings.

One reason why social media outlets were so effective, says Sabry, is because they are actually much more credible than traditional media outlets such as TV, the newspaper, and the radio.  I found this surprising, but Sabry backed his statement up with some compelling arguments.  He said that several studies (which, unfortunately I could not locate on my own) had said that, in the Arab countries where they were conducted,) general public confidence in media outlets was about 15-16%.  On the other hand, these studies found out that people’s confidence in the credibility of posts on Facebook were about 70%.  There are several reasons for this discrepancy in faith.  The most important, according to Sabry, is the fact that what people post on social networks is done completely of their own volition; on the other hand, people who speak on the news or in commercials are advised by their superiors on what to say and are also inclined to say certain things because that is how they make money.

Another reason why people apparently find social media more credible in spreading information about government and human rights issues is because their “friends” or the people they “follow” on Facebook or Twitter (or on other social media sites) are people they trust and respect, whereas most people have no personal relation to or inherent trust of people on TV or other media sources, or even government speakers and employees.  This is exacerbated by the fact that in many Arab countries, oppressive regimes have much control of most aspects of their citizens’ rights, including the media and what information it puts out.

In my opinion, Egypt provides for an interesting case study on social media, a concept we have not talked about in class yet but one that I’m sure we will, and how great of an impact it can have on development.  This one case that I have mentioned focuses specifically on political change and development, but by interlinking people from different areas and classes of cities, countries, and even the world, I think we could find ways in which social media will eventually have the power to make change in cultural, economic, and other areas of development in the future.

ICT4Peace and Humanitarian Aid

ICT4Peace is a humanitarian organization that began in Switzerland. The ICT for Peace Foundation aims to “enhance the performance of the international community in crisis management through the application of Information Communications Technology – technologies that can facilitate effective and sustained communication between peoples, communities and stakeholders involved in crisis management, humanitarian aid and peace-building”. The use of ICT for humanitarian aid is not a new approach, but should be examined more carefully. There are countless benefits that can come from the use of ICT in disaster response, humanitarian aid and peace-building. ICT4Peace has worked with the Ushahidi foundation in the past (http://www.ushahidi.com). One of the more recent projects that the ICT4Peace foundation took part in was in the recent elections in Tunisia. The Arab Spring destroyed the political structure of Tunisia and other Arab nations. Tunisia, like many of these nations, are currently trying to rebuild their government based on a democracy. For a nation that had been under control of a dictatorship for decades, democratic elections are an extremely new concept and can sometimes be scary. The people do not know what to expect; however, in order for a new political body to be formed, the elections must be carried out successfully. The first ever democratic elections for Tunisia took place on October 23, 2011. Wtih the invitation of the Tunisian “Higher Independent Election Committee” and aid from Ushahidi, ICT4Peace created an online monitoring platform for the election called “Carte de Controle du Processus Electorale”. The program used 850 trained reporters throughout Tunisia that reported back to the headquarters giving updates, reports and observations of the progress of the election. The information was verified and placed on a map that all people could access and track the election progress in their area and in the nation as a whole. This program is only one of the many humanitarian projects ICT4Peace has contributed to. The use of ICTs can make the people of a nation feel more comfortable and at ease about change after disaster. The ICT4Peace Foundation is one good example of the proper use of ICTs for humanitarian aid and the impact they can have on the peace-making and rebuilding of a nation.

 

http://ict4peace.org

Election Day Map: http://ict4peace.org/updates/monitoring-tunisias-first-election-ict4peace-foundation-instance-superieure-independante-pour-les-elections

Election Monitoring & Censorship in Cyberspace

Two articles I saw this week that relate to last week’s topic of e-government and e-governance:

1. Technology in Election Monitoring

Technology in general, and ICTs in particular, have the potential to play a key role in ensuring free and fair elections in countries where there have traditionally been cases of election fraud and rigged voting processes. This blog post gives examples of countries such as Lebanon, Benin, and Nigeria where there are either (or both) election concerns or applications of technology to better collect votes and ensure accuracy. The post also discusses a recent study on photos taken during elections at polling stations in Afghanistan to see if the presence of “monitoring” affected the level of voting fraud, finding that it reduced the incidence of theft or damaging of election materials from 18.9% to 11.8%, and affected voting counts.

2. Security, Identity, and Resistance in Asian Cyberspace

Source: Zunia.org blog

This new report put out by MIT includes a series of chapters on a variety of issues surrounding cyberspace/internet in Asia, including Malasian bloggers, Burmese opposition media, and regulations in Thailand. There is also a very interesting chapter on censorship and surveillance in China. Worth reading for anyone studying Asian countries or interested in censorship and internet freedom or cyber-regulation. Original report can be downloaded here.

Elections and Twitter in China

Originally Posted: September 20, 2011 2:19:05 PM CDT
By: Eliza Arnold

I found this article (Tweeting to Electoral Victory In China? Maybe Not by: Louisa Lim) on NPR’s website (you can also listen to it on ‘all things considered’) and I think it shows another side to the impact of information technology for development. Information and communication technology for development does not have to refer only to developing countries, but can also be very useful in the development of free speech in authoritarian governments. This article talks about the impact twitter has had on the ability of chinese citizens to run for government elections. The chinese government closely manages the internet, but with sites like Twitter and Weibo, which are more mobile and harder to track, many citizens have been able to run as independent candidates for elections.