Is "Slacktivism" a form of civic engagement?

The following article I found on the website of the Pittsburg Post-Gazette raises great questions about something I like to call "fake activism." It is activism in the sense that one who participates is actively making a statement but it is fake in the sense that the statement has no effect on any policy or government action. A few years ago, there were several on-line petitions that went around but never were sent to anyone, they just accumulated names and made the signers feel connected to each other. Please read the article. I will likely present my thoughts in a subsequent post. Slacktivism emerges as questionable online way to support causes

Thursday, December 30, 2010

By Carolyn Davis, Philadelphia Inquirer

Victoria Joseph noticed recently that many of her Facebook friends were changing their profile picture to a favorite childhood cartoon character. The effort, some online explanations said, was to show support for child-abuse prevention.

The University of Pennsylvania student estimates that 40 percent of her 800 Facebook friends obliged and became part of the cartoon cascade that officially ended Dec. 6. But not Ms. Joseph, a 21-year-old senior.

"I thought it was just unnecessary," she said. "At the end of the day, what does changing your profile picture even mean?"

Minimally, it means you worship Wilma Flintstone or dote on Underdog. Its impact on the cause celebre, however, is blurrier than the Road Runner whizzing past Wile E. Coyote.

This type of crusading has become so common online that a word has been coined for it -- slacktivism. It's not a term of endearment. Definition: Activism, often done on a computer, that requires a slacker's amount of effort and is of questionable effectiveness.

Why raise money doing a breast cancer walk when you can easily update your Facebook status with the color of your bra? (That Facebook meme happened in January.) Maybe you wanted to encourage Iran's prodemocracy demonstrators last year. To show your support, all you had to do was tint your Twitter avatar green or add to it a virtual green ribbon.

It's not that low-impact activism is new. For years we've sat in traffic and read a bumper crop of bumper stickers proclaiming drivers' concern for the rain forest, support for a political candidate, or pride in little Eddie or Emma making the school honor roll. Walk down the street and you'll see people making statements with T-shirts and rubber wristbands.

But social-media websites up the ante by expanding the audience exponentially for a fraction of the effort. Without getting off the sofa, you instantly can tell your friends about your pet topic. If you want to get involved in a cause but don't know how, you can follow the lead of those who have mentioned their pursuits on Facebook, Twitter or MySpace. No research needed.

"You can make the case that slacktivism is important because it makes people feel affiliated to a movement and be part of it, and talk about it," said Ethan Zuckerman, a fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for Future Civic Media.

Associating ourselves with people and places helps us define our place in the world, says Patricio Abinales, a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington.

"It's social bonding," Mr. Abinales said. "You have the feeling you're not alone."

The flip side is that taming a complicated problem such as child abuse requires moving beyond bonding -- and that is where these Internet campaigns may fall short.

"The question is: How do you get from affiliation to deeper involvement?" Mr. Zuckerman said.

Some experts say slacktivism has the potential to do more harm than good -- that exerting a single, simple effort could make people complacent when otherwise they might have become more active.

Mass online actions also can dilute the heft of a campaign because they suggest a weak commitment on the part of the people involved.

"The easier it is to show support for the cause, the more easily [the action] is dismissed," said Harvard University's Tom Sander, who studies civic engagement as executive director of the Saguaro Seminar at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.

When Dr. Sander worked in Washington for Democratic Massachusetts Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, it was common lore among legislative staffers that e-petitions "signed" online were not taken as seriously as ones that bore actual signatures. The same was true for letters in which writers cut and pasted their messages from a master copy on the Internet, he says.

Sometimes, inaction can be lucrative. One of slacktivism's proudest moments may have been this month when a group of celebrities, including Lady Gaga, Alicia Keys and Justin Timberlake, earned money to help children with HIV/AIDS in Africa and India by doing nothing. Starting Dec. 1, World AIDS Day, they pronounced themselves digitally dead.

"That means no more Twitter or Facebook updates from any of them," said the effort's website. "No more knowing where they are, what they had for dinner. ... Every single dollar helps Keep a Child Alive [Ms. Keys' nonprofit] fight this terrible disease. And when $1 million is reached, everyone will be back online and tweeting in no time."

On Dec. 6, the campaign said it had reached its goal.

Though stunts like that won't work for everyone, experts say it's up to people and organizations to figure out how to harness social media's potential -- and drop the slack from slacktivism.

To dismiss the trend, said Mr. Zuckerman, doesn't acknowledge that it's "a really interesting way of starting to get people involved."

First published on December 30, 2010 at 12:00 am

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10364/1114281-454.stm#ixzz19cZ0qLMD

Should Legal Literacy Efforts Consider Non-Western Approahes to the Law

source of consideration: The Malaysian Star. See: http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?col=reflectingonthelaw&file=/2010/12/29/columnists/reflectingonthelaw/7691447&sec=Reflecting%20On%20The%20Law Shad Saleem Faruqi's December 29, 2010 piece in the Malaysian Star deserves some attention. His piece is titled "Reflecting on the Law" and it argues that most law books in Malaysia tend to discuss law from a Western perspective rather than an Asian one. He argues that the "structure and content of our courses, the choice of core subjects, the categories of thought, the fundamentals, the methods of analysis and research... [and more]....all remain Western [as if they were] universal." As I shall discuss, while Faruqi's point has merit on its own, it also should be considered from the perspective of teaching about the law to those uneducated about the law.

He points out that legal philosphy courses tend to ignore Islamic, Chinese, or Hindu thinkers, He identifies the following examples of important but ignored texts: The Mahabharata, the Arthashastra, the Book of Mencius, Analects of Confucious, the the treatises of Ibn Khaldun Ghazali, Ibn Rushd, Mulla Sadra, Jose Rizal, Benoy Kumar Sarkar, Yanagita Kunio and Naquib al-Attas. I would add the Talmud as a great legal codification that deserves consideration in the accumilation of world legal philosophies. Our author identifes several ways of looking at the law that is missed by this Western-centric approach. For instance, in the Western approach, according to the author, the law is seen as an excercise of political soverignty rather than an excercise of culture, religion, or morality. Another unique aspect of the West is the rigid distinction between crime and tort. Our author further points out that the distinction between rights and duties in public and private are are also Western oriented. According to our author, the Eastern approach is more holistic. Our author's primary point seems to be how eastern texts are good sources from which to learn legal concepts cherished in the west, For instance, he writes "Prophet Muhammad’s sermon at Arafat is one of the world’s greatest human rights declarations. More than 1,400 years ago he spoke about liberty and property, racial equality, women’s rights and the ruler’s subjection to the law." He also points out that in Islamic criminal proces there is a legal presumption of innocence. He makes other similar points. The East is not the only non-Europeans sources of law which are commonly ignored. Many of the legal concepts which the West tend to believe were invented in the 18th and 19th centuries do not date back only to Islam but date back to the pre-Christian era Hebrew/Jewish culture--and may ever date back further than this. However, while Faruqi's points seem to be targed to the formal legal education world such as law schools, I think we who are concerned about educating the public about the law should take his comments to heart. As a lawyer who spends a fair amount of his time teaching non-lawyers about the law. When I started, I didn't fully appreciate what legal concepts were obvioius to all and which ones were obvious to me only because I had legal training in a western style law school. For instance, as a western-educated lawyer, the distinction between crime and tort seems natural to me, but when I educate non-lawyers, I become painfully aware that the distinction only seems natural to me because of my legal education. Although it is obvious to all that the executive brances of their governments are responsible for trying to seek remedies and punishments for certain types of crimes likes assaults and murder, it is not always obvious why the executive branch of the government is not interested in getting involved in disputes such as employment discrimination and defamation. Wrongs like theft and embezzlement can fit in either category, depending on the circumstance -- an opportunity for the most educated of laymen to get confused. Another examples is the distinction between a moral wrong and a legal wrong. In America, most employment is "at will," meaning that an employee has the right to resign his or her employment, an the employer has the right to terminate its employee regardless of motivation--unless it is an unlawful motivation. As an attoney who advises employees of their rights, I am often saying "your employer has clearly acted immorally and unethically; you were clearly wronged in many ways, but the employer did not violate the law in this situation." Those of us who educate the public would do well to appreciate the distinctive features of the legal system in which we operate. We need to understand that the legal presumptions we hold dear are often distinctive and are not obvious to our clients and students. Study of non-western legal systems would provide western lawyers with some perspective. When our appreciation of our own legal system is uniquely western-centric, it is much harder to teach those who do not share our same legal presumptions because we fail to articulate those presumptions. When we have perspective, teaching is easier because it is easier to issue-spot those presumptions.

A Festival For Democracy Could Make Democracy Cool

There are two crucial features required for any institution or government to become or remain democratic. The first element is constitutional, namely the governing structure must adequately provide for opportunities for citizens and members to have a say in the institution's decision-making, and must provide reasonable opportunities for citizens or members to exercise their rights within the institution. The second element is social, also known as cultural. In other words, for an institution to become or remain democratic, there must a legal structure that provides opportunities for citizens to engage in democratic activities, and there must be social or cultural factors that encourage such democratic engagement. When either element is missing the relevant institution cannot be democratic. Thus, one of the challenges faced among those seeking to advance democracy in the world is to make democracy an essential aspect of normative culture. It is not enough to advocate for laws that provide for the right to democratic activism and engagement if the population is no so driven. If one reads into the history of democratic communities, one repeatedly comes across the notion of the public square. Although it is discussed figuratively today, along with the notion of the "marketplace of ideas", there was a time when the market was a place for people of varying social classes and viewpoints to interact and exchange ideas. When one goes to the mall today, one simply does not have the opportunity to replicate the experience. When one goes to city-wide festivals like Artscape in Baltimore or the Taste of Chicago in Chicago, one rarely finds activist and volunteer organizations alongside the sale of hot dogs and showcasing of paintings and pottery. In fact, if one examines the activity calendars of most of the "city papers" in the country, one does not normally or necessarily see activist or volunteer opportunities advertised alongside the latest plays, concerts and arts festivals. [The Philadelphia city paper (at least its online edition) seems to be a notable exception from what I can tell.] This is a shame, and should be corrected. In my bold opinion, there is something curious and ironic that in a country where "robust debate in the public square" is an essential aspect of its self-image, most public squares are devoid of robust public debate. A logical mechanism for correcting this problem would be to bring the pubic debate to the already existing public forum. When I envisioned this piece, I envisioned that I would advocate for a festival that featured booths of numerous activist and communal organizations. The image in my head was for attendees to walk through booths of organizations throughout the political and social spectrum. It would also be fairly interesting for representatives of divergent political organizations to be thrust in a room together to speak to the same potential members. Now, however, as I think about festivals such as Artscape, Taste of Chicago, and other city-wide festivals featuring great art, great music, and numerous people, it strikes me that the more logical approach would be for organizers of these festivals to encourage and allow community associations, non-profit associations, and non-profit service organizations to be permitted space in festivities to advance their causes and showcase their services. I further believe that this is of such communal importance that these organizations should be permitted to participate in these festivals without the need to derive appearance fees analogous to those entities looking to turn a profit. Think about how this would enhance the community festivals that surround the fourth of July--a holiday clearly intended to advance our nation's democratic cause. Imagine how the national discussion would be enhanced so well by the incorporation of our national dialogues into our social experiences. To me, this is the logical way to make our democratic visions come alive. The notion of making civic engagement more connected to our cultural festivities is not unique to this author. In September 2010, a major national arts project aiming to make civic engagement and the Austrailian constitution "cool". One connected effort is a "ride for democracy" where 70 motorcycle riders will ride accross the nation urging the advancement of civic education. The articles I have not read about this have not specified how this advancement will work, but clearly the objective is to connect the social experience of motorcycle riding with the social experience of being part of a national community. Another such example that might be more directly on point is development of mobile legal clinics in Nepal. Hoping to address the lack of knowledge of legal rights and access to mechanisms to address those rights by those in Nepal's rural communities, the A2J project has established 18 free mobile legal clinics, affecting people in Sarlahi, Mahottari, and Rautahat, along with the distribution of legal literacy booklets in local languages. Information distributed includes information concerning rights concerning marriage, caste discrimination, domestic violence and other similar areas of the law. According to one article I read, thees clinics have greatly assisted access to the legal community and legal remedies by otherwise marginalized and disadvantaged communities. Alternatively stated, these clinics have had the cultural affect of making certain members of the community realize their rights and opportunity to act on them.