new media, new civics

New Media, New Civics?Ethan Zuckerman (@ethanz), MIT Center for Civic Media

Oxford Internet Institute,December 6, 2013

“Thank you, Facebook” – Tahrir Square (Reuters)

visualization by Elena Agapie

civics in crisis

48% of US adults take part in a civic activity39% spoke out using offline methods34% spoke out using online methods39% engaged in some political activity via SNS

Online users don’t distinguish betweenonline and offline action

What correlates to civic participationis socioeconomic status

112th Congress10% approval61 bills passed

of 3914 proposed

If young people are disenchanted with politics, rightly or wrongly, how do we help them become

effective civic actors?

Are we bad citizens in an old paradigm,or inept citizens in a new one?

participatory civics

$818m raised

4.9 million backers

civiccrowdfunding

civics is passionate

thin thick

voice

instrumental

thin thick

voice

instrumental

thin thick

voice

instrumental

thin thick

voice

instrumental

The Dream Nine

Brennan Novak

Smári McCarthy

Bjarni Einarsson

Carmen Rios

Khalida BrohiSughar Center

norms

code

markets

laws

norms

code

markets

laws

thin thick

voice

instrumental

thin thick

voice

instrumental

Voice leads to (instrumental) engagement

image by John D. Fisher

Voice begets voice

image by John D. Fisher

Voice sets agenda

image by John D. Fisher

Voice builds movements

image by John D. Fisher

thin thick

voice

instrumental

Zeynep Tufekçi

“Sen de Gel” – “You, too, come”

interlocking public

the pointillist public sphere

Civics is changing. How do we help the young people like those inspired by The Hunger Games use digital tools

to become participatory, passionate and effective civic actors?

thanks!@ethanz

ethanz@mit.edu