Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Digital communication can also nurture connectivity, a sense of ownership, peer-
to-peer as well as people-to-people relationships and a sense of empowerment, and
have acted to counter stereotypes. However, just as visibility is mediated, there is
also a tendency for invisibility to be mediated too. Major participants to a dispute
such as the one over the highly divisive and seemingly intractable deforestation in
Tasmania described by Lester and Hutchins (2012), may ominously lead to a deliberate
decision to become invisible, to stop communicating digitally, thereby removing
politics from public screens and the public sphere, and consequently the range of
potential inputs into the decision-making process. The authors conclude: 'In a
multimodal, multichannel and multi-platform environment, the ability to
not
be seen
at strategically significant moments should be recognized as a sign and source of
power' (Lester and Hutchins, 2012: 860).
Corporate identity, brand positioning and logo awareness have made many
corporations vulnerable to net-based anti-globalization and pro-democracy campaigns.
Microsoft, Nike, Shell and BP have all experienced highly effective cyber campaigning.
Greenpeace International have been particularly adept at harnessing the mobilizing
power of new media and exploiting its affordances in effectively disseminating its
vivid image based communications. Peretti (2003) has shown how an individual
culture jammer working on a small scale can swiftly unleash a communication 'virus'
that can have serious and widespread effects. For Haiven (2007), the Vancouver-
based Adbusters groups have adopted a set of tactics reminiscent of the French
Situationists of the 1950s and 1960s, which might not have a major measurable
impact on public consciousness, but certainly do invite different and often radical
apprehensions of contemporary consumerism and so, in a way, act as a form of
critical public pedagogy. They have also been credited with inspiring the Occupy
Wall Street phenomena and its various spin-offs in major cities throughout the
world. Thus, for a number of years, as Bennett (2003: 35) has suggested, the Internet
has been emerging as 'a core resource for the growth of new global publics'. But
this global politics, which is as likely to manifest itself in a local as a global form,
is also increasingly complex and complicated. Counter-publics of both a progressive
and reactionary varieties use the Internet to engage in counter-publicity and engage
in campaign activities that some commentators see as little more than a slactivist
clicktivism (Shulman, 2009) and others recognize as being functionally equivalent
to earlier offline forms of protest - photocopied petitions, letter writing, and so on
(Karpf, 2010).
YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and many other social networking sites
offer many opportunities for personal expression, information sharing, dialogue and
action. YouTube has become a major outlet for NGO video promos, announcements
from international agencies, governments and corporations, and even though tweets,
blogs and vlogs may not in themselves create meaningful engagement or action on
the ground, they do significantly increase participation of a type (Gladwell, 2010;
Morozov, 2012). Digital-based communication such as 'eco-blogging' may have a
clear pedagogic function, especially if the Internet's technological affordances move
beyond the superficial in order to pose deeper questions about established cultural
and historical values (Tinnell, 2011). Facebook offers an e-deliberation platform that
has been used successfully by some activist groups and some progressive municipalities.
Facebook's affordances tend to enable dialogic and open-ended modes of discourse,
integrating various forms of expression and supporting wide-ranging conversation
