Conference Paper

The Role of Social Media in Participatory Democracy: A Case Study of Facebook Groups

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Text/Conference Paper

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Date

2016

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Source

Proceedings of the 2016 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

Abstract

This dissertation investigates three Facebook groups as case studies of the role of social media in enhancing participatory democracy. I argue that the groups were formed to provide avenues for articulating discourses that are counter to the dominant voices of their societies. The study posits that in stratified societies there typically emerges a dominant hegemonic public opinion, which is inimical to the needs, hopes, desires, and aspirations of subordinate classes. The key research question I ask is: How are these groups using social media to build and articulate identities that question the dominant public opinion about issues that have traditionally been controlled by a hegemonic voice?

Description

Gachau, James Ngetha (2016): The Role of Social Media in Participatory Democracy: A Case Study of Facebook Groups. Proceedings of the 2016 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work. DOI: 10.1145/2957276.2997020. Association for Computing Machinery. pp. 467–472. Sanibel Island, Florida, USA

Keywords

social media , public opinion , hegemony , participatory democracy , social identity , counterpublics. , mass , public sphere

Citation

DOI

10.1145/2957276.2997020

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GROUP 2016