Natalie Pang

Social media and citizen engagement: A meta-analytic review

This meta-analytic study reviews empirical research published from 2007 to 2013 with an aim of providing robust conclusions about the relationship between social media use and citizen engagement. It includes 22 studies that used self-reported measures of social media use and participation, with a total of 116 relationships/effects. The results suggest that social media use generally has a positive relationship with engagement and its three sub-categories, that is, social capital, civic engagement, and political participation. More specifically, we find small-to-medium size positive relationships between expressive, informational, and relational uses of social media and the above indicators of citizen engagement. For identity- and entertainment-oriented uses of social media, our analyses find little evidence supporting their relationship with citizen engagement.

Protesting the Singapore government

This study engages collective action framing theory to examine the strategies employed by Singaporeans, rarely seen on the front lines of politics, on social media to organize a protest against the governments immigration policy. It addresses critical and theoretical questions on the formation and dynamics of collective action frames on social media, and the implications for social movements. An analysis of 1805 posts and comments on blogs and Facebook leading up to the May 1, 2013 protest reveals that while organizers and protestors resonated in their development of diagnostic, prognostic and motivational frames, they placed different emphasis on the frames. This variable use of frames helps explain that while the protest was successful in mobilizing thousands to the outdoor site, it was not able to sustain the movement demanding immigration reform.

Social media, political expression, and participation in Confucian Asia

This study reviews and analyzes the published empirical research on the role of social media in promoting political expression and participation in Confucian Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan. In addition to providing a narrative review of the literature, our analyses show clear numerical estimates of the relationships among different types of social media use (i.e., informational, expressive, relational, and recreational), political expression, and participation in Confucian states. The findings reiterate the importance of the expressive use of social media, showing its moderately strong relationship with participation. The findings also show weak positive relationships with informational and relational uses. We also examine the role of political systems in these relationships and conclude that the strongest relationships are in democratic states, followed by hybrid and authoritarian systems.

Are we all here for the same purpose? Social media and individualized collective action

Purpose – Building on studies examining the role of social media in contemporary forms of collective action and social movements, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the link between prior informational use of social media and individualized collective action. Design/methodology/approach – In total, 220 participants were surveyed in real-time during a protest against overpopulation in Singapore. Findings – Social media use was significant in disseminating information about the protest, and reflecting perceived personal relevance for specific issues. The authors found mixed motivations for attending the protest, significantly shaped by social proximity to organizers and personal relevance. Originality/value – The authors address research gaps in the link between social media use and individualized collective action, and real-time data collection during a protest. It is often difficult to study this link, given that social media may not be always the only platform used prior to a protest by particip...

Can blogs function as rhetorical publics in Asian democracies? An analysis using the case of Singapore

764 blog posts posted during the 2011 Singapore General Election were analyzed.Blogs function as weak publics to surface otherwise excluded discourse.In developing norms as rhetorical publics, they facilitate discursive conversations.Through such exchanges, community norms are established amongst bloggers. Social media platforms such as blogs have been said to improve and expand the potential of the Internet in enabling open access to political discourse. Yet several factors may undermine such potential, even in a place like Singapore, where Internet penetration and usage of social media are high. Participation remains fragmented, with certain groups more active than others, raising questions on the viability of the Internet as a public sphere. The context and conditions under which online publics function provide important basis for understanding the use of social media, yet this has often been overlooked. We examine the use of blogs in Singapore as sites for discursive exchanges, civic engagement, and community construction, and discuss the sustainability of blogs as multiple publics in a functioning Asian democracy.

The Impacts of Mobile Social Media on Collective Action: Two Case Studies from Singapore and Indonesia

The increased adoption of mobile devices and the pervasiveness of mobile social media lead to the pressing need for more empirical research to understand the use and impacts of mobile social media in Asia. In this chapter, two cases of mobile social media use will be presented as examples of collective action. The first case is a comparative analysis of mobile social media against other modalities of sharing information about a protest in Singapore. The second case focused on how peace activists used mobile social media to promote peace in response to past conflicts in Indonesia. These two cases highlight salient issues and challenges of researching mobile social media for political communication in Asian countries. Implications for future research are drawn.