TOOLS BEYOND CONTROL: PRIVATE INFORMATION INTERMEDIARIES AND THE WORK OF ADVOCACY ORGANIZATIONS

Advocacy organizations have come to rely heavily on a new generation of private information intermediaries that have become synonymous with the contemporary Internet. In the field of Internet governance, private information intermediaries have been defined as “private systems that do not provision actual content but rather facilitate information or financial transactions among those who provide and access content” (DeNardis, 2014, p. 153). There private information intermediaries can increasingly determine how citizens and activists engage politically online through the technical architectures and policies they choose to implement—a phenomenon that can often disrupt the work of activists. Based on 16 in-depth interviews with present and former online strategists at several U.S. climate change and environmental advocacy organizations, this paper addresses the strategic importance and uses that online strategists assign to different types of private information intermediaries; their experiences using these tools and their responses to such experiences; and their perceived need to use these intermediaries to conduct their work and ability to use alternative tools

Tools Beyond Control: Social Media and the Work of Advocacy Organizations

Advocacy organizations rely on social media services, such as Facebook and Twitter, to engage their supporters. These services increasingly influence how citizens and advocacy organizations engage politically online through the technical features and policies they choose to implement—a phenomenon that can sometimes disrupt the work of advocates. Interviews with digital strategists at several US advocacy organizations revealed low levels of awareness of this phenomenon, despite its potential impact on their work; substantial dependence on these services for advocacy work; and a shared sense of necessity to embrace these tools, despite their potential downsides. Implications for the scholarship and practice of Internet governance and digitally mediated advocacy are discussed

Visualizing the Paris Climate Talks on Twitter: Media and Climate Stakeholder Visual Social Media During COP21

In 2015, meeting in Paris for the Conference of the Parties (COP21), representatives of 195 nations set an ambitious goal to reach net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by mid-century. This research uses the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which took place in Paris during 30 November to 11 December 2015, as a case study of Twitter coverage of the talks by mainstream and alternative media outlets and other climate stakeholders, including activists and fossil fuel industry groups. It compares the British Guardian with other media and climate stakeholders’ visual framing of climate change on Twitter during COP21, because the publication had launched an advocacy campaign in March 2015 promoting fossil fuel divestment in the lead-up to COP21. Findings show that individual activists and movement organizations functioned similarly in climate change visual framing in Twitter posts, as did individual and organizational multinational representatives and scientific experts. The news media categories varied by type of news organization. The major outliers were the fossil fuel industry and trade association accounts. Industry stakeholders largely focused on former US President Barack Obama’s climate policy, promoting the perception of a lack of domestic support for his climate policies in their visual Twitter postings