FBI recently turned to Facebook for help with its investigation into what had happened at the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, when the US Ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, was killed in the September 11, 2012 attack [along with US Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith, US embassy security personnel Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, plus two other Americans and seven Libyans injured. – Ed.].
This extraordinary investigatory approach was further proof that the Facebook era had come to pass. Facebook, Inc. was founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg, then a 20-year-old Harvard student [along with his fellow students Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes]. Forbes places him 25th among the most influential persons in the political domain, and 35th among the wealthiest men of the world. According to Global Intelligence for the Digital Transition, Facebook dominated 126 out of 137 countries in June 2012, with Russia, other CIS countries, and China still having rival companies.
In October, Facebook announced that it had one billion active users, almost one half of the known Internet users. Considering that Facebook’s user growth rate has been increasing by five percent a month, practically all Internet users will have logged in by the end of 2013.
Facebook impresses one not only by its business achievements. Recent events in the world are proof that this project, originally planned as a social networking service, has become a strong political force capable of altering the course of history. Let me cite several examples.
First. Facebook, Inc. is turning into the most capacious means of political communications and administration. It is being actively used by American senators, congressmen, governors, mayors, state departments, and agencies that want to determine political priorities. Lawmakers are using Facebook sites to discuss bills with the electorate and analyze their responses to make adequate decisions.
Facebook’s role as a daily plebiscite tool was dramatically evident during the last Obama vs. Romney presidential campaign, with both candidates actively using Facebook resources, including family photos and heart-warming stories to win more votes, encouraging Facebook users to continue discussing their action plans.
Facebook helped Barack Obama and Mitt Romney convey their messages to millions of supporters of both candidates. Several days prior to the election date, 32 million wanted Obama and 12 million wanted Romney as the next resident of the White House.
Facebook has become a formidable rival of the television channels, for unlike the channels, Facebook allows its users to say what they want to say, be heard, and know what others think of their statements. Facebook makes it possible for its users to draw the political leadership’s attention to their views on the current national situation, and study its action plans.
This practically unlimited communications and data transfer capacity constitute Facebook’s largest monetary and political assets. Obama and Romney’s spin doctors relied on Facebook’s computerized analyses of millions of electorate feedbacks to instantly respond to any change in the voters’ moods when preparing major campaign statements. No other polling agency, anywhere in the world, would have been able to do so.
Facebook can help politicians communicate with their electorate and improve the turnout, by clicking Facebook’s “I voted” button. This was first used during the US presidential campaign in 2008, when each Facebook user could have access to the vote results, with each account owner being encouraged to send the I-voted message and tell his/her friends to follow suit.
Back in 2008, 5.5 million users sent the message, compared to 61 million in 2010.
The prestigious journal, Nature, reads that the 61-million person study displayed an “I voted” button atop the newsfeed of everyone over the age of 18, monitored whether voting intention was shared with others, and verified if the action had an impact on the user and their friends from official voting logs. In the end, the message (with pictures) boosted turnout by a respectable 2.2 percent. Most importantly, 80 percent of the effect was indirect, caused by friends sharing the message. This did make a difference, and all it took was a simple mouse click to spark a chain reaction of civic goodness.
Second. Facebook is becoming an effective foreign political tool that helps various governments implement their strategic/national interests (if they have any to pursue, of course).
Facebook was first mentioned as a soft power (brainwashing) tool by George Bush, Jr.’s administration. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and members of the National Security Council proposed to browse Facebook to identify and support Arab community activists who opposed Al-Qaeda ideology.
Set by the Republicans, this political course appears to be effectively followed by the Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, and her Senior Advisor for Innovation, Alec Ross. This year the number of users of State Department Facebook/Twitter sites has reached 15 million. Brookings Institution believes Facebook serves as an important channel through which the State Department can reach people in various countries and collect data on them. Blogs, posts, articles on the US embassy sites are worded polemically that can leave few users/visitors uninterested, with most engaging in active discussions of international events, assessing the State Department’s responses.
Third. Most importantly, Facebook is markedly enhancing the role of a civil society, providing fresh opportunities for the evolvement of NGOs, as best evidenced by the Arab Spring (eventually referred to as the first Facebook revolution). Users in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, and Syria met on Facebook sites and formed groups, actively exchanging data, coordinating efforts and working out strategies to pressure their governments.
Another impressive example is Occupy Wall Street when 170,000 supporters of this protest movement began discussing things they thought were important on 400 Facebook sites. These online discussions helped mobilize supporters in NYC and Washington, and kept the movement going for several weeks.
Recent polls show that the Facebook users’ civic activity ratio is higher than that of the people who do not use the Internet. Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project notes that plus 43 percent of the Facebook users want to cast their ballots and 57 percent are willing to convince their friends to follow suit and make the right political choice; that the number of those willing to take part in mass demonstrations has increased by 2.5 times.
In Ukraine, NGOs and public figures are becoming active Facebook users, getting in touch with volunteers, sharing their projects, also in the course of fund-raising campaigns, when informing about various training courses, grant programs, etc.
They will be able to appreciate more of Facebook capacities after a considerable increase in the number of accounts in Ukraine. A Yandex analysis reads that, among the 30 million Internet social network users in Ukraine, 20 million mostly visit http://vk.com/; six million do http://www.odnoklassniki.ru/, and that there are only 2 million Facebook users. This situation may quickly change. Mark Zuckerberg believes the Internet users in the CIS countries will be absorbed by Facebook before long. His visit to Moscow in October, meeting with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, his idea of establishing a Facebook center in Skolkovo were the harbingers of the Facebook absorption strategy on the Russian and Ukrainian social network markets.
Facebook is a revolutionizing company. Among other things, they believe in quick progress and that the current situation will improve before long; that taking no risk is the riskiest way. Zuckerberg’s colleagues often quote him as asking what they would do if they weren’t scared.
Today it is hard to tell what Facebook will have done to Ukraine in a couple of years. Will it turn into a planet-wide social network? Will it make this world safer and more transparent?
One thing is clear: Facebook will not be able to democratize any society without active daily cooperation on the part of the communal members. This is their cross to bear; this is what they must do, without fear.
Kateryna Smagliy is a Fulbright-Kennan Institute research scholar; Director, International Renaissance Foundation; currently involved in Wilson Center’s Project “Social Entrepreneurship and Innovative Ideas for Ukraine’s Third Sector Development in the 21st Century”
