David Sasaki compares our collective enthusiasm for the power of social media to bring about positive social change to Alexander Graham Bell’s hope that the telephone will lead to world peace –
We have many reasons to be hopeful…
However, in the case of the recent conflicts in Georgia and Palestine, we have also seen how citizen media can be used by both sides of a conflict as propaganda tools to win international support rather than engage in meaningful dialogue.
Whether we are talking about the birth of the telephone at the start of the 20th century or today’s ever-expanding Twittersphere, it’s not the technology that matters, it is what you do with it.
Communications technologies that make the world more interconnected have the potential to help us connect to each other as humans, increase understanding and empathy between individuals and institutions, and enable collaboration instead of conflict.
However, technology is only an instrument, and its promise for positive social change will only be realized if we choose to use it to that end. The good news is that many of us are using technology to do good. The bad news is that the same technology can also be used as a weapon of war or anarchy — as the Greece riots, Israel-Gaza, Russia-Georgia, and “the war on terror” have shown us.
Cross-posted on Social Media in Business, Development & Government.
