Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture - Volume 6, Issue 2, 2015

This article draws upon desk-based research carried out during the Contribution of Social Media in Crisis management (COSMIC) project and examines the opportunities and challenges associated with citizens’ engagement with social media to contribute to crisis management activities. Opportunities include the involvement of citizens in providing assistance during crisis, as well as alternative ways to request assistance. Alternatively, challenges include those associated with the increased involvement of citizens in crisis communication activities: the recording and safety of information, the threat of online vigilantism and the danger to the security of citizens. This article shows that it is necessary to consider the role and behaviour of citizens within crisis management. However, further research is required to continue to understand social dynamics of citizen behaviour operating in the virtual and offline realm and its impact on crisis management and preparedness.

This article explores the role of digital platforms in the involvement of citizens in disaster response, relying on an analysis of metadata and of the structure of classification. It adopts the analytical apparatus of Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (Vygotsky, Leontiev, Engeström) and the notion of governmentality (Foucault) in order to conduct a critical comparative analysis of how crowdsourcing platforms construct the relationship between citizens and disasters. The article identifies three regimes of classification (informing, alerting and engagement) and explores the structures of classification for mobilization of citizens’ resources. The notion of governmentality allows us to identify the struggle around the structure of classification as a struggle between the institutional actors interested in controlling citizens’ resources and those actors who are interested in citizen engagement and the synergy between independent and institutional actors as a part of the disaster response. The article suggests the notion of the folksonomy of activity, identifying situations where citizens are able to participate in the definition of their relationships with disaster through participating in classification. It also discusses the visibility of classification and the generativity of classification as a part of citizen–disaster (subject–object) relationships.

This article reviews the role that citizens may play as first responders by comparing how various communication media are utilized by response organizations and government agencies to train and network with citizens. In addition, it aims to investigate the nature of the communication strategies and approaches that are utilized by organizations reaching out to volunteers. In order to accomplish this goal, we engaged in an analysis of citizen awareness programmes and volunteer training processes in three different countries: Turkey, Italy and Germany. Across the analysed countries, we observed inconsistencies in the extent and types of utilization of social media, including the fact that the dominant approach is still communicating to citizens rather than communicating with citizens. Finally, the comparative analysis points out the inconsistent accessibility or availability of training materials online, and particularly in social media platforms. This may reduce the likelihood that a large portion of the population, mostly of younger age, will have the opportunity to stay informed on important emergency preparedness topics.

This article reviews the Turkish media’s treatment of citizen mobilization following a major earthquake in the Turkey’s Marmara region on 17 August 1999. For the first time in the history of Turkey, large numbers of citizens spontaneously took action to assist the victims, in marked contrast to the quasi-failure of the State to mount an appropriate response to the disaster, thus causing widespread frustration. Using this opportunity, Turkish journalists attributed a symbolic role to the catastrophe (milestone) and to the mass-mobilization (social movement), and constructed a critical discourse on the major issues of the country, calling for substantial change in the social and political order of Turkey. Within this rhetoric, the citizens who were involved in relief work and their ‘obvious’ symbol, the Arama Kurtarma Dernegi/Search and Rescue Association (AKUT), were hailed as the precursors of the expected change. Nevertheless, within a short period of time the media revised their stance and ended their contentions as soon as the State reoccupied the space that it had temporarily left and took control in the disaster zone. In sum, the 17 August earthquake remained another case showing that a single event – whatever its extent – is not an agent of social change by itself.

This article reports findings from two studies regarding the role citizen reporting plays in emergencies. Findings from first study, a content analysis of citizen reporting about the Haiti Earthquake, Gezi Park Protests (Istanbul), Xynthia Storm (Europe) and Boston Bombings, indicates that citizen reporters were predominantly engaging in reporting of straight news. Citizen reporters were more likely to report their own observations than reporting or summarizing information they gathered from mainstream news sources. Relatedly, we found that citizen reporters were more likely to give voice to alternative sources of information, like bystanders or witnesses of incidents, than sources, such as government representatives. However, we also found that use of alternative sources does not necessarily translate to providing viewpoints that may contextualize the events. Namely, we found that episodic frames, rather than thematic frames, were likely to be utilized by citizen reporters. The second study, online interviews with citizen reporters whose coverage was content-analysed in the first study, found that a sense of editorial independence and disenchantment with the mainstream media’s coverage of the incidents were the main sources of motivation for citizen reporters. Results also indicate that citizen reporters tend to adopt a ‘publish, then filter’ approach to reporting and fact-checking. Implications for information verification issues are discussed.

Twitter, Instagram and SMS messages have entered into the defining images and texts of humanitarian disasters, theoretically allowing survivors to play a role in the framing of such crises. Yet research suggests that both mainstream media and NGOs – whose symbiotic relationships traditionally framed such stories – have cloned and absorbed such content, potentially restricting whose voices are heard. Issues around privacy and copyright are yet to be resolved in the mainstream media, while NGOs have turned to western bloggers rather than beneficiaries to mediate their message. This article draws on around 50 semi-structured interviews with those whose content was used by UK mainstream media; journalists from the main broadcast and print outlets in the UK; and members of each of the thirteen UK Disaster Emergency Committee aid agencies who responded to recent crises including the 2011 Great East Japan earthquake. It aims to answer how voices of citizens in crises are being mediated and mediatized, and what issues the use of this content raise around contextual integrity of privacy. It concludes by examining whether NGOs’ engagement online allows the voices of the marginalized to emerge.

The aim of this article is to investigate the potential influence of the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) on the organizational structures of entities in contemporary collective action space. In order to do so, the article adopts the collective action space model offered by Bimber, Flanagin and Stohl to analyse the relationship between communicational activities and the organizational characteristics of four different organizations that were actively involved in the Gezi Movement (2013) in Turkey. Specifically, using data collected through in-depth interviews and participant observations, the article focuses on the engagement structures and interaction forms of these four organizations. The findings from this study suggest not only that ICTs allow organizations to become more structurally complex and dynamic but also that the manner in which ICTs are used for interactions and governance plays a critical role in the transformation of the structure of organizations in collective action space.