Policy debate in the age of social media: the Australian experience
Date
2016
Authors
Porter, Tanja
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Abstract
Public distrust and dissatisfaction with mainstream politics is a concern for many Western democracies. Governments have set great store in the potential for social media to reverse citizens retreat from politics and restore public confidence in policy making. According to the Australian government, the open and participatory character of social media will bring a diversity of citizens’ experiences into policy debates, enriching deliberation on policy solutions, and drive greater responsiveness and accountability from government and the political elite. This thesis investigates the extent to which social media is delivering on these expectations. Departing from the positivist assumptions and quantitative techniques that dominate research about social media in Australian politics, this thesis foregrounds the political context and policy dynamics within which social media is adopted. It examines how and with what strategic aims social media has been deployed by policy actors in three contemporary cases of public policy debate in Australia. These are: (i) the introduction of ‘lock-out’ laws and mandatory sentencing in response to alcohol-fuelled violence in Sydney; (ii) the decision to overhaul arrangements to support disabled Australians, as manifest in the National Disability Insurance Scheme and (iii) the level of personal control over end of life choices and attempts to legislate for voluntary euthanasia. Each of these debates is illustrative of the constant contest between policy actors over the role of contemporary government and the scope of citizen responsibilities and each therefore offer rich empirical insights into the ways social media may be influencing established democratic relations. With insights derived from elite actor communications, policy analysis and digital ethnography, the thesis finds social media being used by policy actors across the political spectrum in highly targeted strategies that both open new and compound existing channels to influence policy debate. For citizens and civil society, social media is facilitating a groundswell of personalised story-telling and mobilisation, while for government and formal political actors, social media enables more precise targeting and wider circulation of political messaging. Although the impact of this activity on policy vii outcomes is highly contingent on the policy relationships at play, the use of social media is largely consistent with government expectations. To assess whether the case evidence points to deepening democratic relationships, as is the express aim of government policy, the thesis draws on concepts from critical theory, namely Jurgen Habermas’ ‘public sphere’ and the normative framework it provides for political deliberation. When the evidence is viewed through this lens, it is apparent that social media also has various deleterious effects. For instance, it tends to amplify what Habermas called the ‘raw’ discourses of our private domain in the public sphere, therein weakening the independence and public-mindedness that underscores the legitimacy of public opinion. The thesis concludes that, rather than contributing wholly positively to citizens' deliberative capacity, social media accentuates long running trends that contribute to the democratic deficit. The juxtaposition of these two conclusions about the impact of social media paves the way for a discussion that provides a modest but significant contribution to the existing scholarship.
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public policy, social media, democratic deficit
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