Social media is changing how civil society is organized and how people interact. It has become a new realm for civil society, where individuals voluntarily join online communities centered around common interests, norms and values to influence corporations or enact political change. Interacting and being involved in these groups builds social capital through reciprocity, honesty and trust, allowing for easier cooperation and collective gains. However, social media could also lead to more niche, fragmented communities that are homogeneous in ideas but divided in other ways. While social media compresses space and connects people globally, it cannot replace real-world social engagement and actions.

1. Social Media and Civil Society Social Media is changing the way we organize and interact:

2. The New Realm of Social Interaction: -Civil society is the institution built by individual participants self organizing into groups engaged in public interaction with the aim of correcting perceived government and market insufficiencies. -Social media networks can be thought of as the new realm of civil society; individuals voluntarily participate by organizing online communities centered around common ideas, norms and values while actively defining what it is to be a member. They often unite to influence corporate interests or seek to enact political change.

3. Social Capital & Communication: *Interaction and group involvement builds social capital *Social capital is rooted in values of reciprocity, honesty and trust *Social capital allows for easier cooperation and greater collective gains “Community, communion, and communication are intimately as well as etymologically related. Communication is a fundamental prerequisite for social and emotional connections. Telecommunications in general and the Internet in particular substantially enhance our ability to communicate; thus it seems reasonable to assume that their net effect will be to enhance community, even dramatically. Social capital is about networks, and the Net is the network to end all networks. (Putnam, 171).”

4. Actor Network Theory: -As we delegate tasks and responsibilities to technology it prescribes particular actions back to us -The technology enters into the network and changes the way in which humans interact, becoming part of the interaction itself. “Societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media by which men communicate than by the content of the communication, (McLuhan, 8).”

5. Ideas as Identity: -People are forming groups around common ideas “Internet chat groups may bridge across geography, gender, age and religion, while being tightly homogeneous in education and ideology, (Putnam, 23).” -Collective intelligence over individual intuition? -Does this depersonalize knowledge? -Aren’t our identities defined by what we know?

6. Fractionalization? -Niche communities -“A society in which it becomes easy for every small group to indulge its tastes will have more difficulty mobilizing unity, (Jenkins, 248).” -Cyberbalkanization: the process whereby individuals “confine our communication to people who share precisely our interests, (Putnam, 177).”

7. Global Society: -Space has been compressed -Convergence of people and ideas -Increasingly horizontal organization & adhocracies -Distinct need for glocalization and increased interaction “There is no longer any nation that can prevent its citizens from knowing what is happening in other countries, and it will soon be impossible to prevent the subject of any dictatorship to know in real time what’s going on elsewhere, (Eco, 79).” “In an electric information environment, minority groups can no longer be contained-ignored. Too many people know too much about each other. Our new environment compels commitment and participation. We have become irrevocably involved with, and responsible for, each other, (McLuhan, 24).”

8. Supplement or Substitution? -Social media is a nonphysical realm -If we look to social media as primary format for social engagement we lose part of our efficacy in physical reality -Social media is a tool, its value is determined by its use -Social media is about communication and we must remember that actions speak louder than words