Ex-presidents Felipe Calderon of Mexico, Alan Garcia of Peru and Cesar Gaviria of Colombia brought to Bogota the fad for selfies that has overtaken Hollywood and US President Barack Obama. In charge of posting the dignitaries' picture on the social network Twitter was Calderon, and judging by the look of concentration on his face, he seems to have been the photographer as well.
Social media can be a powerful tool, especially when considering how it empowers regular people with the ability to reach a large audience. It certainly played a prominent role in the Arab Spring protests of 2010, when protestors took to Twitter and Facebook to document the uncensored reality of their experience.
It has had its fair share of social media scandals and been accused of buying fake Facebook likes, but the White House believes the benefits of being an active participant in the uncertain world of social media still far outweigh the risks. It calls it digital diplomacy.
At a recent series of events in Beijing hosted by the Berggruen Institute, I was asked to speak about social media and the potential harm and good associated with it. My view is pretty straightforward -- I believe that social media is a tool of liberation and empowerment. That may seem fairly audacious when a good portion of the Western world is using Facebook and Twitter to post pictures of what they had for dinner or take quizzes on what TV character they may be.
Public diplomacy has always been an important tool in communicating a country’s policies, values, and culture. However, the means through which these goals could be achieved considerably changed in the last one hundred years, and politicians as well as scholars have had to face new challenges and adapt to a new media era.
Journalist Simon Shuster said it was “straight out of Hieronymus Bosch.” Writer Philip Gourevitch thought it was more like Bruegel. But the main word to describe the violent clashes in Ukraine’s capital city of Kyiv was “apocalyptic.”
Yesterday, Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López, whom the government has blamed for the recent protests, promised to turn himself in under one condition: that the protests continue in Caracas today. This morning, tens of thousands of people obliged. Twitter has been flooded with aerial pictures of the mass protests—many of which Venezuela’s government seems to prefer no one see, as it blocked some of them from appearing for a time, according to the company.
A photo of a 4-year-old Syrian refugee in the desert and surrounded by humanitarian workers became a sensation online - as did the media covering it, after many questioned the narrative behind the photo. The picture sparked a storm of articles covering the story of a Syrian child crossing the desert alone.