Periodic Reporting for period 4 - SocialMedia (Social Media, Political Participation, and Accountability)
Berichtszeitraum: 2020-07-01 bis 2021-06-30
The ultimate goal of the project is to examine how advances in information technologies affect public policies. In the recent years, internet in general and social media in particular started playing an increasingly important role in our lives. The political consequences of the advent of social media are now a hotly contested topic. An optimistic view has been that social media would empower ordinary citizens and serve as a Liberation Technology, which would lead to faster democratization in authoritarian countries and make politicians more accountable. A more pessimistic view has been that autocratic governments would adjust and learn how to exploit social media to their own advantage, while in democracies, social media is often blamed for the exacerbated political polarization, the spread of xenophobic ideas, proliferation of fake news, and manipulation of elections by outside actors.
Regulatory measures have recently been adopted by a number of countries to regulate the content of social media and many more policy proposals are being discussed. However, such regulation is not always backed up by sound evidence, especially with respect to the effect of social media on offline political behavior of people.
The goal of the project is to provide credible empirical evidence on the effect of internet and social media on political behavior, with specific focus on studying the mechanisms behind these effects. In particular, we focus on the effect of social media on participation in political protests. We study whether social media penetration had a causal effect on participation in political protests. In the analysis we distinguish between two channels – the information channel and the coordination channel. The informational channel reflects the fact that low barriers to entry make it much more difficult to limit the spread of potentially harmful information that would lead to more anti-government sentiments in the population. The coordination channel reflects the fact that social media relies on user-generated content facilitates horizontal information flows, which could lower the costs of coordination and, thus, alleviate the collective action problem. We also study how the structure of network connections, which can affect both the information proliferation and ability of people to coordinate. Finally, we examine the role of social motivation in the decision to participate in political protests, since it is likely to be strongly affected by social media.
Regulatory measures have recently been adopted by a number of countries to regulate the content of social media and many more policy proposals are being discussed. However, such regulation is not always backed up by sound evidence, especially with respect to the effect of social media on offline political behavior of people.
The goal of the project is to provide credible empirical evidence on the effect of internet and social media on political behavior, with specific focus on studying the mechanisms behind these effects. In particular, we focus on the effect of social media on participation in political protests. We study whether social media penetration had a causal effect on participation in political protests. In the analysis we distinguish between two channels – the information channel and the coordination channel. The informational channel reflects the fact that low barriers to entry make it much more difficult to limit the spread of potentially harmful information that would lead to more anti-government sentiments in the population. The coordination channel reflects the fact that social media relies on user-generated content facilitates horizontal information flows, which could lower the costs of coordination and, thus, alleviate the collective action problem. We also study how the structure of network connections, which can affect both the information proliferation and ability of people to coordinate. Finally, we examine the role of social motivation in the decision to participate in political protests, since it is likely to be strongly affected by social media.
The central line of research was focused on identifying causal effect of social media penetration on political outcomes. In particular, we examine whether penetration of the most popular online social network in Russia – VK – affected anti-government protests in December 2011.
VK was created in 2006 by a student of the Saint Petersburg State University (SPbSU), Pavel Durov. The idiosyncratic variation in the distribution of the home cities of Durov’s classmates had a long-lasting effect on VK penetration. Using these fluctuations in the student flow from Russian cities to SPbSU as an instrument in an instrumental variable framework, we find that, on average, a 10% increase in VK penetration leads to a 4 percentage points higher chance of a protest taking place and a 19% larger protest. Non-parametrically, we document that there exists a threshold of VK penetration below which there is no relation between VK penetration and protests.
We also provide evidence that this effect was not driven by the spread of uncensored that would lead to more anti-government sentiments in the population. In particular, we show that, consistently across all elections after the creation of the social network, VK led to the higher, not lower, pro-government vote. We also do not find any evidence for increased political polarization since there was no jump in negative attitudes toward the regime or in the opposition vote. However, we do find evidence that social media facilitated coordination.
In another paper we highlight the importance of social image concerns in the decision to participate in political protests. We develop a dynamic model of protest participation, where socially-minded individuals use protest participation to signal their type. We then test predictions of the model using individual and city-level data from 2011-2012 political protests in Russia. We report several findings, consistent with the theory. First, list experiment results from a specially conducted survey imply that social signaling motives indeed were important for the decision to participate in protests. Second, participation in online protest groups increased offline protest participation. Third, participation in protests was associated with higher social capital in a city. Finally, the importance of both online social networks and offline social capital for protest participation diminished over time.
VK was created in 2006 by a student of the Saint Petersburg State University (SPbSU), Pavel Durov. The idiosyncratic variation in the distribution of the home cities of Durov’s classmates had a long-lasting effect on VK penetration. Using these fluctuations in the student flow from Russian cities to SPbSU as an instrument in an instrumental variable framework, we find that, on average, a 10% increase in VK penetration leads to a 4 percentage points higher chance of a protest taking place and a 19% larger protest. Non-parametrically, we document that there exists a threshold of VK penetration below which there is no relation between VK penetration and protests.
We also provide evidence that this effect was not driven by the spread of uncensored that would lead to more anti-government sentiments in the population. In particular, we show that, consistently across all elections after the creation of the social network, VK led to the higher, not lower, pro-government vote. We also do not find any evidence for increased political polarization since there was no jump in negative attitudes toward the regime or in the opposition vote. However, we do find evidence that social media facilitated coordination.
In another paper we highlight the importance of social image concerns in the decision to participate in political protests. We develop a dynamic model of protest participation, where socially-minded individuals use protest participation to signal their type. We then test predictions of the model using individual and city-level data from 2011-2012 political protests in Russia. We report several findings, consistent with the theory. First, list experiment results from a specially conducted survey imply that social signaling motives indeed were important for the decision to participate in protests. Second, participation in online protest groups increased offline protest participation. Third, participation in protests was associated with higher social capital in a city. Finally, the importance of both online social networks and offline social capital for protest participation diminished over time.
The project makes a significant contribution to the literature by providing the first reliable evidence on the causal effect of social media on political outcomes. Our results indicate that social media penetration facilitates participation in political protests, and the reduction in the costs of collective action is the primary mechanism behind this effect. There were a lot of speculations regarding the positive impact of social media penetration on collective action, but so far there has been no systematic empirical evidence to support this prediction. Our results imply that the availability of social media may have important consequences as political protests can affect within-regime power-sharing agreements, as well as related economic and political outcomes
We believe that our methodology can be used for studying the impact of social media penetration on other forms of collective action. For example, consumers who would like to lower tariffs or discipline companies’ misbehavior through boycotts, also face the same collective action problem. Similarly, collective action is important for the fundraising campaigns of charitable or educational institutions, for environmental activism, or hate crime. More generally, our identification approach, which relies on social distance from the inventor to instrument for the spread of the new technology, is likely to be applicable to studying the impact of technology adoption in other settings.
Our work is one the first steps in studying how social media can change societies. More research is needed to understand whether similar results hold for other outcomes and in other contexts. One important step in this direction is a more detailed analysis of the particular mechanisms behind these effects. In the project we provide detailed examination of one such mechanisms –the role of social image concerns in the decision to participation in political process and the way online social media mediates this motivation. Another direction of research is examining the association between the structure of online social networks and the occurrence of political protests.
The results that we have already obtained and the ones that we expect to get before the completion of the project will contribute the policy debate on the regulation of social media from the point of view of their impact on political outcomes and participation in collective actions, which can have an important effect on societal outcomes.
We believe that our methodology can be used for studying the impact of social media penetration on other forms of collective action. For example, consumers who would like to lower tariffs or discipline companies’ misbehavior through boycotts, also face the same collective action problem. Similarly, collective action is important for the fundraising campaigns of charitable or educational institutions, for environmental activism, or hate crime. More generally, our identification approach, which relies on social distance from the inventor to instrument for the spread of the new technology, is likely to be applicable to studying the impact of technology adoption in other settings.
Our work is one the first steps in studying how social media can change societies. More research is needed to understand whether similar results hold for other outcomes and in other contexts. One important step in this direction is a more detailed analysis of the particular mechanisms behind these effects. In the project we provide detailed examination of one such mechanisms –the role of social image concerns in the decision to participation in political process and the way online social media mediates this motivation. Another direction of research is examining the association between the structure of online social networks and the occurrence of political protests.
The results that we have already obtained and the ones that we expect to get before the completion of the project will contribute the policy debate on the regulation of social media from the point of view of their impact on political outcomes and participation in collective actions, which can have an important effect on societal outcomes.