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Indeed, for a movement, you need numbers. And that's what Global Citizen's digital activism brand provides.
"They need people to go out and protest, they need people to attend a rally," said Henry Jenkins, media expert at the University of Southern California, at Make It. "It does not mean that these people are going to be organizers, but they are men, which allows them to express their concerns to the political leaders."
This idea of shallow width is a common criticism of digital activism, like that of Global Citizen.
"[Global Citizen’s] The theory seems to be: Get a lot of people to lobby for all kinds of things and the world will get better, it's rather an approach rather than a targeted one, "said Leslie Lenkowsky, professor emeritus of public affairs and Philanthropic Studies at Indiana University Bloomington told CNBC in 2017. "It does not matter, but it's probably not as effective as it could be." To be, "he said (Sheldrick claims that the political and public pressure generated by users has led to concrete changes).
Micah White, one of the co-founders of the Occupy Wall Street movement, told CNBC Make It the Global Citizen Festival is not an effective way to make changes. This is an example of "commercialization and cooptation of social activism" and this extreme poverty "can not be solved by playing games on a luxury smartphone, even if the participants are well-intentioned," he explains in an email. (Global Citizen did not comment on White's statement.)
The problem with such a strategy, according to an essay written by White for The Guardian, is that once the excitement stems from what he called "clicktivism", there is no change to see and the Activists are disappointed and think forms of effective activism at all.
But digital activism addresses a generation of young citizens who care about social issues but may not have the tools or the desire to act alone, according to Jenkins. The world is so complex that people can not be deeply involved in everything, he says.
"We need to rely on a community that draws our attention to urgent issues and tells us what we need to get people to get more information through social media," he said. He sees social activism as the "Global Citizen Festival" as a mechanism to get people "aware of political events" to take the next step and get involved.
In addition, "there is real skepticism about institutional policy change," said Jenkins. "Efforts like Global Citizen offer a point of entry or an invitation to people who might otherwise feel unwelcome."
Disclosure: The 2018 Global Citizen Festival will be broadcast on MSNBC. CNBC, NBCUniversal and MSNBC are owned by Comcast.
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