The birth of cyberactivism!

When you get overwhelmed by doubts if PR is good for democracy (e.g. when you write dissertation about PR in politics as I do) think about activists groups who use PR to popularize their causes and exert pressure on corporate giants. Yes, PR is good for democracy!

Activism enables not-dominant interests in society to articulate their arguments in the public sphere. PR acts as megaphone in this process, by providing campaigning organizations with ‘oxygen of publicity’. It makes their messages audible in media getting them across to wider public in order to create  awareness or persuade people to change their behavior. The activism contradicts the argument about citizen’s apathy. In UK there are approximately one million members of political parties comparing to 5 million people paying membership fee to the environmental organizations.  

When it comes to effects for PR profession, those are two sided. From one point of view activists groups are a challenge for PRs working for corporations often confronted by campaigners. On the second side the nongovernmental sector employs PR people too.  The causes undertook by campaigners are often controversial and thus newsworthy which attracts other companies to align with certain activist group in order to generate positive media coverage. Moreover, even celebrities approach the organizations or pressure groups.

 

 In the same time pressure groups have become one of the most important stakeholders which companies need to consider and conduct a dialogue with to secure their financial profitability. Here is the role for Consensus orientated public relations. However when pressure groups act against corporate interest of companies, the former sometimes hire the PR consultancies to discredit them, which is often successful due to limited financial resources and PR skill base of pressure groups.

However internet which brought about the cyberactivism has significantly changed this landscape, shifting the advantage towards pressure groups that use social media to disseminate their messages, recruit members and spread the debate. Apart from this, World Wide Web has provided the pressure groups with ample set of campaigning tools allowing them to put pressure on businesses by disrupting their internet presence. Some of those tools like site attack or hacking (often manifested by accessing companies emailing system and company discrediting messages to its customers) are recruited from legal borderland. Others sourced by humor include parody sites often more dangerous for companies than hacking as they confuse the public. An example is a false BP twitter account which had been set up after oil spill revelations. It currently has 15,000 followers (comparing to 36,000 followers of official BP twitter account) and its famous tweets inlude:"Think about it this way, the ocean is like root beer and oil is like ice cream. We just made America a giant root beer float!' or "Sadly we can no longer certify our oil as Dolphin Safe."

 A very successful online tactic is creating an image of corporate bully. The recent victim of such activities was BP after oil spill in Mexico gulf. Some other examples include Kit Kat and Princess (UK tuna company) both effectively sabotaged by Greenpeace.

Enjoy some  examples of internet activism below.