04 March 2011

Don’t Call Mideast Unrest a “Facebook Revolution,” Panelists Say

By Stephen Kaufman
Staff Writer

Washington — Social media may have provided an important tool for the political upheaval in the Arab world, but participants on a panel of Arab and American media experts say the discussion over its role should not divert attention from the courage being shown by people standing up for their rights.

The question of whether what is occurring is a “Facebook” or “Twitter” revolution is a “silly debate,” said Michael Nelson, a professor of Internet studies at Georgetown University.

“At the end of the day, the Internet is not causing this revolution, but it is enabling it,” just as the invention of the printing press in the 15th century helped spread the Protestant Reformation in Europe by making it easier to share information, he said.

Nelson was speaking with a group of media personalities and experts at a March 1 panel discussion in Washington hosted by the Center for International Media Assistance and the National Endowment for Democracy.

U.S. officials, including President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, have paid tribute to those who used nonviolent protest to overthrow regimes that had ruled Tunisia and Egypt for decades. Obama praised Egyptians for their display of “the power of human dignity,” and Clinton said the protesters have inspired the American people.

Speaking on the panel, Egyptian journalist and blogger Mona Eltahawy said Facebook and Twitter “did not invent courage,” but they allowed people from different sectors of society who had been critical of their governments to connect with each other and take action.

She said people who argue that the unrest was sparked by either social media or the WikiLeaks publication of classified U.S. cables describing abuses by Arab governments are implicitly denying the universal human will for freedom.

“When you say it was WikiLeaks or when you say it was Facebook, you are basically saying that these people who, for years, have been denied freedom and dignity and who are now demanding that freedom and dignity, [that] it was something outside of them that told them ‘Hey, you must rise up.’”

But Eltahawy did not discount the importance of social media. She said many in the Middle East and North Africa are highly net-savvy and are using Facebook “in ways that you could never imagine” for political causes, including the promotion of gay rights and women’s rights.

She said she is very encouraged by the changes taking place in the region.

“I’m a foolish optimist, maybe, but I embrace the foolishness because it is a fantastic time right now. … The region has its opportunity to breathe and say ‘Let’s fix this,’” she said.

Amira Maaty of the National Endowment for Democracy said it is important for the international community to support the democratic character of the Internet, but it is “more important to support the activists that drive it, the innovators who first thought of connecting new media with social change.”

She encouraged U.S. and other institutions to work directly with Egyptian civil society as it transitions to a new era.

“The Egyptians are seeking a system that will ensure that the pharaohs remain in their ancient history and allows them to choose, challenge and change their leaders, and it is important to support them in developing the institutions and structures that allow that to happen,” she said.

Abderrahim Foukara, the Washington bureau chief of Al Jazeera satellite television, argued that social media have been important, but people needed more traditional media outlets to help put the many tweets, YouTube videos and Facebook postings on the unrest into context.

“Social media provided the dots, but it took conventional media, principally television, to connect those dots, and that’s when the picture became complete,” Foukara said.

To make the Internet a truly democratic platform, Foukara said, there is a need to increase literacy and to educate older generations on how they can participate.

Nelson said that rather than creating new social media platforms for people to interact on, “it’s a matter of telling people what’s available and letting the courageous people in these countries get online.”

He also warned of the need for users to remain vigilant in order to keep the Internet free.

“The good news is that the barriers to entry are so much lower now. The bad news is that politicians still do everything they can to avoid giving more reign to people who can tell their citizens what’s really going on,” he said.

Carl Gershman, president of the National Endowment for Democracy, closed the panel discussion by saying that the significance of the current “Arab awakening” is profoundly important to people around the world, not just in the Middle East.

“This revolution … made by the people, by non-Western people, will travel to other regions in the world in a very powerful way,” he said.

He urged his listeners to “do everything we can to help those young people who showed such courage, and others, to build democracy,” warning that the creation of a true democracy will take a long time and will be “very, very difficult.”

(This is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)