To what extent, do you think, social media can be considered as the public sphere of contemporary times?

M. Zaher Dowran

19913212

Habermas defined the public sphere as the sphere in which private people come together as a public. In the public sphere, it is possible to openly discuss matters of public concern.

In the public sphere, individuals in a free state, away from coercion, discuss the general matter and evaluate each other's views, thereby maximizing the possibility of reaching a real collective agreement. As the dialogue and the reached agreements are not based on leading forces such as "power, money and propaganda", it creates a "different policy" from the usual perceptions. The public sphere is one of the key concepts used and explained by Jurgen Habermas. According to him, the public sphere is an arena where people come together to participate in open and public discussions. Habermas argues that the public sphere emerges when individuals think in groups about their public needs. He uses the term public sphere to refer to the social sphere in which individuals, through reasoning and communicating adopt normative positions and orientations that have a conscious and rationalizing effect on the process of exercising state power.

Habermas argues that citizens and private individuals act as the public when they can address issues of public interest without coercion and compulsion and this is possible when the necessary guarantees are provided for their gathering, and they feel express and propagate their thoughts.

There are some ideal dimensions of the public sphere according to Habermas:

-         There is a guarantee that every citizen will be able to access the public sphere on an equal footing with others, regardless of status.

-         Every citizen is free to say whatever he or she deems appropriate. There are no barriers to talking about issues. Of course, the issues raised must be related to the public interest, otherwise, it will automatically withdraw from the public sphere.

-         There is no place for exercising power by force and authority (government and other types) and money.

-         As there is no place for money, inequality and force, reasoning becomes important and superior reasoning is always accepted.

Nowadays both news organizations and journalists and audiences are increasingly using the internet and social media for different aims, including news. Printed newspapers have their own websites and a wide range of international TV broadcasts are available in social media platforms as well. The public uses social media to share and discuss their appropriate deemed thoughts.  Social media have also been described as a new public sphere where people can equally get access to information and participate in the creation, distribution and discussion of content. However, whether social media can be a public sphere?

To get a clear answer to whether social networks can form a public sphere or not? The criteria of the public sphere and the conditions of social platforms should be analyzed. For instance, the first unique feature of the public sphere is its accessibility to everyone. Although the use of social networks is not limited to a specific class, everyone with access to the Internet and electronic devices can benefit it. But, does everyone's accessibility to the Internet and technology the same? It may not a matter of concern for advanced countries, but residents of backward countries are deprived of Internet services. However, the Internet is available to some extent, a wide range of people cannot afford to use it due to financial shortages. Here in the first encounter, it questions the formation of the public sphere on social media.

In the second step, the public sphere is characterized by everyone's right to expressing and commenting at the same chance. In cyberspace, however, everyone has the right to unleash their thoughts, but not on an equal footing. Users are being affected by social media's rule. The platform is under the control of a manager and a privileged owner. In many cases, we have been witnessed the closure of social accounts with millions of followers. That is, their point of view has been ignored. Somehow the government is also involved in controlling social media platforms with the authority of banning its use whenever it prefers.

The third characteristic of the public sphere is the deficiency of using force, including government power and capital. The boosting feature of social platforms violates the core terms of this trait. Those who spend more capital can gain more points on social media.

In the public sphere, people are able to discuss the general issues and evaluate each other's views far from coercion and impositions. On the contrary, social platforms somehow impose restrictions and coercion.

Finally, it can be said that social media undoubtedly perform lots of functions of the public sphere. Social media do widen participation possibility for discussion and the possibility for the contribution of ordinary people. It can perform as public space to gather people together to express their opinions towards political and social issues. The contribution of ordinary people is available and social media widen participation and possibilities for discussions and interactions. To some extend social media can be seen as a new form of a public sphere. Habermas points out that "The public sphere is an area that all citizens have access to it and they have freedom of assembly, association, and freedom of expression and publication of opinions".

As it may not be ignored that the Internet and social media have made a great contribution to democratization but, on the other hand, the dominance and influence of big corporations and opinion leaders still remain in place in the social media.

Bourdieu's thought can be crystallized in the most concise and simplest form in several basic concepts, the most important of which are the following concepts: Champs, Capital, Distinction, Habitus, Violence Symbolique.

For the first time, the concept of capital can be traced to Marx's views. In Marx's concept of capitalization, capital is part of the surplus-value that capitalists or owners of the means of production derive from the circulation of goods and money in the process of production and consumption. According to Bourdieu, capital is the accumulated labour that is monopolized by the perpetrators or a group of perpetrators which enables them to seize joint power. He refers to capital as any kind of ability and skill that a person can achieve in society in an attributive or acquired way and use it in his relationships with other individuals and groups to advance his position. It can be said that capital is the social privilege on which people compete. If Marx considered the owner of the means of production to be the owner of capital, for Bourdieu economic capital is only one of the assets in society, and besides, there are at least three other types of capital.

First, cultural capital, which includes education and the acquisition of cultural and artistic, expressive and verbal capabilities. Second, social capital; means gaining social opportunities and having more or less extensive networks of relationships, friends and acquaintances who can act in one's favour when necessary. And the third is symbolic capital, which involves the use of symbols that a person uses to legitimize other levels of his capital.

Cultural capital can be described as what you have and what you know. Pierre Bourdieu divided cultural capital further into three subtypes. Embodied, Objectified and institutionalized cultural capital.

Embodied cultural capital is the qualities of your mind or body. These include things like the skills you have, your accent, dialect, posture and mannerisms. It also includes your tasts such as your tastes in music, art and literature. Embodied cultural capital is important because more powerful social classes tend to differentiate themselves from others by how they look and behave. Therefore you essentially need to buy membership into these classes with embodied social capital.

Objectified capital is your material belongings that have cultural significance.

Finally, institutionalized cultural capital is symbols of cultural competence and authority. So, this refers to thinks like credentials and qualifications. Even seemingly small things such as the title doctor can give you a large amount of institutionalized cultural capital. University degrees are a powerful form of institutionalized cultural capital.

If the cultural capital is what you know and what you have, then social capital is who you know. Your amount of social capital depends on your social network. You gain social capital in two different ways. By being connected to a lot of people or by having a connection with a few people who have a lot of capital. In other words, being connected to a smaller amount of people who have more power. Basically, your social relationship give you social capital

To Marx, class, social power and social standing are very much rooted in the amount of financial capital an individual or a group has. Notably, this is a very binary system and although Marx does mention the existence of the so-called petty bourgeoisie, or middle class, he doesn't flash this idea out fully beyond suggesting that they might be small business owners or those very highly paid professionals. To find a more granular system of analyzing class, then, we might turn to the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. Bourdieu suggests that social class is made up of three contributing factors: economic capital, social capital and cultural capital. This is a slightly more complex system but allow as for a slightly more specific analysis than the orthodox Marxist approach. Economic capital works much the same as it does in Marx's system, recognizing how much economic power an individual or group has within society. Social capital, then, acknowledges the social and familial relationships that an individual or group might have that might give them a certain advantage in life. For example, having a friend of the family work at a particular firm who can introduce you or perhaps get you a job might count as being an aspect of social capital.

When Marx emphasizes economic capital and suggests that that grows to have an influence on culture, Bourdieu suggests that our individual culture capital has an impact on how much economic capital we might earn. Bourdieu is less interested in our relationships to the means of production than with class as a social phenomenon. Both Marx and Bourdieu, however, are very clear that socio-cultural and economic capital has an impact on one another.

Note: The essay is the draft versian of my writings, needs to be completed. 

M. Zaher Dowran

I would like to analyse and interpret the possible effects of the mentioned news coverage on society according to Michel Foucault and Stuart Hall's theories. 

In a short video, the presenter talks about what he called "looting", showing some people collecting properties flooded in rivers in Istanbul. He describes the situation "very serious" saying people go with their minibuses to collect the properties, which were hit by floods. The police are trying to intervene, but they are so numerous that the question of how to handle them comes to mind, he further adds. During the approximately five minutes coverage of the incident, the presenter comments and interpret it. It seems the presenter violates the core values of news, including impartiality and not using loaded words. But if we analyse the coverage's effects on society in the context of theorists Michel Foucault and Stuart Hall, we will face with different outcomes.

First, Michel Foucault gives a new way of thinking about power. Foucault has suggested that most power indeed the most important kind of power in our modern society does not repressive at all. It works in a far subtler, less visible way. This power is what he called normalizing power. Normalizing power is a power that determines what we see as normal. It constructs our view of the world and ourselves.

 As in the news coverage, the remarks or the narration made by the presenter could be accepted as the view of a large number of audiences. Without a doubt, numerous audiences believe what they see and hear via media outlets without thinking about different aspects of the issue. The news presenter seems trying to show the inefficiency of the government and the greed of the people repeating the footage several times and commenting on it. As the word or image is reproduced again and again it becomes fact. Media outlets can act in the framework of their sponsors' interests without using police force, the army or the judge.

But Stuart Hall gives three options for audiences to react to the media messages. Hall has said the audiences come to a different understanding of a text depending on the reception context in which they saw it. The response of audiences to the media messages will be in dominant-hegemonic or preferred, negotiated and oppositional manners according to Hall. If we analyse the possible effects of the coverage on society according to Stuart Hall's perception theory, we can say there could be three kinds of reactions to the coverage. The first group will fully agree with what the presenter says, the second group will negotiate and take a decision after a while and the third group will be oppositional to the media messages. Passive audiences will soon be exposed to media images and messages. But active media audiences take the issue seriously before they fully believe in the media messages. According to the video, dominated responders, as Hall has said, will receive a severe situations' imagination from the coverage.

Note: The interpret was selected as the best answer to the assignment by Assoc. Prof. Dr Cenk Saraçoğlu. 

M. Zaher DOWRAN

The first case of the novel Coronavirus, known as the Covid-19, was reported in the Chinese City of Wuhan in late December 2019. Since then, the pandemic paralyzed the world's economy as well as social life. Almost, no country is immune from being hit by the deadly coronavirus outbreak as the virus has claimed the lives of more than 165,000 people with over two million infections across the world so far. Undoubtedly, the number of fatalities of the virus will vary depending on the level of the public awareness, health facilities and the provision of desirable health services in different countries.

  The first positive case of the coronavirus was recorded in late February 2020 in Afghanistan following the influx of thousands of Afghan refugees from neighbouring countries, especially Iran, which is the worst-coronavirus hit country in the Middle East. Plagued by the Covid-19, Iran shares more than 945 Km of borders with Afghanistan, hosting more than two million Afghan refugees. 

  As an Afghan journalist, I have tried to make people aware of the dangers of the coronavirus with sharing the latest death toll and infections of the pandemic in my Facebook account where I host almost 5,000 friends and more than 14,000 followers. By making a video clip, I have denied the rumours that there is no coronavirus cases in Afghanistan and that this virus is a mercy to Muslims and a punishment for infidels. A large group of the public in Afghanistan, who are illiterate and somehow believe in the pulpit of the mosque, have been guaranteed that the virus will not hit Afghanistan. They do not take it seriously and still have full faith in the clerics who consider the coronavirus as a punishment from Allah to unbelievers. The missionaries in most of the mosques preach the Covid-19 as a mercy for Muslims and chastisement to infidels from Allah. 

  I have shared my commentary entitled "Triangle of Afghanistan's Problem in Dealing with Coronavirus" in my personal BLOGFA address. Recently, we have made a video clip encouraging people to take the coronavirus seriously and stay at home with the coordination of a number of students studying in Turkey. The clip was welcomed by pursuers and have been shared multiple times in different social media platforms.

  Afghanistan is experiencing an extremely painful and obscurant situation. Our lens touches with desperation and calamity from every dimension we look to it. I hope that these efforts will be fruitful and yield to a good result in containing the coronavirus outbreak. But wishes won't wash dishes, governance of dormant and inefficient official to impoverished territorial devastates all these wishes. I am crossing my fingers to my country but every Tom and dick and Harry knows that darker and more catastrophic days will be recorded in the future history of Afghanistan if the government and the people do not take serious actions to combat the coronavirus pandemic. 

Note: The essay was part of an assignment by Prof. Dr. Bedriye Poyraz, Communication Faculty of Anakra University. 

M. Zaher Dowran