The Rise of Cyberactivism: Implications for the Future of Advocacy in the Human Services

• Published in: Families in society Vol. 89; no. 1; pp. 33 - 38
• Main Authors: McNutt, John G., Menon, Goutham M.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01-01-2008; Sage Publications Ltd
• Subjects: Activism; Advocacy; Campaigns; Human Services; Internet; Social activism; Social Welfare; Social workers; Welfare; Welfare Recipients
• ISSN: 1044-3894; 1945-1350
• DOI: 10.1606/1044-3894.3706

These are hard times for social welfare advocates. Globalization, devolution, and a conservative political climate have challenged our traditional approaches to advocacy. New advocacy methods that use technology to change public policy have been developed and provide us with new avenues to address the changed political economy of social welfare. Collectively called cyberactivism, these techniques can be used to advantage by social work advocates. This article looks at recent cyberactivist campaigns, examines barriers to cyberactivism, and suggests actions that social work advocates can take to use these new tools and ideas. We conclude that these techniques have been widely used by social activists to contribute to policy change and have excellent potential as part of the social work advocacy arsenal.