Saad Masood
Social media is officially part of the business, political and governmental environment. It is a very strong consequence of the three democratisations of information, technology and finance as described by Thomas Friedman. Thus, information is now available to a majority of the planet “farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before”. Social media is the biggest tool available that implements this new paradigm. But the question is this, does it affect the art of policy formulation and ensuing strategy execution? Yes, it does! But in a variety of ways – and not always with a positive impact. Consider.
Contrary to popular belief, social media has been around in a number of forms and with a subsequent influence on different social spheres to match. Just before the French Revolution, the French finance minister strongly suggested the importance of ‘investor confidence’ to maintain social and financial cohesion. In the early part of the 19th century, the print media started to use ‘straw polls’ with the first one rumoured to appear in 1824. In the US, private organisations such as American Institute of Public Opinions – pre-cursor to the Gallup corporation – were focused on querying the mood of the electorate on a variety of topics. Since then not only gathering societal information has been pertinent but also influencing people’s mood has been a crucial lynchpin of the social media saga.
A good, modern day example of the optimal and appropriate use of social media would be President Obama’s re-election effort in 2012. The campaign team included a Chief Technology Officer, Chief Innovation Officer and even a Director of Analytics. They used voter data to identify voting patterns and also delivered localised – and GPS dependent – content to their support base. The clever aspect to all this was that even policy statements were disseminated using a myriad of social interfaces. This approach did work as Obama won a second presidential term.
The current American president however, has taken the use of social media – especially twitter – to new heights! From policy announcements to feuding with governmental institutions to firing people. It is rumoured that Rex Tillerson, former Secretary of State, got to know of his firing from Twitter! So did Reince Preibus, the previous Chief of Staff. White House council Don McGahn also found out that he was leaving from one of Trump’s tweets!
Donald Trump has also used Twitter for major policy statements. In July 2017, He announced his decision to ban transgender troops. James Mattis, the Secretary of Defence at the time, got to know about this one day earlier while he was on vacation. Suffice to say, the White House and the Pentagon were in damage limitation mode after this news broke on Twitter! The Trump – Kim Jong-un meeting also got an honourable mention in quite a few of Trump tweets. His first tweet of 2018 was to flay Pakistan, wrongly so, for not doing much in the war on terror when Pakistan is the only country in the front line of this war and has lost over 70,000 lives!
Moreover, the armed forces of different countries use diverse social media platforms – such as Facebook and Twitter – to make major announcements, respond to geo-political scenarios and lend clarifications and provide further information on a variety of topics. In the US, the Pentagon does it with aplomb while in Pakistan, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) uses social media with great affect.
The conclusion must be that social media is a very effective tool in getting policy arguments across to a wider audience “farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before”. But, for this to be effective and beneficial, some principles must be kept in mind. Or else it could backfire tremendously!
First, knowing one’s audience is key. This needs at-least some understanding of the people with whom one can engage on different platforms. There are a myriad number of ways to obtain social data to aid with this understanding. Second, policy announcements must be made when the top tier leadership – whether it is a government, corporation or organisation – is on the same page. A policy shift should never come as a surprise to anyone in the inner sanctum! Third, certain norms of diplomacy must be kept in mind when making major announcements. Premium among them is to not box an ally, or even a foe, in a corner from which there is no retreat. This is counterproductive for both parties. Fourth, keep policy and strategy announcements succinct and allow the process outside of social media to expand upon the details. The character limit on platforms such as Twitter should help this to a great extent. Fifth, prepare for backlash. Remember that policy statements will not be received in kind from both sides of the aisle. This is the time to avoid knee-jerk reactions and remain calmly and concisely on topic. Sixth – and most importantly – while social media is a good tool to reflect succinctly policy discussions and decisions but there is a plethora of leg-work and activity – at the strategic, operational and tactical levels – that doesn’t need to become part of this piece and must exist outside of such platforms!
There is no escaping social media. It is everywhere and that is the key – policy and strategy information can be disseminated efficiently across this medium. If that is not done, then other non- representative actors can hog the limelight for their own ends. Thus, it becomes a necessity to use social media but while keeping the aforementioned values in mind. Ultimately, it is a fine balancing-act between populism and principle. Politicians might be occasionally guided by populism, but true leaders should always be led by principles!
