Internet Literacy
Ted Naylor and Charlene Croft, with E. Dianne Looker
from May 2007
While issues of access to technology and connectivity infrastructure remain essential, it is also paramount that on top of connectivity we recognize that inclusive access does not end at being ‘connected’. Rather, inclusion and participation in the knowledge society is tied to social processes that are dynamic and complex and which vary across different socio-economic contexts.
To this end, we introduce and discuss the notion of ICT literacy. This concept provides an analytical approach that makes visible that there are important differences in use, skill levels and objectives in using ICTs throughout the social order, particularly across the key socio-economic sectors of governance, business, education and community. ICT literacy therefore provides the analytical link to understanding how to navigate and use the information highway in ways that cuts experiences of users in different ways; people form literacies with meaning that are socially and culturally mediated. An equitable knowledge society is indeed a connected one, yet is also one based on acknowledging that a plurality of ICT literacies exist; there are not ‘dumb’ users of technology and ‘smart’ users of technology when considering how individuals employ ICTs in ways that matter to their lives, circumstances and needs.
From a policy and practice perspective, we believe this approach helpfully moves us away from the prevailing tendency to understand ICT literacy as a singular, hierarchy ranked, uniform set of competencies with computers or technologies that can be measured, standardized and taught.
The Knowledge Economy
It is now generally acknowledged that Canada, similar to other advanced social democracies, is becoming a knowledge based economy. This shift is premised on the accentuation of “knowledge” as the most important factor of production, surpassing land, labour, and capital based on the diffusion of information communication technologies (ICTs) throughout the social order (Parayil 2005).
From a federal policy and programme perspective, Canada has aggressively positioned itself as a leading proponent of the knowledge economy, making massive investments in infrastructure and programs based on the understanding that “Canada needs a highly skilled and educated workforce to remain competitive and sustain its prosperity in an increasingly global and knowledge-based economy” (Berger et al. 2007).
The Knowledge Society
While there has been a great deal of focus on creating an advantageous climate for growing the knowledge economy, considerably less focus has been put into considering how we might ensure the development of an equitable knowledge society. In broad terms, a knowledge society centre’s around the social capabilities to identify, process, transform, disseminate and use information to build and apply knowledge for human development (UNESCO).
However, while issues of access to technology and connectivity infrastructure remain essential, it is also paramount that on top of connectivity we recognize that inclusive access does not end at being ‘connected’. Rather, inclusion and participation in the knowledge society is tied to social processes that are dynamic and complex and which vary across different socio-economic contexts.
Indeed, scholars of the ‘digital divide’ now point out that this divide cannot be reduced to just technological access, “solved” through “simple technological fixes” (Parayil 2005) because connectivity and access to infrastructures are not a sufficient basis to develop a knowledge society based on equitable inclusion and participation (UNESCO).
In both cases, the concept of the knowledge society and economy hinges on access to computing infrastructures – while government policy and programme has begun to successfully conquer the ‘digital divide’ in terms of access to technology and connectivity infrastructure it has not yet sufficiently addressed the digital divide in terms of ensuring adequate levels of literacy with ICTs.
ICT literacy addresses the post-connectivity question of, what now? For those with access to the ubiquitous information highway, ICT literacy provides the analytical link to understanding how to navigate and use the information highway in ways that cuts experiences of users in different ways. This approach makes visible that there are important differences in use, skill levels and objectives in using ICTs throughout the social order and that these differences should not, and do not, necessarily follow along a hierarchal ordering of ‘lower’ and ‘higher’ skills within the social realm – there are not ‘dumb’ users of technology and ‘smart’ users of technology when considering how individuals employ ICTs in ways that matter to their lives, circumstances and needs.
ICT literacy
While there are many definitions of ICT literacy within the scholarly literature (see Bawden 2001 for a review), ICT literacy is generally taken as an “umbrella term” that attempts to describe a new set of literacies which have emerged as a result of a broader shift to an “information society” and the accompanying technologies embedded in that shift. As Warschauer (in press: 16) concludes, “Today, the social, economic, and technological transformations are again aligned to bring about major changes in literacy practices.”
Currently, the prevailing tendency in understanding ICT literacy is to understand it as a singular, standardized set of competencies with computers or technologies. In the tradition of traditional literacy, we then find those agents and organizations wishing “to define ‘it’, to teach it, measure it, assess it, and remediate it – in a word, to universalize and standardize it (Lankshear and Knobel 2005).” If you don’t have ‘it’, then you better get ‘it’ because you will need ‘it’ in the future, goes the rationale. Within the education sector, for example, this approach is ensconced within traditional curriculum programs that understand ICT literacy as a teachable and unified set of skills to be learned. However, evidence from our study, among others, suggests that ICT literacy should be more accurately understood across a broad range of competencies and skills, and that individuals use ICTs in ways that matter to them, and not necessarily along a fixed continuum of ‘advancing’ skills.
Our understanding of ICT literacy therefore differs from the normative understandings of ICT literacy by recognizing that there are social and cultural elements which draw our attention to understanding literacy in different ways which vary in different social contexts (Simpson 2005). Freire (2000) describes literacy as “an active phenomenon, deeply linked to personal and cultural identity. Its power lies not in a received ability to read and write, but rather in an individual’s capacity to put those skills to work in shaping the course of his or her own life.” In this context, ICT literacy conceptualizes a whole host of social practices of how people engage in making meaning “mediated by texts that are produced, received, distributed, exchanged, etc., via digital codification” (Lankshear and Knobel 2005: 9). People form literacies with meaning that are socially and culturally mediated, which is not the result from some universally learned skill or technique.
With this in mind, we would suggest four major socio-economic sectors where ICT literacy matters; it matters in the sense that while literacies with ICTs will inevitably vary among individuals, these sectors continue to form the basis of the knowledge society. Therefore a consideration of literacy with ICTs among these sectors is paramount to ensure equitable inclusion in the knowledge society.
* Governance
It is important to consider ICT literacy in relation to its significance around equitable participation within the public domain. The existence of asymmetries in democratic and governing practices in Canada is now well established. In this context, ICTs are increasingly playing an important role in inclusion around policy formulation and decision-making processes (Dale and Naylor 2006). Civic engagement processes are increasingly found on-line, and the communication possibilities created by ICTs allow the public to express itself more immediately and effectively than previously possible, helping citizens reinvigorate public talk and dialogue in entirely new ways, and with entirely new results (Dale and Naylor 2006).
Aside from ICTs contribution to civic engagement, ICTs are also now crucial to evolving notions of alternative service delivery mechanisms within government. In efforts to become more efficient and effective, many government services are now found online (http://www.gov.ns.ca/snsmr). The rationale is that the public can be better served by making these services available online, circumventing the traditional bureaucratic ‘silos and stovepipes’ found across departments, and offering more immediate and better services to citizens.
* Business
Simply connecting business to the Internet isn’t sufficient for ensuring effective use of the advantages offered by ICTs. In a study of rural New Zealand small businesses, the authors recommend that human capability play the key role in their E-Commerce strategy as a priority for the Government in the drive for economic transformation. To this end, among a host of recommendations, the authors direct the government to facilitate skill training for small business by ensuring the education sector focuses on ICT literacy, and that the government helps the private sector “build broader ICT literacy and capability in the community including rural areas” (Al-Qirim and Corbett 2003). In this way, ICT literacy becomes positioned as the key competitive edge for businesses once they have gained connectivity – the better literacy skills with ICTs on behalf of businesses and owners, the more competitive they become within a global marketplace where ICT literacy is presumed to be the entry fee to compete.
* Education
Canada requires a highly skilled and educated workforce to ensure it is competitive and to sustain its long-term prosperity in a knowledge-based economy (Berger et al. 2007).
At the same time, it is widely believed that students who have difficulty converting written information to knowledge are at a critical disadvantage in today’s world (Sim 2006). ICT literacy is therefore a desirable and necessary form of human capital, particularly in relation to an increasing emphasis on an individual’s success within the context of a knowledge economy.
Within the field of economics, there is also a growing theoretical consensus that the driving force behind economic growth is technological advancement; an assertion which has clearly found its way into educational policy formulation, and curriculum reform and practice for many governments, including Canada. As Milton (2005: 10) contends, “The early drivers of levels of investment in ICT in education have not changed. ICT skills are a key factor in both individuals’ success in the labour market and in national economic growth.” So while connectivity and access remain important obstacles within education, obstacles to creating literacy with ICTs within the education sector is the key to ensuring all groups have access to tapping the potential created by connectivity within Nova Scotia, particularly those groups that have been historically marginalized (Naylor and Frank, forthcoming).
* Community
Rural connectivity and literacy with that connectivity represents an important development in the historical use of ICTs to foster and enhance civic participation within the public domain (Dale and Naylor 2006). In this context, the use of the ICTs to expand dialogue, literacy and discourse are taken as new features of a potentially democratic process within the public sphere since to a large extent they seek to involve different groups employing different techniques to achieve different objectives.
Rural communities worldwide are now facing formidable challenges: significant demographic urban growth, with associated problems of economic and population losses in many rural and resource-dependent communities, with associated job loss and community decline; and meeting the basic necessities for clean air, clean water, energy, transportation, land use, housing, jobs, health, waste disposal, etc. Such problems are dynamically interconnected and cannot be dealt with in isolation; they require new approaches, frameworks, partnerships and tools to address them in an integrative fashion (Dale and Onyx, in press). Key to facing these challenges is the capacity of communities to coordinate and lead discussions around these issues, potentially contributing to a rapid development of social capital.
The emergent tools of Web 2.0, for example, suggest the importance of a set of communication tools that rural communities might adopt as strategies that cut across the rural socio-economic experience. It also highlights the critical need to address a plurality of literacies that need to be considered in relation to connectivity.
Internet Web 2.0 applications are “those that make the most of the intrinsic advantages of that platform: delivering software as a continually-updated services that gets better the more people use it, creating network effects through an ‘architecture of participation’ (O’Reilly 2005). In this way, Web 2.0 first assumes access to web based infrastructure but from there departs from the current understanding of the internet as a single entry point to access more information or as static communications link. Rather Web 2.0 is centered on a model of knowledge generation and production by communities.
As rural communities continue to face the challenges noted above, they require the tools to mobilize not only their civic voices and participation but their commerce and economies; and without the literacy to embrace and adapt the evolving architecture of the knowledge society and economy they risk becoming marginalized as technology ‘have-not’s’.
tangled webs of the brave new world
Come writers and critics who prophesize with your pen – And keep your eyes wide the chance won’t come again – And don’t speak too soon for the wheel’s still in spin – And there’s no tellin’ who that it’s namin’ – For the loser now will be later to win – For the times they are a-changin‘
For the past three days I’ve had that friggin’ song in my head. And most definitely, it has been Bob Dylan’s version of the song. It’s so stuck I often find myself walking down the street singing it fairly loudly, and upon recognizing that, I find myself wanting to burst on out into it… all theatrical and shit.
I love being a citizen of Now. Observing these structurally shaking instances of history.
Citizens of Iran, speaking out against their theocracy. The Women of Iran, finding their voices. The Net Generation of Iran, fighting violence with information-communication technologies. Amazing. I am sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for the results of this one. Unfortunately our attention spans here in the West are so short, especially the media’s attention span. Also unfortunately democracy always comes bundled with bureaucracy and it is possible that the institution has far more power to drag the recount process out. I suspect the Iran saga will be anti-climatic. They will do the recount, and the numbers won’t change. What then? The citizens will have to accept it. Just as US citizens did in their 2000 election … and in the end, they didn’t even get their recount. The Supreme Court decided… much like the Supreme Overlord will.
Unless, of course, the recount happens and the numbers do change… what will happen then? I have no idea.
I am ultimately convinced that if Obama had not won in November, we would have seen a similar uprising in the US. I know it is a highly theoretical thing to say, but I stand by it. What’s happening in Iran is a smackdown of cultures. What happened in the 2008 election was also a smackdown of cultures. If John McCain won in a landslide, or even by a narrow margin, there would have been protests and allegations of voter fraud en masse. In 2008, the outrage would have expanded past an audience of election wonking observers like it did in 2000 and 2004. You would have seen these scenes from Tehran in Washington.
God I’m happy that didn’t happen. I am increasingly impressed with Barack on a daily basis. He is governing exactly how I hoped he would. And, he is still using all those social media tools that got him elected to reach out to his constituents.
Though, when I read about a City in Montana that requires you submit all of you Web 2.0 logins and passwords, I think… WTF America? Background check takes on a whole new meaning when you have to start opening up your cyberlife to your employers. That is the depth approach to job screening.
Then I start thinking about the Bill just introduced in Canadian Parliament about intercepting Internet transmissions and gathering user information from ISPs and I think WTF Canada? “Twenty-first century technology calls for 21st-century tools,” said Justice Minister Rob Nicholson (via CBC). Indeed they do Minister Nicholson.
The Internet is blowing it all up. Thrusting us into a brave new world whether we want to go or not. We early adopters are all quite giddy about it. Once labelled the “cyber-utopianists” it is clear the skeptics are now paying attention. And jumping on board where they can. The revolution could never be televised because it must be an interactive, reflexive process for it to be real.
But, now that the Internets’ transformative potential is very clear, it becomes scary. Because Now, it is no longer theory… and you can bet your bottom dollar that there will be people trying to make their top dollars by attempting to exploit the technology for profit, for security, and for measuring an individual’s moral value by snooping around their Web 2.0 pages.
Now is, indeed an interesting and exciting time.
The line it is drawn the curse it is cast – The slow one now will later be fast – As the present now will later be past – The order is rapidly fadin’ – And the first one now will later be last – For the times they are a-changin’
Talkin’ ‘Bout My Generation…
Bread and Circuits:
“The electronic era tendency to view party politics as corny – no longer relevant or meaningful or useful to modern societal issues, and in many cases dangerous.” – from Generation X by Douglas Coupland, 1991
It occurred to me that Generation X will be turning 50 soon. It kind of freaked me out a bit. Is Generation X and the up-and-coming Net Generation ready to take the reigns or power during these turbulent times and over the next three decades as their Boomer parents retire?
According to demographer and digital theorist Don Tapscott (perhaps one of the most prolific demographers around today), our society is currently trying to balance the values of 4 distinct generational categories: The Boomers (those born between 1946 -1964); Generation X (1965 – 1976); The Net Generation (1977 – 1997) – also called the “me” generation, Generation Y, or the Millenials; and the Next Generation (1998 – 2008).
I have long been a believer in demography as being one of the most valuable social tools we have. Basic demographic data would include the salary you have, the type of neighborhood you live in, your education, your family status, how old you are, and whether or not you have a penis… to name a few. It has been argued that the most telling, or predicting, demographic characteristic is age (they call them cohorts). Age cohorts move in waves which are formed by the cultural conditions they are raised in… they are generally educated by the same curriculum, exposed to the same music and television, interfaced with the same technology and driven by the same cultural values.
There is a commonly accepted myth that the Net Generation is politically apathetic. That those under the age of 30 don’t vote, because they don’t care. They are too wrapped up in their iPods, cell phones and video games to pay attention. And that they form a huge chunk of the non-voting block. In his latest offering Grown up Digital (a sequel to his 2000 book, Growing up Digital), Tapscott proposes that while it is true the Net Generation doesn’t vote… they are actually more civically engaged than generations before. The difference? The ways that they are engaging.
Rather than going to the polls, they are going out to volunteer. Instead of casting ballots, they are writing blogs and tweeting at CNN and CBC. They aren’t in churches listening to sermons, they are on rooftop patios with margaritas discussing the issues of the day with each other.
This generation – my generation – along with the Gen Xers who jumped on the Internet bandwagon and Yippie/Hippie Boomers who never traded in their bullhorns and flower chains, have different values than the status quo Boomers, because my generation experienced and continues to experience culture differently than them. It’s not one-way communication… it’s two-way.
Our brains developed differently because they were stimulated differently. The way we learned was more mediated and interactive than the way the Boomers learned, and the things we were learning were focused around our planet, respect for diversity and individual freedom.
My generation was positively socialized. We were taught that beauty resides on the inside, that letters and numbers were fun and that inner city living didn’t have to be all about guns and gangs. We were socialized on Sesame Street…
For the most part, my generation understands that the personal is political. We were the first generation to experience perspective-widening effects of mass advertising with a social conscious through Unicef and Part of Your Heritage Commercials…
My generation has a different sense of humor. We get a kick out of turning the sacred into the profane and could never quite understand the hub-bub about being politically correct. We were entertained by the Simpsons…
My generation is far more media savvy than the Boomers. We seem to have a vague understanding of how hegemonic culture manipulates us, how media distorts, and that things are not always as they seem. Perhaps this explains our tendencies towards cynicism and distrust of authority. My generation learned all we needed to know about the media from Jon Stewart.
My generation is the steward of the Internet. We are the gatekeepers of code and the social web. We navigate the Information Highway with precision and speed, always ready to change lanes quickly, and never minding to take the scenic route to get to the proper exit. We are the mavens and connectors of our virtual communities, and we are uninhibited to express our opinions and expose ourselves to the world.
My generation is also the generation with the greatest amount of disposable income, ergo our consumer-power has every post-modern adman scouring the Internet for the hippest music and the hippest design. My generation is not having as many babies, but those of us who are get to revisit our childhoods through the massive recycling of Saturday Morning Cartoon Merchandise.
If it is true, that my generation doesn’t feel the urge to go out and engage with the democratic process, or participate in partisan tomfoolery, it is not because they don’t care – it is because the political system does not embrace their values. It is because they feel as though the system doesn’t serve them. It is because they view the system as outdated and inefficient. It is because the disenfranchisement goes way deeper than simply being lazy and apathetic.
This is why President Obama was so popular with young voters… not simply because he whipped them into a frenzy using social media, their media, but also because he promised revolutionary change in the way politics were done. So far, he’s been true to his word, and his approval rating is holding steady despite the rabble-rousing of choice Boomer republicans who aren’t quite ready to cede power to this culture of “loose morals” and irreverence.
My generation is ready, willing and able to safely land this bird, even if it is on an uninhabited island. In fact, we’d probably prefer an uninhabited island, so that we could experiment with new forms of democracy and social organization.
Why I am voting Green
I have a very dear friend named Greg. Greg has lived with schizophrenia for his whole adult life. After many struggles, psychotic breaks, pills, poverty, addictions and therapies, he has arrived at a very good place in his life. He has found a nice balance between the meds, his art, his friends and living. He has been on Income Assistance because of his schizophrenia for a while now. But recently, he has expressed a desire to get off I.A. and try to find a job. He’s in a stable housing situation, and starting to get involved in a few community and advocacy organizations around Mental Health. Greg will need his meds to be able to maintain a job though, and if he goes off of I.A. he loses coverage for his meds… you see the problem.
I jokingly said to him the other night that his situation now was a good symbol for everything that was wrong with the Departments of Health and Community Services. It is really not right.
So what does Greg have to do with why I’m voting Green? Well Green is not simply about the environment. It is actually about the approach. You see, approaching things in a Green way means looking at them holistically (David doesn’t like it when I use that word, because it’s flaky, and we are really trying hard to reduce the stereotype that the Green Party seems to still face in Canada and especially in Nova Scotia). Viewing something holistically means that you do your absolute best to look at it from all angles, and see exactly where it overlaps and intersects with other issues.
The reason why it’s Green, is because it is the physical environment first.
When David, Ryan (Watson) and I went to Dartmouth High last week, one of the kids there said, “so I’m going to die in 80 years and I don’t plan on having any kids, why should I care so much about the environment (he later admitted he was playing devil’s advocate). But I said to him… if our physical environment keeps going the way that it’s going, it might not be 80 years, but 40… and David asked if he wanted to go take a dip in the Harbour.
The reason why it’s Green is because environment means more than just saving the trees and putting up windmills… it’s about our social environment to. For too long our governments have been disconnected our selves from our environments, physical and social, for the sake of profit margins and powerful lobby groups.
Our physical environments and our social environments are intimately intertwined. We need clean air, clean food, clean water and protection from the elements absolutely first. Our survival depends on it. Yet, it seems as though it is too much to demand these things living in our democratic and abundant society. You may question the word abundant in these times of economic crisis, but we still have many resources at our disposal, despite the minuscule drops in our GDP.
Last night on CTV Atlantic, Ryan Watson was interviewed by Steve Murphy and he was asked, what do you mean by seeing opportunity in this global economic crisis? Ryan responded that when a crisis emerges, it is the perfect time to take a step back and examine why we have arrived at a crisis situation. It’s not about a few emergency room beds here and a few “green” jobs there… it’s about looking at the whole structure. It’s about taking a step back and examining whether or not we are delivering services in the most effective and efficient ways, it’s about throwing away the perspectives that got us in this mess in the first place… it’s about moving into the 21st century with 21st century ideas using 21st century technology and organizing our government in 21st century ways…
The Green Party is the only party suggesting that it’s time to move away from the GDP as a measure of our progress and province well-being, and instead adopt the GPI, Geniune Progress Index. The fundamental difference between the GDP and the GPI is social accounting. Social accounting is a difficult task because really, what price tag can you put on a human life? How to do calculate the human experience in economics? The current trend is to simply discount it as a part of the equation. The GDP calculates the value of the person as a consumer, and nothing more. The GPI considers the value of a person as a person, participating and communicating with their community.
I am so sick of being referred to as a consumer. I am a person damnit. I have a family and a community. My life is more meaningful than being part of the bottom line in some trans-national corporations year-end profit margins. Greg is not a mental health consumer, he is a person who requires a little more support in his community because his brain works a little differently than most.
I love my province. Nova Scotia is a gem. We have a perfect-sized population, a wealth of natural resources, and a creative class with great ideas. I believe in the 6 priniciples that the Green Party embraces: Ecological wisdom, social justice, participatory democracy, nonviolence, sustainability, and respect for diversity.
I am voting Green because I want to see structural change which reflects their holisitic approach to the issues. I am voting Green because I believe the citizens need an opportunity to participate in the dialogue.
“Safer” Communities Act?
On the surface, the Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act is a fine piece of legislation. It essentially empowers citizens in their communities to do something about brothels, crack-houses, gambling rings and other types of seedy operations in their neighbourhoods. Police then take this information, assess the situation, and if evidence warrants, they get a court order to evict the tenants of these crime houses.
“Shut ‘em down,” the mob cries.
Shutting down known crime houses, informed by the people who know best about the goings-on in their communities sounds great… no? But what if in the end, there are no criminal charges laid against the tenants of the crime houses being evicted? Certainly criminals live in houses where criminal activities are taking place… right? Certainly if a judge orders that tenants be removed from their homes, the tenants are facing criminal charges for their criminal activities… right? Certainly the idea is not to shut down crime houses and then disperse criminals elsewhere in other people’s communities… right?
So why is it then, that today there is a man in Cape Breton living in his car with his dogs, while his wife and one of his sons stays with friends, and his other two sons seek help for their addictions? According to CBC NS this morning, a family was removed from their home under the Safer Communities Act. The windows and doors boarded up for 90 days because of neighbour complaints of criminal activities taking place in the house. No one living in the house was charged with a criminal offense… no one living in the house was carted off to jail… no one living in the house was able to face their accusers in a court of law… and denied the right to even appeal the decision.
It is alarming.
Because while the Safer Communities Act has done much to shut down brothels and crack-houses and gambling rings in low-income neighbourhoods based on community reporting of criminal activities, how is it that making this family homeless will make the community safer?
I’m even willing to accept that criminal activity was indeed taking place in this guy’s house. That the complaints registered against this family by their neighbours were valid. That the consequences of having two adult sons suffering from addictions disrupted and unsettled the community. Given that I am not party to the documents which resulted in the court order I cannot make a decision on this either way. But it sort of sounds like this guy was a victim himself. Being a hostage to addiction in his own home.
What concerns me the most about this story, and the possible precedent that it sets, is that the burden of proof is reduced into some sort of perverted community-based panopticon. A family is sentanced to become homeless for 90 days because their neighbours didn’t like the kind of company they kept.
Perhaps I am over-reacting. Perhaps there is some piece of condemning evidence against this guy or other members of his family which is so compelling that such drastic measures were required. But it seems to me that if that were the case, there would be criminal charges of some description laid.
The kicker in this story is that the accused does not even have the right to appeal the decision. Even if he did, he cannot afford a lawyer to represent his family’s rights.
How is it that we can allow a family in this province, in the 21st century, suffer the consequences for crimes that were not committed? How is it that our own rule of law has allowed the tyranny of the majority to trump the personal security of a citizen? How is it that tossing a family suspected (but not convicted) of criminal activity out of their home for 90 days results in creating a safer community?
Addiction is a nasty thing. It is a mental health condition, fed by the desperation and hopelessness of poverty. It produces all kinds of unsavory and criminal activity in our communities and neighborhoods. But is our best strategy really to simply shut down the buildings without any plan to deal with the people inside of them?
I guess it’s just a good thing that 1) this guy didn’t have any kids under the age of 15 who were also rendered homeless by this bizzaro situation and 2) the curfew law is not yet in place… poor bugger would be facing a $500 fine everyday for the next 90 days, until they were allowed to go back into their home.
We need to seriously rethink the way we approach law and order around here.
Fringe Fancies of the Loonie Left
There’s a running joke at work now, they are calling me “the politician’s wife.” My friends are calling me Michelle Obama. Well, some of them are. Others are asking how we got involved with with The Green Party. Except they are phrasing it, “how did you get hooked up with these flaky loonies anyway.” To that I got defensive (as any good partisan and politician’s wife would).
“Have you even looked at any of the Green Party’s stuff? I mean, before you start calling them loonies, you should probably read their strategy ideas. Remember it’s the Green Party, not the Pinko party.”
To which he responded he would read the strategy document when it was released tomorrow.
Seriously, we understand the Green Party of Nova Scotia is not in a position to take power on June 9. This is, after all, only our second provincial election. Even David has a realistic goal set for the day. 500 votes. That’s the goal. We’re asking people in our riding (Dartmouth South – Portland Valley) to be 1 of 500 who place an X in the box by David’s name. 1 of 500 who place an X in the box for an alternative approach to political representation. 1 of 500 who place an X in the box to say, I agree that the envrionment, social justice, community sustainability and participatory democracy are important issues that need to be brought to the table.
Of course, if he gets more than 500 votes, we’ll be giddy, since this riding saw 308 votes for the Greens in the last (and their first) provincial election (the third highest riding in the province). But like the tagline in the Green Party brochure, we are approaching David’s participation in this election with “clear-eyed realism.”
David would be a fabulous MLA. Although I am obviously biassed, you will probably not find a person who knows David who would disagree with this statement. Someone with a better grasp of political theatre you will never meet. And he would certainly make the scrum an interesting and entertaining event.
Even our former MLA from Eastern Passage, Kevin Deveaux, understood David’s grasp of politics during the 2007 by-election in the area (that David was voting in and blogging about). He commented “Articulate, intelligent and balanced… glad to see there are thoughtful voters who are able to see through the political bullshit and make decisions based on facts.“
David would indeed be a fabulous MLA, because he gets it…
And because he gets it, I have been able to get it. I credit all that I understand about the political process to David. I also credit my ability to logically attack complex problems to the late night debates and intellectual sparring which often occur in this household. Likewise, I think David would credit me with his understanding of human behaviour and social theory, two areas which were beyond his expertise, but thoroughly entrenched in mine. David and I make a kick ass team when we combine our strengths and mask each others deficits.
In fact if David does, by miracle, manage to get elected, Nova Scotians will be getting a good deal… two brains for the price of one.
We get that there are a myriad of issues facing Nova Scotians today. We get that these issues are complex and interconnected with our economies and our environments. From health care to education to the increasing cost of living, we get that Nova Scotians are struggling to cope with the uncertainty of the future, because we are struggling to cope with the uncertainty of our future.
The relationships that exist between our physical environment, our economy, our culture, and our daily existence in rural and urban Nova Scotia need to be disentangled. While our current government claims to “get it”, years of mismanaged policy and finances, coupled with a ‘wait and see’ approach to the effects of the global economic crisis on Nova Scotia, proves they just don’t get it. While our opposition parties also claim to get it, the platforms released in this current election reveal them to be clinging to 20th century perspectives in the face of 21st century complexity.
We really wish our politicians did get it, so that we wouldn’t feel so compelled to set aside the beautiful month of May to actively engage with it like this. Usually during elections, we snipe from the sidelines. We ridicule these stale old policiticans and moan about these stale old policies. We usually hold an alcohol-fuelled salon on election night… not an alcohol-fuelled victory party.
And I have a feeling it will be a victory party. No matter how many votes David gets in the end. Because it turns out that this is an exercise of participatory democracy. We may not be getting proportional representation any time soon – but we are seizing this opportunity to have our voices heard, we are seizing this opportunity to have an excuse to go knock on the doors of our neighbors and chat with them about the things that they need, and we are seizing this opportunity to get our feet wet.
Because when the time comes that Nova Scotians realize that the environment, social justice, sustainability and paticipatory democracy are not just the fringe fancies of the loonie left, but the issues which are fundamental to a truly free and just democray, David, and I and the Green Party of Nova Scotia will have more than just a platform, we’ll have an implementable plan.
Web 2.0 and the Nova Scotia Election
Back during the last US Presidential Elections, I wrote a blog about the candidates utilization of the Internet in their campaigns. It was way back in the election when it looked like John McCain didn’t have a chance in hell of getting the Republican nod, and Barack Obama had just won a legal battle to have his campaign staff take over the MySpace site which someone else started in his name. I had no idea back then that Obama would turn his campaign into a social media blitzkrieg… picking up where Howard Dean was cut off in 2004.
Obama and his campaign staff knew how to do it… they knew how to effectively use Web 2.0 and engage a whole generation of otherwise disenfranchised voters. By reaching out to them online, because he knew that he probably would get them to come out to the rallies… In fact, after his comment at the first ever Virtual Presidential Town Hall regarding marijuana legalization and the “type” of people he was engaging online… he probably didn’t want too many of them showing up at the rallies after all!
In any case, in that review, I gave each candidate’s website a Web 2.0/Hipness rating, on a scale of 1 to 10… ranking the sites in terms of ability to engage youth, disenfranchised cynics, connectors and netizens based on my critical understanding of all of those things…
Here in Nova Scotia, things are a little different. The population of youth, disenfranchised cynics, connectors and netizens is substantially smaller than the population of status quo voters. We Nova Scotians have been accused of being fearful of progressive change… and Web 2.0 has not necessarily penetrated the whole population as well as in other provinces. Frig, not even our whole population has access to High-Speed Internet… with far too many rural communities being left in the dust.
However, in an election, sometimes it is the small populations of those who have never previously voted which can make big differences in the election outcomes… And politicians are recognizing more and more that the Internet, and the effective use of Web 2.0 platforms can make those small differences have mega impacts. So far the candidates have been slow to take full advantage of the platforms. Of the three mainstream leaders, only Stephen McNeil is twittering… and none have encouraged user-generated video and photo… But they are all trying to connect using their Party’s websites.
Yesterday I chirped “The Liberals are smoking the other parties in terms of an effective Social Networking infrastructure… #nselection” and after taking a thorough look at their site, now I know why. A company called KTUpload is powering the Liberals Website. I worked very closely with one of the folks at KTUpload for years at the Atlantic Centre for the Study of the Information Society… and while he had little to do with the site, I know that he “gets” it. So while the Liberals have a smokin’ website, it is more important to note that they had the foresight to hire a web development team which gets it.
First point… When you Google NS Liberals, the sponsored link at the very top of the page is Darrell Dexter’s NDP website (Brilliant Guerrilla Marketing technique from the NDP)
Second point… The site is clean and easy to navigate. It has clear menu titles and no drop-down boxes. The pages interlink with one another very well… so if you are interested in looking at the media, you can click through the home page… and you will find the Media link on other pages of the site.
Third point… Web 2.0 platform use. The Liberals are using all the big ones… Facebook, Flickr, Youtube and Twitter, and thier links to these pages are prominently displayed on the home page. You don’t have to search for the legitimate groups… you just have to click through.
Although the home page of the Liberal Website may have too many sets of Stephen McNeil’s eyes on it… there is a simple contact form which makes it easy for the voter looking to get a sign or volunteer or get on the mailing list without have to search for it.
The “Follow the Leader” feature on the home page links to a calendar of events for McNeil… but when you click on it… there are very few engagements, making it look like he’s not very active on the campaign trail… While it is a great feature, it may not be juicy enough to be a home page link, when the photo gallery (which is buried on the media page) is very juicy and may have been a better choice as being prominently displayed… either that, or display the calendar for the whole month + of the campaign to show all the places he’s been as well as where he is going on a single view (they could even integrate the photos into the calendar)
The Candidates page shows the current 29 candidates for the Liberals. You can click through to a little bio page with some of their info… the candidates pages are inconsistent in their format. Some of the photos are way too big for a quick load of the page, which is problematic for those who get impatient with page load time (especially for all those folks in rural Nova Scotia who only have dial-up). Also, the candidates who are on twitter, should have links to them on their individual bio pages.
All the multimedia is great on the Liberals page, but they should have the text of the videos audio as well (again for our good friends in rural Nova Scotia who are trying to access the site via dial-up)
Overall the Liberal website gets my Web 2.0/Hipness Rating of 7/10… they lost points because no matter how good their site is, it’s really hard to make Stephen McNeil hip and because of the issues listed above. But also because there is absolutely no where on the website which indicates their platform or positions on the issues… Aesthetics should never compromise information.
It is unclear who is behind the NDP website, which leads me to believe that someone from the party itself is maintaining it. There are pros and cons to this approach. On the one hand, the party will have more control of the content… on the other hand, sometimes you should just let the professionals do their thing.
I do not like the amount of blank space on the NDP’s website. The colour scheme seems weird to me… Too much blue, and not enough orange. The slide show is nice, but there are far too many images with text that is what I would consider ‘negative campaigning’… too much talking about the Conservatives… People are coming to the website to find out about the NDP, not what the Conservatives are doing wrong. And why oh why do the NDP have a widget with PC on it as one of the most prominent graphics on the home page. They are on the offensive, and the tactics leave a bad taste in my mouth.
I like the “your action centre” widget, but disagree with using the word “your” for the videos and pictures on the site… because they are very obviously campaign photos and videos… not “your” videos and photos. If they wanted to show ‘your’ videos and photos, they would have a site upload form and allow supporters to *really* share “their” photos and videos from the campaign trail. They are really “Your Candidates” videos and photos…
The NDP have one up on the Liberals in that they have links to “the issues.” Though again every single stance on every single issue is preambled with where the conservatives have failed, and there is very little substance, or indication how the NDP plan to address the issues. So while they have done their job in identifying their priorities in this campaign… they have not done much to tell the voter the strategy in addressing the issues.
Their Candidates page is nice. I like the electoral map and the list (though rather than alphabetizing by name, it may be better to alphabetize by riding). Their candidate table could also be bigger, with direct links to their websites, emails, etc right on that main candidate page, which would be easy to do if they widened their content page.
The NDP have their Web 2.0 links embedded in the footer of every page, which is very clever… but the blue font is hard to read and the logos are not prominent enough (and the Facebook one may actually violate the FB TOS for logo use).
Overall (and though it breaks my heart) the NDP get my web 2.0/Hipness rating of 6/10… Negative campaigning is NOT hip… and the Website is lacking in aesthetic appeal, without the content to help bump the rating up a bit.
So… when I Google NS PCs, the sponsored link (again) is a link to the NDP website. But, the first link is not the Tory site, it is the Nova Scotia Young Progressive Conservatives site… in fact, Rodney MacDonald’s site is no where on the first page of search results at all. A readjustment of the search to NS Conservatives (still the NDP sponsored link), but there it is (immediately followed by a CTV news story about the conservatives “failing”)
The Conservatives have a very slick website. It is extremely aesthetic and “Nova Scotian”… which is easy to do when you have access to the designers which have gotten some very nice contracts from the Tories (NSLC, and the Nova Scotian Gaming Authority to name two)… Revolve Branding 360 are big playas round these parts… and the Tories have always understood the importance of branding…
Aesthetically, the PCs score big points on the site… they do have the most visually pleasing home page for my eyes. That said, I can’t really find many too many design “problems” with the site, except in their Web 2.0 use.
While they allow the option to “share” their site on a multitude of platforms… they do not offer the voter the chance to *engage* the party and the candidates by linking to their Facebook, Twitter and YouTube presence… in fact the lack of these links indicates to me (a non-Tory supporter) that they do not even have a presence on these sites… ergo, it is not their priority to engage and interact with the electorate in this way.
So rather than critique the site, I’ll point out the subliminal marketing strategies behind some of the graphics and language on the site.
They are rotating three pictures which visually sum up their whole campaign beautifully.
The first is a photoshopped picture of Rodney and his team (the photoshop is in the sign on the podium Rodney is standing at) “Proven Record Economy First” This image wants to remind you that Rodney has a team of capable MLAs behind him… They are applauding him (some very vigorously – look at the two dudes on the exteme left in the front row). This photo, reinforces the other prominent language on the site… “our leader” “our team” “our track record”… they are presenting a united front. Reminding those who are uncertain of Rodney’s experience himself, that he has a solid team of experience behind him.
The second photo is a garbage can, with a white background simply stating that the Liberals (red font) and NDP (orange font) have thrown 20,000 jobs in the garbage. This must have to do with the infrastructure contract cancelling fiasco, but in the end it doesn’t matter… the graphic doesn’t link to the whole story like the other two images do… just a simple statement of interpreted truth with a simple graphic to accompany it.
The third photo is a beauty… perhaps the most compelling of all three. It is related to gambling, and risk… which the designer knows much about given they do design work for both ALC and the gaming corporation… It is an image of two sets of dice, one with letters (probably Boggle dice) spelling out the word “R-I-S-K-Y” and two standard orange one. Both of the visible sides of the dice show the smallest possible numbers they could be arranged with… notice the two ones…
The PC website gets a Web 2.0/Hipness score of 7/10 as well. If the issues around the Web 2.0 connections were resolved, along with a letting Rodney MacDonald have a Twitter account… then I would revise my earlier statement that the Liberals were smokin’ the other parties in their SNS infrastructure, to say that the Tories were.
The NDP don’t care much about the Green Party… not enough to pay for a sponsored link when someone Googles it… But, the NS Green Party is so unknown that Google wants to know if you really meant the “NZ Green Party”.
The Green Party of Nova Scotia uses the federal Green Website template. Which is a good thing, because it is important for people to remember that they are another Federal party… not simply a fringe party with little support… despite the fact that it is a fringe party with very little support.
The Green Party website has no external Web 2.0 integration, however does have a little SNS embedded in it’s site called “The Green Network”. It’s a pretty good idea, though I am beginning to question the effectiveness of trying to start up your own SNS when there is free access to popular ones like Facebook and Twitter… only the most diehard of supporters will actually take the extra step to become a member of yet another SNS… It could, however, be a VERY effective tool for coordinating their campaign provincially… for the candidates to connect and share ideas, and to create strategies which can unite the party itself. But it needs to be integrated with the large existing and successful SNS’s to be very effective.
The Green Party site does not appear to be in election mode at all. There is no candidate list, no campaign rhetoric. no upcoming events. But, the one thing that The Green Party Site does have is content and ideas… Their About the Party page outlines the Green Party’s core values as a party… something that none of the other parties care to offer up to the voter.
The other thing I really like about the site, is the opportunity to really get to know the leader of the Green Party, Ryan Watson… He has a blog, he has a twitter… and if you message him, he messages back! Ryan Watson is young, handsome, charismatic, and hip himself… which scores the Party more points in this election than it has in past elections the NS Greens have participated in.
Overall, the website is severely lacking though. No candidate list, an online form to request a sign which doesn’t inform you if your request has been completed and a graphics which lead the viewer to believe that the Green Party is a one issue, environmental, tree-huggin’ party. Which isn’t bad if you are into that sort of thing… but will not play very well in industrial Nova Scotia.
Unfortunately, the Nova Scotian Greens have a small operating budget, therefore they rely heavily on volunteers to carry out the campaign… so it is hard to do regular updates and high level interaction… Ryan Watson is doing well assuming the role of leader… it’s just too bad that he doesn’t have a political infrastructure to back him up… we may have heard much more buzz about him if he had.
So while I’m giving the Green Party the lowest Web 2.0/Hipness rating a 5/10… I’m giving Ryan Watson the prize for hippest leader with an 8/10.
Hope you found this deconstruction interesting…
A 1400 Word Long Rambling Rant about History, The Enlightenment, Capitalism and The Brave New World
There is no denying that it is an exciting time to be alive. Though some will argue that mankind is in a constant state of evolution and revolution, therefore these times are no more or less significant than any of the times before them… but I disagree. We’re in a state of flux and riding the wave of whateveritis to whereveritis that we’re going. We seem to be experiencing some sort of large scale crisis of meaning… and when that has happened in the past, new systems emerge in an effort to stabilize the structure.
So far though, the course of Western Human Civilization, in all its manifestations and adaptations, has operated based on the same structure… one which features a power base from above, controls the resources, and distributes those resources according to their rules. When huge shifts have happened throughout civilization, they have occurred because a new group has infiltrated and assumed control of the power base… and they change the rules according to their values and philosophies and ideologies…
The Enlightenment. The last time there was a massive shift in the rules… The Rational Empiricists, those who were the strongest critics of the Religious Establishment… had finally organized themselves well enough to change the conversation. Through a series of revolutions, they infiltrated the structure and changed the way that resources were distributed. Two new models emerged from the Enlightenment… Capitalism and Representative Democracy.
The rules of this game were laid out in a couple of key documents which provided the masses with a new narrative of rights, freedom and equality… The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, The Social Contract by Russo, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica by Isaac Newton , A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft, The Emancapation Proclamation and The Delcaration of Independence are a few off the top of my head.
Although the systems changed… and the new narrative had much promise, the structure did not change. That is, resource control was still concentrated in the hands of a select few… and they were still riding on a fundamental ideal of absolute moral authority, guided by a Christian God. A Christian God which would reward materially if you did his good works here on earth. Both before and after the Enlightenment, wealth and power was still concentrated among those who were literate… among those who could spin the best yarns, promise the best material rewards and be the best manipulators of and dictators to the masses.
Capitalism and Democracy were new systems of the best and brightest minds of the times… Replacing previous systems of Imperialism and Monarchy… but they still were being actualized through a top-down structure. And perhaps worse than the systems they replaced, they were presented and legitimized as the “best” and most objective processes towards the ultimate goal of the new narrative… that of personal freedom, individualism, and consumer choice… things that were attainable by anyone and entitled to everyone, equalized by the checks and balances of these shiny new systems.
Some very important ideas were born in The Enligtenment… but I tend to believe that Rousseau and Locke and Smith had much higher expectations of humans than they were capable of living up to at that point in history. The lofty ideals of the narratives did not confront human as flawed, and prone to greed and corruption when faced with the opportunity to advance himself despite the consequences to the greater good. Like communism, democratic capitalism looks way better on paper than it does in its actuality.
And ultimately the culture of greed, competition, entitlement and individualism that the systems of Capitalism and democracy fostered, inherently compromised the integrity of everything… and has now brought us here, where the architects of Capitalism and Democracy once sat… skeptical, cynical, doubting the norms, and angry…Calling for Change! Now!
And the calls are being echoed around the Western world… Change! Now!
But the question remains; as the ideas and systems of the Enlightenment changed the narrative, whose ideas will shape the next narrative? Who gets to change and enforce the rules? Will we completely break the cycle of civilization, and finally change the way we control and distribute resources and power? Or will we once again reproduce the structure, but frame them with new systems and processes?
David claims that Capitalism is “the only natural system” that it is as old as humanity itself, and that morphs and changes with the power structure. I tend to agree, but only because I don’t think that those who would replace the structure (which are also a natural byproduct of the structure) have figured out effective delivery systems of that structure… and no one is going to be convinced to abandon the structure with nothing there to take its place. Therefore the structure remains and the new systems have to adapt to it.
I tend to believe the only ingredient to finally compel us to shakedown power structure will lie in the realm of knowledge of human perception. Some major revelation which forces us to stop competing for power and resources and re-evaluate everything that we think that we know about human existence. Indeed, if the pursuits to find absolute, objective truth about our existence, pursuits enacted by the ideals of the Enlightenment, are allowed to progress naturally, then perhaps Western Civilization will be provided the opportunity to actualize… I believe if we are allowed to naturally evolve as a society, then this structural change is imminent.
But we may have gotten to the point, where the current power structure, in its effort to maintain power will do everything that it can to suppress any new knowledge which arises that could potentially cause that shakedown.
We will never be allowed to naturally evolve…
In all likelihood, the structure stays the same, and fulfills its next destiny – the fascist democracy… the perfect dystopian blend of individual freedom and comodification of identity.
Though it might sound like an inherently contradictory system… In my mind, the fascist democracy is the one where the narrative of personal freedom, individual entitlement, and consumer choice as being the raison d’etre, and all those which stand in the way of the pursuit of these things, will be judged and persecuted for it, if not institutionally, then by their peers… It is a recombinant society… the capitalist imprint mutated, and resulting in the effects as prophecized by Huxley, Foucault, Asimov and Gibson…
We will be given robots and bionic eyes (with Twitter integration) and hovercars and SOMA to keep us preoccupied. There will be a cure for cancer and a microchip that we can implant into our wrists, which contain all of our data identities… S.I.N., PIN, MSI, Interac… we will never have to worry about those pesky cards again. We will have two minutes of hate towards our political enemies… those who despise freedom and democracy… and enclose the absolute poor and sick in large glass domes… not to mention the ugly and the fat… We will be able to have our genes manipulated to produce the image of perfection… designer babies coming out of their physical vessels of the best and the brightest.
And some might ask… well is that so bad? A friend of mine told me that she was so primed for change, that if it meant we were hurtled into the Brave New World… she wouldn’t care… she just wanted something to give… for the next phase to make itself visible and certain. Indeed, as I typed the paragraph above, I ask myself… well is the Brave New World so bad? Why is it that I continue to fight, what appears to be destiny? I don’t have the answers to those questions yet… all I know is that I do…
In the end, the systems and narratives that win out will be the ones which holds the most promise. That spirit that has been with us through feudalism, imperialism and now, capitialism… will morph into its next top-down, heirarchial system… only this time, our brains are much more malleable and squishy… we actually already idolize the cultural ingredients necessary for the top-down structure to take this next leap. Technology, Beauty and Pleasure. Therefore, we will almost certainly, and willfully accept the new system, in whatever form it takes. And be fooled once again into thinking that change has occured and we have naturally evolved to our next form of social organization.
