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Listen, Participate,Transform. A social media framework for local government
The Young Foundation June 2010
A Local 2.0 think-pieceJune 2010
Local 2.0 is a Young Foundation project funded by the Department of Communities and Local Governmenthttp://local2point0.wordpress.comFollow us on twitter @local2point0
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Introduction
Impending budget cuts mean that local government will need to change the way itworks, largely moving away from a model of delivering services to and for people, toa model of delivering services with people. Public servants will be required to buildnew relationships with citizens; relationships to help support civil society inresponding to inevitable challenges. As a consequence, local and central government needs to find better ways to forgenew partnerships, involving citizens and the state working together to generate newideas, tap into latent community capacity and make better use of local assets.These challenges come at a time when social media has become part of everyday lifefor millions of people. For those in central and local government, social media willundoubtedly become part of everyday business – a channel for improved dialogue,wider networks and a new kind of mutualism that will be central to deliveringeffective public services. However, at this point social media is largely unchartedterritory for many councils and public agencies.Good and bad examples, from councils using Twitter during emergencies, topoliticians making inappropriate remarks, demonstrate the power of social media andprovide lessons and inspiration to new adopters. But these high-profile successesand mistakes also distort the picture of both the opportunities and risks that socialmedia presents for government. The fear of getting it wrong stifles many individualsand agencies from taking the first steps towards using social media to engage peopleas residents, services users, community groups and active citizens.This paper – the second in a series from the Young Foundation’s Local 2.0 project –is intended to support those councils interested in using social media, by presentinga simple and practical framework to base social media activity on.The framework, adapted from work by one of the world’s largest media agencies,allows councils to approach social media with less trepidation. It encouragesauthorities to start by listening and analysing social media activity. Councils shouldthen participate in conversations with five actions: to create dialogue with citizens, toenergise citizens around a particular theme or event, to support communities to helpeach other, to involve people in decisions, and to measure social media activity. Butsocial media will achieve more than just conversations and communication; it willlead to a transformation in existing ways of doing business. Services will benefit fromgreater insight with which they can redesign their delivery, some of the old ways of doing things will become obsolete, and new business models will emerge that arebuilt around social media and other internet and mobile technologies.
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A SOCIAL MEDIA FRAMEWORK FOR LOCAL GOVERNMENT,
ADAPTEDFROM
BEING SOCIAL: THE MEC GUIDE TO SOCIAL MEDIA (2009)
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Listen
to social media users and conversations about local issues
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Participate
in conversations, building dialogue with citizens through socialmedia, but also by: energising them around local issues, providing spaces forresidents to support each other, and ultimately empowering them throughdecision making. The impact of participation should also be measured
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Transform
service redesign, replacing or complimenting existing ways of working and adopting new models of workingTo support the framework, this paper draws on lessons from the public and privatesector, as well as statistical evidence to address the concerns expressed by localgovernment officers about the systematic deployment of social media tools.
Section 1: a social media framework forlocal government
The end of the broadcast democracy
At first glance, the three Prime Ministerial debates screened during the 2010 UK elections strengthened our traditional ‘broadcast democracy’ – viewers consumingthe messages of leaders were dominated by TV. However, while millions of viewerswere sitting at home –
perhaps discussing the events with friends or family on thesofa – thousands were engaging in mass online democratic participation, using socialmedia tools to discuss and debate and arguably, influence what leaders were saying.During the third debate over 33,000 Twitter users wrote over 150,000 tweets,
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andthrough all three debates, newspapers offered live commentary, weaving in theviews of readers with the analysis of journalists.
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