Week 8’s session saw Thomas Nash and Sally Angelson discussing their activism in relation to conflicts. It got me thinking about how, as young people, it feels like we can’t really make a difference- not when these issues are overwhelmingly huge and distant. But a few years ago I stumbled on the single most effective tool in combating my activism anxiety and now I want to share it with you.
Global Citizen is an organisation which has the aim to end extreme poverty by 2030. As poverty is deeply interconnected with war- they are both causes and results of each other, GC tends to work with third world countries that have been impacted by conflict (however this is not an exclusive partnership). Available as both a website and downloadable application, GC provides an online platform for people to follow and take action on issues they are passionate about. These issues are categorised under the following:
The ‘actions’ that can be taken are all online- sending emails, tweeting at government officials, spreading information and educating oneself on the realities faced by those living in poverty. These actions are worth ‘points’ which can be saved up and then spent as raffle tickets to go into the draw to win free passes to music festivals, concerts and other local events.
Hugh Evans, founder of Global Citizen, describes this platform as “democracy on steroids” because people can engage with issues they’re passionate about year round. And the thing is; GC works. Global Citizens instigated a twitter invasion of Norway in August 2015. They bombarded the Prime Minister of Norway with tweets during her election campaign. Unable to stop the flood of tweets, she was forced to respond. Two weeks later she pledged to double her country’s contribution to girls education globally over four years (from NOK 290 million in 2014, to NOK 590 million in 2017). GC utilises the incredible technology we have available to us, particularly as young people, to put pressure on nation’s leaders to acknowledge and respond to world issues.
Global Citizen does not only take momentary interest in global problems though. Once a world leader pledges to make changes in legislature, funding etc, GC begins tracking their progress and releases reports periodically. These are publicly published in the cyberspace to hold nations accountable. This ensures that promises are meaningful and social change is guaranteed.
This platform is wildly successful in harnessing citizen passion to achieve justice- it’s an accessible and effective tool that anyone can use to make a change. In the past few weeks, we have proven ourselves capable of influencing legal change in first world countries but now is not the time to slow down. We have the ability to change people’s circumstances all over the world and we must continuing working for social justice. I implore you; become a Global Citizen. There is bound to be an issue you are passionate about which you can take meaningful action on from our corner of the world.
Bibliography:
https://gsdrc.org/professional-dev/poverty-and-conflict/
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3ehRnijLbvOOqcgzrELJHV?si=QPvYiTpbSga979z9NCsmhQ
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/twitter-solberg-norway-commits/
All images sourced from https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/
This platform seems very useful in our current online communities!
I’ve found that sometimes it’s very easy to feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of small (yet still very good and valuable movements) which are available to subscribe to online, to a point where it’s hard to tell where is the best place to dedicate effort in order to make quantifiable change. This issue has the potential to lead to inaction, but Global Citizen seems like it overcomes that issue by collating a range of movements into one site. This combination of different methods and ideas appears to allow for a well established site which achieves its goal of making widespread change.
Thank you for this! I definitely relate to what you were saying about feeling distant from big issues I hear so much about so this sounds like a great way to get involved. It’s a disappointing reality that many charities and organisations can’t be easily trusted since most people engage with charity online these days – that’s why its more important than ever to be sharing reliable organisations that we care about and that allow us to actually do some good.