Amy Saunderson-Meyer

With the dramatic uptake of new media tools – such as mobile applications, digital media, blogging, social networking and video activism – do citizens, citizen groups and service organisations, have the power to challenge the state and mobilize political change?  

Global examples

In a recent interview by the Guardian UK, CEO of 2020 Social, Gaurav Mishra argues that there are two main paradigms of digital activism: empowering people with information and engaging with inspiration.

Mishra lists Freedom Fone as a good example of a simple-to-use technology which empowers disadvantaged communities mainly in Africa and Asia, with access to basic information and with a voice to tell their stories firsthand.

The Econet lines of the MDC audio news and information service were recently suspended a few days after its launch.

I had visions of Bulawayo being a sleepy little hollow and perhaps in some ways it is.  But last week, after arriving at Radio Dialogue nestled in Pioneer House in Bulawayo’s central business district, I was very pleasantly surprised.  We were in the City of Skies to run a practical two-day workshop with six local organisations on using Freedom Fone and Pioneer House seemed to me, to be pioneering the way!