ROLE OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN THE

PROCESS OF POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION OF EDUCATED YOUTH: A GENER

PERSPECTIVE
 Abstract:

In the past political scientists and media intellectuals have labelled youth as dispassionate and

unmoved by the political events. But last decade has seen rapid changes, first mainstream media

and now the use of information and communication technologies have revolutionized the political

culture all across the globe. Hence, ICTS have become the catalyst, and encouraged youth: both

male and female to participate in politics. The present study critically examined and unfolded the

role of information and communication technologies: social media, internet, mobile phones and

other resources in promoting political socialization in the life of educated youth in a gender

perspective. This empirical study examined the consumption, patterns of consumption and

behavior of youth consuming the information and communication technologies. This research

addressed the phenomenon of change, explained the concept of political socialization up to a

greater extent and linked it with political interest, political orientation, political trust and political

participation of educated youth. Apart from that, the diversity in the political vision of men and

women has also been examined. This detailed study also analyzed the role of cultivation theory in

political orientation in a genre perspective. Quantitative method of research was used to collect the

data. For this purpose, 700 students of the University of Punjab Lahore have been selected. The

study also reviewed the previous academic and literary work written on the same topic. The

random sampling covered the multiple aspects and concerns of male and female.

1.2 Hypothesis

The hypotheses for the research study are as stated below.

H1: There is a substantial relationship between the time spent on ICTS and frequency of using

internet for political purposes.

H2: The use of social media websites has a significant impact on online and offline political

participation.

H3: Predicting the political orientation on face book, twitter and on other social media platforms

is almost impossible.

H3: Use of ICTs has created a positive relationship between youth and political intellectuals

including: journalists, politicians, and political analysts.

H4: ICTs have bring a signification changes in the communication at the masse level.

H5: In Pakistan, ICTs have made it possible for youth to know the political history and political

issues of the country.

1.3 Objectives of the Study

 To measure the differences in the usage of ICTs among youth in gender perspective;

 To explore the differences in the patterns of ICTs use in gender perspective;

 To examine the purposes of using ICTSs by both male and female youngsters engaged

with ICTs;

 To fine out the perception of male and female students regarding the role of ICTs in

political socialization with opposite sex;

 To scrutinize the students perception regarding the ICTs role in increasing the

information level of youth;

 To investigate the perception of students about the role of ICTs for addressing the

academic activities of youth;

  To look into students perception about ICTs role for creating awareness about rights;

 Tow find out the perception of students about ICTs function in career planning and

economic aspects;

 Tow find out the students perception about the function of ICTs in affecting youth’s

morality;

 To examine the students insight about the role of ICTs in creating harassment.

1.4 Research Method

Research method is defined as “a systematic approach to examine the credibility of various integral

components of any particular research project on consistent and transparent manner in order to

address the issues raised in research questioner”. For this specific research work I have adopted

the quantitative method of collecting the relative data.

Quantitative method is being considered more fruitful and beneficial when it comes to explain the

“way of thinking, behavior, attitudes and perceptions of different individuals. Apart from

quantitative data, I also heavily relied on the research work of others as I have included the

literature review of other’s work existed already. Cross surveys were conducted, total 700 students

belong to different social and political sciences departments of the University of the Punjab

participated in this research work.

1.5 Targeted Audience

This empirical study targeted educated youth of Pakistan who are getting their education in

University. Male and female students both have participated in this study. The percipients were

the post graduate students of the University of the Punjab in the Punjab province. The primary

focus of this work was on the role of ICTS in brining political socialization in the lives of the
educated youth. Majority of the participants agreed that ICTS especially social media like

facebook and twitter had played an integral part in bringing political awareness. Participants also

admitted that they actively engage themselves in political issues.

2. Introduction

In political science, socialization is considered as the method of studying and analyzing politics.

Hence, political socialization is a process through which attitudes, latest trends, norms, values,

ethics, and popular beliefs of the society, living in a political system are being measured

(Greenberg, 2017). However, Greenberg says such defilation includes wide range of approaches

and factors who play integral part in bringing and shaping up political socialization. Nowadays,

youth is actively taking part in political activities, political scientists and researchers have argued

that participation of youth in political activities cannot be overlooked. The foundation of strong

democratic system is forged on the people as political whole that socialized in various ways,

discuss the common interests, talk about public affairs, and gain the overall information about the

things accruing worldwide (Memon, Ishak & Hamid,2018). This modern era is known as the era

of Millennials who heavily rely on ICTs, the consumption of information on internet newspapers,

website social media, and mobile increased the political participation, via interpersonal

communication. Hence, many researchers have made claims that today’s youth both male and

female relies heavily on ICTs. The use of internet, social media websites, mobile phones, and other

information technology application have revolutionized youngster’s way of thinking, behaviors,

and life styles. Many scholars and intellectuals still believe that ICTs will play the role of catalyst

and bring more rapid changes in the political scenario of future. This broader changes can be either

positive of negative. The fact of the matter is that ICTs have played more effective roles than the

typical media, those who have deeply studied the impacts of information technology on democracy
argued that the use of technology eradicated the role of intermediaries (Edwards, 2006). Social

media has allow the youth space to talk and exchange their political ideas. Both males and females

seem aware of the major issues. In Pakistan, youth both male and female directly tweets to senior

politicians and journalists. A large number of people retweets the original tweets of political

personalities. Women have used ICT’s to support feminism and empowerment of women

(Shaheen, 2009). But the credibility of the news through social media has been a real dilemma.

Apart from that, judging the political orientation through ICT is another major concern.

In the literature review of this particular study I will examine the consumption, pattern of

consumption and purposes of using information and technology. Moreover, the impact of ICTs

on political awareness, political interest, political orientation, political trust and political

participation will also be reviewed. I have linked the phenomena of political orientation with

cultivation theory. I have also critically examined the impact of ICT on women harassment and

gender discrimination in political context.

3. LITERATURE REVIEW

3.1 USAGE OF ICT: POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS

Information and Communication Technologies have revolutionized the world and turned it into a

global village. ICTS are becoming more and easier to access. It seems that youth is more interested

in ICTS and becoming politically aware. However, the political scientists have examined very

deep and diverse implications of ICTS on today’s politics. Many studies have revealed that ICTS

now controls the flow of information. Moreover the usage of ICTS has also challenged the

traditional wheel of power circling from past many centuries. Yet, the consumption of content

available on internet, social media and other places depends on age, gender, society, ethnicity,

education, affordability and political intellect.

(Juris 2008; Keck and Sikkink 1997), argued that ICTs connected the people and this rapid social

networking has played a vibrant role in hostility movements and harmonized mass protests all

across the globe. People are now more aware than past and stand united against common issues.

Wilson, (2009) submits that from the past 10 years, ICTs emerged as a pillar of democracy and

strengthen democracy in many ways. According to him, the feature of digital media like

participation, ingenuousness, information and social construction of reality are foundation stones

for strong democratic nation. ICTS have brought competition, informed people about their rights,

responsibilities, and lured people in political functioning.

Martina Eckardt, 2014 in her research, unfolded the role of social media twitter in particular, during

the so-called “Arab Spring” in 2011. She stated that twitter earned its acceptance in the society

during Arab Spring, it had played very prominent, transparent and decisive role in political

mobilization of people in repressive establishments, and thus twitter had forged the routes of
democratization in the Arab world. It has played the role of catalyst in political process in Arab

and given people of Arab freedom to speak. Other than that ICTs also forces the governments to

form the policies, politics and polities in the favor of general public argued (Promberger/ Bernhart/

Früh, 2010).

Many studies have also examined gender perspective in usage of ICT, that how gender divides

affected the usage of ICTS. (Powell, 2005) examined political interest of women that what issues

they discus and look for. He used the survey methods to know the perception of ladies. The

researcher had found that top three political interests for women were: gender equality, women

empowerment and social connectivity. Researcher noted that majority of women were so

aggressive and emotional about their rights and they were equally aggressive about women

harassment. Which seems that social media has also shaped up the political vision of female.

Following incidents shows the significance of social media in the political affairs.

 Women all across the globe played their part in making “I’m Malala” campaign successful.

 Social media also spoken very freely and vibrantly about the detainment of Palestinian girl

“Ahed Tamimi”.

 In Pakistan people very actively launched anti-corruption campaigns on social media and

ended Shareef’s regime in 2018 general elections.

3.2 Pattern of ICT Usage

The nexus of ICT and Politics has become stronger than it was ever before. The past couple of

decades have seen the raid growth in the field of technology. Technological scientists now labels,

facebook as third most populous country in the world, having over 750 million members. Many

researchers studied the pattern of ICT usage.

Ruzgar, 2005 written that number of people are using personal computers, laptops, smart phones

inducing android and iPhones to use internet. Because of the easy access to internet, internet has

changed the lives of many people. Internet has changed people’s behaviors, ideas, political

perception and many more. Nowadays, ICT’s are being considered as global system of

communication and networking, millions of people all across the globe can disseminate and

receive information within minutes (Ruzgar, 2005).

(Ishi, 2004) conducted the detailed study in order to find out the pattern of usage of internet. He

focused on the use of internet via mobile phones. The study unfolded the sociocultural and political

aspects of the usage of mobile internet. The results of the study shown that mobile was popular

and more attractive activity than the laptop and PC internet use. The study revealed that the

penetration of mobile internet usage was higher than the other methods of using internet. Usage of

mobile internet were positive in nature as people were can easily carry mobile with them during

traveling. Majority of people admitted that they use mobile internet to get information, for study

purposes. They explore online newspapers to know about politics. The study used survey method

to conduct information about the differences between mobile internet and pc internet.

(Peter and Allocu, 2005) organized a detailed empirical study about the mobile communication.

Researchers observed 25 mobile phones users for three months. The activities of participants were

monitored very closely. Researchers stated that in the beginning factors like fashion, status symbol

and entertainment were more attractive for participants than other activities like social and
political interaction. But with the passage of the time there was no boundary for personal and

professional use of mobile and participants started to use mobiles randomly. The study also

revealed the youth: especially University students are heavy audience and attracted to mobile

internet more than others. For university students internet is an agent of socialization and political

socialization, the use of internet for research purpose and they exchange information through

internet.

Another research named “Internet Usage Pattern Can Indicate Depression”, conducted by Live

Science staff back in 2016, argued that depressed university students use internet more randomly,

explored websites randomly, switch from one app to another in more random manner. Researchers

explored that university students who are under some kind of depression tend to use file-sharing

service regularly than others, follow random pattern of consumption, chat more and exchange

their emotions more than others (Live Science Staff,2016).

3.3 Political Participation:

Gimple at al.’s stated that the term political socialization explains modern political culture, which

includes attitudes and behaviors of individuals. He, Gimple also observed the rapid changes in the

behaviors and perceptions of the people as per changes occur in surroundings. Zaheer, 2106 argued

that social media and political participation are directly linked with each other. The importance of

social media especially (facebook and twitter) has evolved over the years to become the integral

part of political culture. People receive and disseminate the political information through social

media (Zaheer, 2016). Instead of relying on traditional media, people express sentiments, views
and logics to masses as well as political stakeholders with full of confidence on Facebook and

Twitter.

In their separate researches, Bode et al, 2010, and Hsieh and Li, 2012 noticed positive relationship

between online freedom of expression and political participation. Zhang and Lin15 in, 2015 found

that use of social media escalated the political engagement and freedom of expression. Researchers

also found that women have also become very vocal about their rights and they also confronted

women harassment. Researchers also found that feminism is amongst the most popular trends on

the twitter from past many years. Moreover, Dalton-Hoffman, 2012 studied the role of social media

in 2012 US Presidential Elections, and argued that Obama’s victory is indebted to social media.

President Obama’s tactic of using social media showed a sharp contrast in attracting the youth:

both male and female, against his competitor Willard Mitt Romney.

In his study, Ellis, 2017 stated that in 2016 US presidential election campaign between Donald

Trump and Hillary Clinton changed the perception of social media usage as the news sources, the

credibility of social media was attacked by the traditional media. Moreover, many males and

females all across the globe brutally criticized Donald J. Trump on his statement, “I could stand in

the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot people and I wouldn’t lose voters.” Similarly many white

Americans also bullied “Hilleary Clinton” during her Presidential campaign. Researcher found

that many political intellectuals and journalists also used Twitter very frequently, in order to

engage with common men and women. In the same way, ICTs, like Twitter and Facebook, were

being used during election campaigns in Sweden, Finland, UK, Turkey, India and Pakistan. Latif

(2013) monitored that during 2013 elections, political parties including: Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf

(PTI), Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) and Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), used

social media for the promotion of their narrative. They also criticized opponent’s narrative.
In order to testify the credibility of the social media, survey method was adopted. Students of

University of the Punjab participated in that survey. The result showed that (41.0%) candidates

considered that social media is more credible than traditional media. However, 34% voted in the

favor of traditional media, 25% people stayed neutral. In case of female participants, 50% of the

female said that they faced harassment and received abusive comments as response to their

political beliefs.

3.4 Political Awareness

In this modern digital world use of ICT’s, penetration of internet in society and personal life, and

consumption of information available on social media platforms have escalated all across the

globe. That much influence of ICT’s, especially social media has affected the politics in many

ways (Yunus, 2013). Yunus also argued that social media is the platform for every politician to

carry out the political campaigns all over the globe. Moreover, social media has played vital role

in the political movements and campaigns. The vibrant role of social media during Arab Spring

and during politics movements in Turkey has no parallel in terms of effectiveness. The researcher

has also addressed the role of social media in creating awareness against corruption, about social

justice, economic fairness and women empowerment.

Dutta and Fraser, 2008 argued that during Presidential Election in 2008, Barak Obama had more

than 112,000 supporters "tweeting" in his favor. MaCain, in his camp, had above 4,600 followers

on Twitter. Researchers also claimed that Obama supporters uploaded almost 1,800 videos, on

Twitter in Obama’s favor as compared to his opponent’s very few videos. This was the first time

when world has seen the political awareness of social media. The second big incident was Arab

Spring. The protest begun in Tunisia on 18th of December 2010 and soon it circled the whole Arab
World. (Morutada and Salem, 2011) in their research claimed that every second Egyptian and

Tunisian admitted that they used facebook frequently in participating protests and spread

awareness. They also shed light on “The Occupy Movement” a protest initiated by the social

activist group “Adbusters.” The protest took the inspiration from the Arab Spring. Social media

made this movement a worldwide protest, took place in more than fifty countries. (Gutierrz, 2017)

made claim that social media has summarily, and extensively binge feminism ideologies and

empowered women in multiple ways. She emphasize that hashtags and online campaigns have

provided women the wings to fly and voice to scream against the women abuse. She brought the

example of Victoria’s Secret faced widespread social media backlash for their campaign “The

Perfect Body.” That pressure forced the change in the tile. “A Body for Every Body,” was more

acceptable title. Even Rappler’s own #SaveMaryJane, was another female matter where social

media played the decisive role in saving the life of Mary Jane.

3.5 Political Trust

Political trust create positive collective political psychology of any nation, and it also radicalize

positive relation and activities resulted from mutual allure between citizens and political system.

Trust refers towards political and social interest. Researches often considered political

participation as a major sign of political trust. The degree of political trust depends on the

transparency of electoral process, corruption free society, and on social system. In case of women,

they trust more on the policies regarding the women empowerment, and genre equality (Chen,

2018).
(Hardin, 2000,p.26) explained that trust is a relation between a person who trusts and what is

trusted. Without common object trust is not possible. Scientists who have studied the implications

of ICT’s on politics have very firm believe that the power and freedom of social media has created

a vibrant economic and electoral process. As the result, overall poetical trust level escalade: they

also believe that this dramatic rise in political participation ,and political awareness are the key

indicators of political trust. (Weatherford, 1987; Wessels, 2009; Norris, 2011: ch10; Armingeon

and Guthmann, 2014) these intellectuals have studied a vibrant economies and concluded that

political trust and democratic stability are directly linked to country’s economic development, and

with corruption in the society this economic development is not possible. Panama case is supreme

example where social media has escalated the hate against corruption and created awareness

among the people, promoted anit-corruption sentiment. Especially in Pakistan, this anti-corruption

sentiment has ended on of the country’s most powerful and famous dynasty: Supreme Court of

Pakistan has disqualified Nawaz Sharif on PANAMA papers charges.

Moreover, (Patterson and Caldeira, 1990; Bellucci and Memoli, 2012) argued that economic

indicators like GDP growth and unemployment plays the vital part in creating political trust in

system. Media works as lens and shows the performance of political parties to the public. But ICTs

are more than lens. ICTs have played the role of cleanser.

Researchers do believe that authoritarians control and restrict the media in order to keep people

intact so they might not turn against their regime. In recent years Facebook and Twitter sparked

many anti-government movements resulted electoral fraud. Pakistan also witnessed the same after

2013 general elections. (Reuter&Szakony, 2015) appreciated the role of social in creating

awareness against the fraud in electoral process. They also claimed that use of social websites have

restored people’s faith in democracy by making people aware about the electoral process. People
are no more feeling pessimist against the authorities who deprive them of their rights. Researchers

also noticed women bashing the government on their any act against empowerment and freedom

of women.

3.6 Political Interest

There was a time when young people had low level of interest in politics and their political

participation was almost nil. During the 1990’s the rumors about the disaffection of young people

with the politics were very famous, and were of great importance. But now the scenario has

changed, the use of ICTs and its impacts on the level of awareness accelerated the political interest

in the youngsters. Today’s youth is more concerned about socioeconomic conditions, social justice

system, global warming, and environmental changes: in fact they are using social media to express

their point of view (White, Bruce& Ritchie, 2000). They also argued that youth’s association with

politics depends on an issue that concerns them. Shaheen, 2008 studied the usage of social media,

online political activity, and political interest in the country like Pakistan. The outcomes of the

study established the fact that use of the ICTs: especially internet has created political awareness,

strengthen the democratic process, provided the youth with the platform to express their political

sentiments, protected freedom of expression, and increased the youth’s awareness of their political

rights. Shaheen also pointed out that youth’s direct interaction with politicians, journalists and

intellectuals has made them realize that they are the part of country’s political system. Therefore

ICTs have escalated the political interest in the country like Pakistan. Dubose, 2011 states social

media platforms like: facebook and twitter are the only platforms that allows the public generated

sentiments to flourish through sharing and liking. Apart from that, social activists and political

pundits argued that social media played the decisive role in d in the Arab Spring revolution.
Historians also acceded to the argument that Social media has assisted in bringing justice upon the

culprits, their execution and created a transparent Middle East (Latif, 2011).

On the other hand ICTs also recolonized the existence of gender divide in this digital world. There

exits the great diversity in males and females perception of the political interest and their usage of

internet are also different. Narayan& Ahmad, 2016 argued that social media has made women

more vocal and encouraged them to participate in the process of decision making through the

media and new technologies of communication. Researchers also revealed that over the past 10

years, Information and technology has altered the boundaries set for women, there has been a

massive change in policy, private attitudes and behaviors, when it comes to women. Women are

pursuing their careers in the field of ICT’s, women’s over all interest in the politics is ablaze. Many

women are now in the position of decision making and legislating for women. Researchers also

revealed that women’s voting preferences are tied up with the issues like gender equality,

protection of women rights, women empowerment, women education and feminism. Researchers

also unfold the truth that as compared with men, women are found more conservative and selfish

in their approaches. I strongly believe ICTs gave birth to this modern and vibrant political cultural,

modern day’s political society should be thankful to ICT’s: especially social media.