The influence of social media on civic engagement and democracy among the youth in the Omaruru constituency of Namibia
The aim of this study was to explore the influence of social media on civic engagement and democracy among the youth in the Omaruru Constituency of Namibia. The study employed qualitative research design with purposive and snowball sampling methods to select the participants. The findings reveal that social media is influential in the domain of civic engagement. It is also shown that land availability, youth empowerment, gender-based violence, unemployment, and high crime rate, entertainment and retail business draw the attention of the youth on social media. The youth participants prefer to use social media to express their views and opinions instead of addressing relevant authorities because of fear of prosecution and because social media helps the users to reach a wider audience. It seems that the main stream media has been monopolised by the government to limit freedom of expression and accessibility to the youth. The youth have diverging perspectives with regard to the impact that social media has had on the community in Omaruru Constituency as some youth believe that the use of social media had indeed made a tangible impact, while other were unsure as to whether social media has had an impact on the community of Omaruru Constituency or not. Moreover, the study revealed that mainstream media has been monopolised and is controlled by the Government to limit freedom of expression and accessibility to the youth. The youth urged the Government to consider using social media as a platform to engage them because social media promotes civic engagement through social dialogue, not just be between government institutions, and elected government officials but with the public especially the youth that use Facebook. The recommendations target the government, the youth and the community emphasising on the need for law or policy to engage community members and youth without fear of intimidation. Further studies should be undertaken regarding other regions of Namibia, and future research should examine and distinguish the causal relationship between online and offline participation in the public discourse for civic engagement among the youth.
Social media, Civic engagement and democracy, Omaruru Constituency
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