Social Participation and Communication of the Net Generation in Hong Kong: A Post-Umbrella Movement Study

In the 2014 Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, young faces were ubiquitous. After the Movement, many young people continue to be socially active. This is a generation we call digital natives. Do new communication technologies play a role in the formation of their generational culture? How does this generational culture lead to their social participation and community communication?

The purposes of this study include: (1) the influence of communication technologies on young generation’s social participation; (2) the formation and characteristics of the Net-geners’ culture; (3) the ways Net-geners conduct social participation and communication.

In Hong Kong, neither the media nor the government has a comprehensive answer to why and how the Net-geners are so enthusiastic in social participation. This study will have practical significance for solving this puzzle. Theoretically, this study is grounded in generational study, and it puts forward a conceptual framework of the Net-geners’ generational culture which consists of three components: media use, civic and political mindset, and life attitude.

Edmund and Turner (2002) define a generation as an age cohort that comes to have social significance by constituting a cultural identity embedded in the interaction between historical resources, contingent circumstances and social formation – a generational location. What makes the social significance is the generation actuality which shares a set of historical responses to its location (Mannheim, 1952). However, previous generational studies put emphasis on political economic analysis and ignored the “communication” factor. With the advancement of globally connected media, generational culture formation has taken a new path (Eyerman & Turner, 1998). This study tries to fill this theoretical gap.

Digital technologies contribute to a new civic culture, namely actualizing citizenship (Bennett, Wells, & Freelon, 2011). The Net generation tends to have looser personal engagement with peer networks that organize civic action and to use social technologies as a way to maximize individual expression (Bennett & Segerberg, 2012, 2013).

This study uses focus groups and content analysis as research methods. Fifty-two university students (12 groups) participated in the focus group interviews. About 1,000 movement-related articles were selected from local media for analysis.

Findings show that the Net generation has been embedded in the online culture of equality, connectivity and immediacy which have an influence on their civic and political mindset. The resonance of global exposure and social grievances arouses their strong sense of social justice and their motivation in social participation which comes in various forms including (1) close attention to public affairs; (2) virtual participation such as sharing socio-political information, signing online petition, producing kuso artifacts, writing blogs and being keyboard fighter; (3) traditional forms of social participation including writing articles in traditional newspapers, voting and protesting. Their generational culture is characterized by critical consumption of information, willingness to act as civic agent, devotion to social reform and a quest for local identity.

In sum, this study highlights a new form of networked publics, active citizenship, and participatory community communication.