The Relationship between Social Media and Political Awareness: Applied Study

Abstract

The study tackles the relationship between social media and political awareness. It reveals that there is a correlation between social media and political awareness among Cairo University students. It further shows a positive correlation between these means and political awareness indicators, such as the realization of rights and duties, political knowledge, reacting to events, and political participation.  Regardless of such positive correlation, but the study revealed that there is a problem related to traditional institutions, such as Parliament, government, or political parties that are unable to take advantage of the opportunities in social media platforms in influencing and communicating with citizens and using it as a means for political education and channels for communication. The study finds a weakness in the role and the impact of political parties, the Parliament lack of interest of popular participation in debating draft legislations, and the government lack of addressing to public opinion. The study has a number of important implications; the most important one is that the traditional institutions in Egypt should change their perspectives, ideology, and approach in dealing with political socialization, along with investing social media in creating channels of communication with citizens, designing governmental programs for awareness,crowding out virtual entities to draw youth, establishing observatories to analyze and monitor public opinion, and conducting additional scientific studies that are specialized in the role of traditional political institutions in Egypt in shaping political awareness.