Why We Should Keep Studying Good (and Everyday) Participation: An Analogy to Political Participation

Abstract

Research on participation is currently characterized by a trend towards studying its “darker” sides. In this commentary, I make an argument for why we should keep studying good participation. In addition, I claim that the flipside of studying exceptional case studies of participation shouldn’t be only focusing on dark participation, but on everyday, mundane forms of participation, that may happen in surprising contexts (such as non-proprietary platforms) and may take different shapes. To make these claims, I introduce a case study of “good participation” in news production processes, and explain why it may merit this distinction. I then use a three-pronged analogy to the cognate field of political participation to show what it can tell us about good—and everyday—participation in the news.

Keywords

• citizen journalism
• dark participation
• everyday participation
• good participation
• news
• participatory journalism
• political participation
• social media