As Communicators, we have to accept we may have been partly at fault in feeding an age of high consumption. Advertising and Communications have been engines of the material world, selling people stuff they did not always need or really want. Communications companies now have to take a long hard look at themselves and ask “What purpose are we here to serve?”. Because others have woken up and are taking action.
Citizens today scour the web to ask tough questions, to highlight waste and profligacy and to demand action. They challenge the assertions of the big pharmaceutical companies, and hold Energy, Tobacco, Alcohol and Transport to account. Many companies fear such Citizen enablement but they have to face up to it. As we examine in this chapter, in a new Digital Democracy, the online world is fast, anonymous and efficient. Citizen wrath can start with one individual and mushroom at incredible speed, spreading virally, collecting into mass petitions, rooting out smugness and cant. By the same token, Citizens can be rapid, effective, vocal and loyal advocates and endorsers. Citizens are changing the consumption habits of our world.
The new Citizen wants to know about a company’s supply chain, the size of its carbon footprint, its stance on local labour and ethical sourcing.
Parallel to this, bland corporate statements will not cut it anymore. The new Citizen wants to know about a company’s supply chain, the size of its carbon footprint, its stance on local labour and ethical sourcing. A whole host of questions for which businesses will be held accountable. Come the AGM, someone with a tiny minority of shares now feels empowered to stand up and challenge – with ready access to a receptive audience online. That said, why wait for the AGM to mount the challenge? The audience is out there and can mobilise at their fingertips.
As we will examine in Part Four, this poses a dilemma for communicators. Companies need to be open, prove their own Citizen credentials. And they need to tune into and align with shifting social values which are beginning to tune away from relative materialism and into planetary and human Wellbeing. In turn, questions will need to be asked about the nature and function of Communications companies. A new set of standards is likely to emerge, as part of a radical re-alignment that re-engineers the relationship between the way society is and the way it is reflected in the Communications space.
