Using Collaborative Technologies and Social Media to Engage Citizens and Governments during the COVID-19 Crisis. The Case of Spain

Abstract

During the COVID-19 crisis, governments around the world have been organizing activities to foster citizens' participation during the lockdown. In Germany and Estonia, for example, their governments launched civic hackathons during March 2020 to find new solutions to the challenges associated with the COVID-19 crisis. This article is intended to provide evidence about the utilization of collaborative and social platforms to foster co-production with citizens during the COVID-19 crisis in Spain. In the case of "Frena la Curva," (Flattening the Curve), a metalab fostered by the innovation lab of the regional Government of Aragon, the scalability of the platform has even facilitated spreading this collaborative initiative to different countries. Regarding the use of social media hashtags, including "#EsteVirusLoParamosUnidos," Spanish authorities have encouraged citizen-networked co-production for communication and crisis coordination. These two cases illustrate how digital platforms have been used to offer a more agile response to COVID-19.

Engaging social media users with attitudinal messages during health crisis communication

“…Social media can thus be used not only as a complementary channel to release crisis information, but also a tool to monitor public opinions, promote social cohesion, and foster support ( Alexander, 2014 , Zhang et al, 2019 ). It was found that during crises such as extreme weather and outbreaks of infections, crisis-related messages communicated by news media outlets, government and health authorities on social media could increase public engagement as they prompted public responses in form of ‘likes’, ‘shares’, and ‘comments’ (e.g., Ngai et al, 2020 , Bruns et al, 2012 , Criado et al, 2020 , Househ, 2016 , Vera-Burgos and Padgett, 2020 ). These social media cues are meaningful indicators of engagement.…”

Infodemi Covid-19 dalam Perspektif Open Government: Sebuah Tinjauan Literatur

“…Penelitian tentang posisi media sosial pemerintah dalam infodemi Covid-19 telah dilakukan di berbagai negara, seperti Vietnam (La et al, 2020), Spanyol (Criado, Guevara-Gómez, & Villodre, 2020), India (Das & Dutta, 2020), Singapura (Wong & Jensen, 2020), hingga Kanada (Bridgman et al, 2020;Teichmann et al, 2020b) dan Amerika Serikat (Papakyriakopoulos, Serrano, & Hegelich, 2020). Perbandingan pemanfaatan media sosial pemerintah pada konteks Covid-19 antar negara juga telah dilakukan oleh Raamkumar, Tan, & Wee (2020) untuk melihat kondisi perbandungannya.…”

“…Pada periode awal pandemi, misalnya, media sosial mampu membantu mengendalikan pembatasan sosial serta mendorong orang-orang untuk menghindari aktivitas di luar rumah yang tidak terlalu penting. Hal itu juga didorong oleh adanya kolaborasi seperti yang terjadi Spanyol dan India (Criado et al, 2020;Das & Dutta, 2020).…”

“…Walau demikian gerakan yang diberi nama 'Frena la Curva' atau 'landaikan kurvanya' ini dibuat untuk mendukung pemerintah dan pelayanan publik. Sistematikanya adalah dengan penyediaan kebutuhan masyarakat, mulai dari masker hingga buku untuk pelajar sekolah dasar yang kebutuhannya ditampilkan pada suatu platform untuk kemudian dipenuhi oleh masyarakat lain yang berkelebihan (Criado et al, 2020).…”

Colaboración entre administraciones públicas y ciudadanía en Twitter durante la crisis del Covid-19 en España

“…81-91] actores. Esta perspectiva puede complementar, además, estudios recientes sobre el uso y gestión de redes sociales desde el sector público durante la crisis del Covid-19 (Criado y Guevara-Gómez, 2021;Criado et al, 2020;Chen et al, 2020;Cortés, 2020). En el plano práctico, los resultados de este trabajo pueden ayudar a los gestores públicos a desarrollar mejores estrategias en redes sociales que ayuden al control de la pandemia, así como a aprovechar e incentivar la aparición de buenas prácticas ciudadanas en estas plataformas.…”