IN PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT PROCESSES ABSTRACT:
WHAT IS SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS?
City Planners are connecting places, people, information, and events through social media. How can we make sense of the tangle of connections that form our social networks? How can city planners grow to understand who they are reaching through social media and how they are connected? Social network analysis (SNA) is an analytic method for understanding the complexity of social networks, a need that is more important now than ever as the internet and social media are changing the dynamic of public engagement. SNA views social relationships through detection of communities, defining a series of nodes and edges which represent the individuals within the social network, and tracing the diffusion of information and how opinions are formed. I hypothesize that the networks of people that engage online through social media are a unique and distinct group of people from those that engage in onsite planning. To test this hypothesis interviews with city planners combined with qualitative and quantitative analysis were undertaken. The results lead to strategies that city planners and others can adopt to further their public engagement efforts and aid in the stakeholder analysis stage of planning projects.
CASE STUDIES:
EDGE
NODE
For this study, 20 Facebook city planning project pages were selected. Of these pages, three were selected for detailed case studies based on different levels of public participation.
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For each case study, a social network analysis was undertaken using Gephi, a graphic visualization tool that utilizes 3D graphing to portray the connections and communities within a social network.
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NodeXL is an Excel based software that was used to download user activity from each Facebook page. After collecting the data, Nvivo and Ncapture, qualitative analysis tools, were used to analyze the content of what participants were communicating via the Facebook page.
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Using Nvivo, the comment and post activity was coded by whether or not it was engaging or sharing, and the level of activity surrounding any given post. Interviews with the project planners were then conducted to understand the degree to which those who are engaging online were or were not engaging offline in the planning project.
BURLINGTON, VERMONT DOWNTOWN & WATERFRONT PLAN
Health Education
Government
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SNA views social relationships through detection of communities, defining a series of nodes and edges which represent the individuals within the social network, and tracing the diffusion of information and how opinions are formed.
ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND CITY DOCK MASTER PLAN
Out of State
METHODOLOGY:
PHILADELPHIA 2035: COMPREHENSIVE PLAN
PLAN CINCINNATI: COMPREHENSIVE PLAN
Out of State Local Business
Local Business
N/A
Government
Health
Out of State
Health Local Business
Advocacy
N/A Education
Education Government N/A
In 2010, the City of Annapolis began a yearlong planning effort to revitalize and renew the city’s signature public space. As one tool for public engagement, the city created a Facebook page for the City Dock Master Plan to share relevant information, rather than encourage two-way communication.
• Annapolis had 317 people engage in the planning process through the Facebook page. • The social network map to the left shows who the most active users are, based on their role in the community.
• The interview with the planner on the project helped to identify who the most active users were, and whether or not they were engaging with the project in other ways.
• The largest nodes in the graph belonged to people who were not key stakeholders or engaging with the project in person. ENGAGING
SHARING
NUMBER OF LIKES
39
28
NUMBER OF COMMENTS
26
23
TOTAL POSTS
13 3:1 2:1
33 0.85:1 0.70:1
RATIO LIKES:POSTS RATIO COMMENTS:POSTS
Although the Facebook page was not primarily being used for engagement purposes, it did generate some activity through engaging posts that posed questions to the users. Posts that were engaging received an average of three likes and two comments per post, versus those that were sharing information which received less than 1 like or comment per post.
In 2009, Burlington, Vermont was award a HUD Sustainable Communities Challenge Grant. This grant has allowed Burlington to develop a plan for its downtown and waterfront. The planning team created a Facebook page to share information as well as get public input on a variety of issues.
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Philadelphia 2035’s Facebook page has been very successful in engaging the public in the planning process.
Burlington’s Facebook page has received 384 likes. While Burlington has had some engagement on its Facebook page, it has primarily used the page for sharing information.
• There are a small amount of users actively commenting on the page, and many of these users are governmental officials who are involved with the planning process.
• The page has also allowed Burlington to connect with its out of state constituents. • Burlington created a web tool for its public engagement process and received 1,000s of
comments and over 40,000 votes. While this web tool has been the main source of engagement, the plans Facebook page has also been helpful by providing people a central place to comment and find information, although the city found that capturing the input from the Facebook page was problematic.
The matrix to the right shows the level of activity generated by the different types of posts on the organization’s Facebook page. Those that were coded as engaging saw an average of 1.37 likes per post, compared to about half a like per sharing post. As far as generating conversation, it is clear that engaging posts helped to get users talking about the project.
Philadelphia 2035 is a comprehensive planning process for the city of Philadelphia that began with a city wide vision to guide public and private development for the city and will end with district plans which lay out recommendations for each of the 18 geographic areas of the city.
ENGAGING
SHARING
NUMBER OF LIKES
197
226
NUMBER OF COMMENTS
81
15
TOTAL POSTS
144 1.37:1 0.56:1
412 0.55:1 0.04:1
RATIO LIKES:POSTS RATIO COMMENTS:POSTS
Local Business
Plan Cincinnati is a comprehensive plan for the future growth of Cincinnati. The City of Cincinnati's Department of City Planning and Buildings has engaged citizens, business owners, stakeholders, and Out of State Government other individuals for over a year and half now, including two Neighborhood Summits, and is currently working with other City Department staff and a Steering Committee to begin drafting the Plan.
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Plan Cincinnati has been using its Facebook profile to share information about events and meetings.
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The page has 1,540 likes and there are more than 80 active users on the page. These users range from community members who work in the city to government officials, students, health care providers and community members who have moved out of state.
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The page has 1,206 likes and 56 active users who contribute to the pages activity.
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An interview with one of the planners on the project revealed that the most active users on the page were people they were not familiar with in person.
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However, this revealed that the project had been successful at engaging a wide variety of stakeholders.
Some active users online are also engaged offline, however a few of the more active users engage strictly online.
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The planning team has followed up with individuals who comment on the page, making the page a successful tool for developing stakeholder relationships.
The matrix to the right shows the overwhelming difference in activity generated by engaging posts as compared to sharing posts. There was an average of 2.85 likes and 1.11 comments per ENGAGING SHARING engaging post. Facebook has been helpful in introducing NUMBER OF the planning team to community members who have an 705 1,329 LIKES interest in the project. While the team has not tried to follow NUMBER OF up with each person who is active on the page, they have 276 192 COMMENTS made concerted efforts to connect with those who have TOTAL POSTS 248 698 posted something that warrants a more in-depth RATIO 1.91:1 2.85:1 discussion. LIKES:POSTS RATIO COMMENTS:POSTS
1.11:1
These users align with the stakeholders targeted for public engagement, with the majority being community members employed at local businesses and government officials.
The vast majority of Plan Cincinnati’s posts are sharing information about an upcoming meeting or event. The planner working on the project revealed that some ENGAGING SHARING community members at meetings mentioned that they NUMBER OF 47 347 LIKES learned about the meeting through Facebook, and without the Facebook posts, they would not have attended. As for NUMBER OF 39 46 COMMENTS generating activity and spreading the word about the plan, engaging posts generated slightly more likes, and over a TOTAL POSTS 22 174 RATIO comment more on average per post. 1.99:1 2.14:1 LIKES:POSTS RATIO COMMENTS:POSTS
0.30:1
1.77:1
0.26:1
KEY FINDINGS:
CONCLUSION:
KEY REFERENCES:
A Facebook page can serve as a source of public engagement and outreach for an organization. Planners have found many ways to use their page for engaging the public as a method of sharing information, getting the public excited and gathering public input. This study has identified ways in which planners can use SNA software to enhance their public engagement efforts and identification of key stakeholders.
There is a large amount of literature on social network analysis and its applications. This study has identified quantitative and qualitative results that help support SNA use for public engagement strategies. The use of SNA can allow an organization to better target its engagement efforts as well as identify key online stakeholders who are “influencers” of others online and can help expand the scope and exposure of a given project. This research will help further the use of SNA software to practical applications in planning firms and agencies. SNA can help organizations determine which of their posts have been most successful, and allow them to replicate this success by creating a strategy for their social media platform. The use of SNA software is also helpful for identifying key topics or emerging issues that the public finds most important. Many types of SNA software are open source and user friendly, giving planners the ability to do ‘high level analysis’ of their social network data with limited technical knowledge.
Bastian, M., Heymann, S., & Jacomy, M. (n.d.). Gephi: An open source software for exploring and manipulating networks (Publication). Retrieved from https://gephi.org/publications/gephi-bastian-feb09.pdf Hansen, D., Shneiderman, B., & Smith, M. A. (2011). Analyzing social media networks with NodeXL: Insights from a connected world. International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, 27(4), 405-408. Sederviciute, K., & Valentini, C. (2011). Towards a more holistic stakeholder analysis approach. Mapping known and undiscovered stakeholders from social media. International Journal of Strategic Communication, 5(4), 221-239. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1553118X.2011.592170 Wu, M. (2011, May 18). Quantifying Facebook engagement: More than just counting fans and likes. Lithosphere. Retrieved from http://lithosphere.lithium.com/t5/science-of-social-blog/Quantifying-Facebook-Engage ment-More-than-Just-Counting-Fans-and/ba-p/26022
• The case studies show that the social network of an organizations Facebook page differs from that of its’ engaged in person network. This illustrates that organizations have the opportunity to expand their network of engaged stakeholders, including people who may have previously been left out of the planning process.
• Through SNA key “influencers” were identified in each network. • Within each network, groups of users and their connectivity between each other was understood.
CREATED BY: BRITTANY KUBINSKI
FACULTY ADVISOR: DR. JENNIFER EVANS-COWLEY, AICP