Sustainability Governance and the Sociomateriality of Social Media: Lessons from Megaprojects

There is a need for effective governance of environmental, economic, and social sustainability in the modern age. This paper discusses the most neglected social sustainability dimension considering the case of megaprojects as they are large scale displacements and disruptions. The multiple and conflicting interests of different stakeholders make social sustainability very challenging in the context of megaprojects. Social media is used for different purposes and encompasses multiple affordances from a sociomateriality perspective. From the dimensions of power perspective, this paper conceptualizes how social media can be leveraged for alternative governance. The persuading, framing, and hegemonizing uses of social media for implementing negotiated interests, identifying with existing interests, and influencing existing interests respectively are discussed. Following this, the role of organizing in social media to give continuity and consistency to discourses is discussed. It is highlighted that for leveraging the full affordances of social media, the interest group’s representing environmental, economic, or social dimensions need to organize themselves through social media pages