Information Cascade in Women’s March
In the beginning of 2017, with the inauguration of the new U.S. president, government policies established in the previous administration were being reevaluated – many of which involved social justice and human rights issues. One of the most prominent conversations that has surfaced as a result was women’s rights. In response to Trump’s election and his alarming, offensive comments about women, many women in the U.S. began to create and share Facebook events, inviting and encouraging people to march in protest in Washington. Yet, what was initially planned to be held in Washington simultaneously happened in at least 408 other national cities, including New York City, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, and Philadelphia, and even in international countries such as Canada, Mexico, France, Kenya, and India. How did this one event grow and evolve into the largest single-day, worldwide protest?
This phenomenon can be explained through the general model of information cascades. With the help of social media, the original planners of the Women’s March in Washington were able to spread this idea of protesting to the global friendship network on Facebook. One way the planners of the women’s marches in other cities made the decision to initiate protests in those additional locations was based upon the number of people who clicked “going” or even “interested” on the Facebook event for the first march in Washington. This factor served as a signal that helped them gauge how popular the event was and thus to decide whether to copy the Washington planners in initiating their own women’s marches. Another signal included people’s reactions to Trump’s election. With the increasingly negative response in those cities to the news of his inauguration, with some people protesting, others may have followed with the same negative thoughts on Trump’s election, attracting more people to participate in the protest so as to make the government feel more accountable and urge it to take action in advocating for the policies – mentioned in the women’s march policy platform – and in which Trump has failed to do.
Oftentimes, copying other people’s behaviors can be perceived as a blindly-made decision, but in this case it created a powerful movement that ensured important concerns were being raised and people’s voices were being heard, which demonstrates the positive power of information cascades.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/21/us/womens-march.html