Digital Inequality and Second-Order Disasters: Social Media in the Typhoon Haiyan Recovery

The fact that some participants are recovering at a rapid pace while others are languishing behind represents a deepening of social inequalities. Those who are already rela-tively  better  off  have  access  to  a  richer  media  landscape  which they are able to navigate often reaping significant ben-efits. By contrast, the more disadvantaged participants draw on a diminished media landscape and are less likely to take advantage  of  any  social  media  opportunities.  Rather  than  democratizing  opportunities  or  creating  a  “level  playing  field,” the web exacerbates social inequalities by heightening the  life  chances  for  the  better  off  while  leaving  the  poorer  participants behind. The potential of so-called humanitarian technologies to help disaster-affected communities “respond to their own problems” (WDR, 2013, p. 13) is only realized for  some  participants,  but  certainly  not  for  those  who  were  most adversely affected by the disaster

Our analysis divided our participants into  four  categories  depending  on  the  media  environments  they had access to:••Media poor: no mobile phone and minimal access tra-ditional media; no Internet connection (9 participants);••Minimal  owners:  a  feature  mobile  phone  with  some  access  to  traditional  media  but  without  autonomous  Internet access (33 participants);••Moderate  owners:  a  feature  phone  with  some  web  connectivity  (most  typically  Facebook)9  plus  some  traditional media and occasional use of Internet cafes (22 participants);••Media  rich:  smartphone  and/or  a  range  of  other  Internet-enabled  devices  plus  traditional  media  (37  participants).