Social Media’s Role In Trade Wars

This is the first trade war where social media and a globally connected society has played a role. What could the impacts be?

Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash

This is the first trade war in human history where the entire world is digitally connected and where social media is playing a defining role. No longer are economic conflicts confined to diplomatic cables and corporate boardrooms. It is the first trade war of the social media age. Unfolding in real-time across borders and through the screens in our pockets. Not just reshaping how nations respond, but who participates in that response.

While it is hard to say without deeper research and so early in this global economic war brought on by the President of the United States, we can hypothesise that social media is having some sort of impact.

Having conducted netnographic research into how online hate speech translates into political violence in the streets and advised corporations and governments on the impact of social media and digital technologies on geopolitics, I am seeing patterns emerge. Weak signals and early indicators.

In Canada, as the U.S. threatened and imposed tariffs, then called them off and then the president added fuel to the fire with calls for Canada to become the 51st State and called the…