The Stepping into Visibility Model: reflecting on consequences of social media visibility – a Global South perspective

This article discusses activists’ need to reflect on how achieving social media visibility might translate into vulnerability. In order to provide activists with a tool for this reflection, the Stepping into Visibility Model has been developed and applied to two case studies: a) an activist group in a Brazilian favela using social media for protection against police brutality and b) a Kenyan photographer, affiliated to an artivist (artistic and activist) collective, producing images of Nairobi at night to tackle social anxiety issues. The research draws from sociological insights on the concept of “visibility” and adopts a case study methodology combined with ethnographic approaches. By adopting a Global South perspective, it discusses counter surveillance efforts in ways that go beyond techno-legal solutionism (Dencik et al, 2016) and in periods outside that of big scale protests (McCosker, 2015). By devising this model, we hope to offer a contribution on how marginalised communities can be better informed when they encounter unintended negative visibility.