Value Co-creation of Charity Subjects Empowered by Social Media: Foundations, Practices, and Outcomes

Tang Fan, Hou Jundong, Zhou Rong

Foreign Economics & Management Vol. 46, Issue 08, pp. 120 - 137 (2024)  DOI:10.16538/j.cnki.fem.20230902.301

Summary

As an inseparable digital context for the public, social media has become an important scenario for charity subjects to co-create social values. Therefore, a comprehensive and systematic understanding on the value co-creation process of charity subjects empowered by social media will help to fully release its empowering potential to promote the high-quality development of public cause. Based on a review of the literature on social media empowering charity subjects, this paper forms the internal logic of “foundations-practices-outcomes”. Following this logic, it firstly starts from the perspective of affordances and analyzes the technical foundation of social media empowering charity subjects by invoking the framework of “Needs-Affordances-Features”. Secondly, it clarifies the empowering practices of social media by generalizing the practical activities of charity subjects. Finally, by identifying the key resources that affect the realization of value effect and summarizing the value effect obtained by charity subjects, it deepens the understanding on the empowering effect of social media. This paper presents useful reflections on the empowering effect of social media, which not only profoundly reveals the nature of social media’s empowerment on the value co-creation of charity subjects, but also provides a basis for promoting the integration and development of social media and charity contexts.

Keywords

social media; value co-creation; charity organization; stakeholder; fundraising platform