![]() This paper is a systematic review of the current literature on WhatsApp. With mixed conclusions on the effects of WhatsApp in political and civic engagement, it is timely to systematically review the empirical studies to discuss the use of WhatsApp. With regards to engagement, while there has been anecdotal evidence of WhatsApp playing a central role in civic as well as political engagement, negative effects of WhatsApp have also been recognised, such as the platform being weaponised (Aizenkot and Kashy-Rosenbaum, 2018) and exposure to falsehoods (Ahad and Lim, 2014). Yet, its growth since then has been rapid (Silver, et al., 2019). Having been introduced to the masses in 2009, WhatsApp is a relatively latecomer to social media. ![]() The findings contribute to the theorising of social media-mediated movements and activism and highlight methodological gaps of ongoing research on WhatsApp. This paper seeks to answer three central questions related to WhatsApp and engagement: 1) What are the motivations in using WhatsApp and how do they manifest in the use of WhatsApp as a communication tool? 2) What is the role of WhatsApp in civic and political engagement? 3) How do researchers study the use of WhatsApp in civic and political engagement? The review finds that across empirical studies, while WhatsApp is used by activists and organisational networks for mobilisation and coordinating actions, it is also used by users who draw on the affordances of the medium for informal and ‘de-politicised’ conversations. ![]() Using empirical research on WhatsApp studies published from 2009 to 2019 as its corpus of data, this article systematically reviews them to provide more robust conclusions about WhatsApp and its relationship with political and/or civic engagement. The use of instant messaging platforms such as WhatsApp for civic and political purposes has been observed and reported to be growing faster than other social media platforms especially in recent years. What about WhatsApp? A systematic review of WhatsApp and its role in civic and political engagement
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