Petitioning for change

Customers protesting high bank fees, or a mother fighting bullying at her kid's school, are some of users you might expect to find campaigning on the petition platform, Change.org.

The website is a hub for social activism online, and encourages its 40 million members to "create the change they want to see."

The site allows users to launch their own petitions about local or international issues, and address them to specific decision makers. Once a petition is online, it can be promoted by Change.org, or shared via Facebook, Twitter and e-mail. The decision makers targeted by petitions also have an opportunity to respond on the web platform.

'A powerful tool for citizen engagement'

Stanford University students Ben Rattray and Marc Dimas launched the project in the United States in 2007, aiming to encourage collective action and civil participation.

Change.org has since become the fastest growing petition platform in the world. It is currently used in 196 countries, with half a million petitions uploaded so far.

In 2012 Change.org came to Germany, where it now has around 2 million users. Paula Hannemann, the platform's Campaigns Director in Germany, says online petitions are one of the most powerful tools for citizen engagement to have emerged in recent years.

"We have seen worldwide - but also in Germany - the most incredible stories of people creating change through digital mobilization," she said. "It's not the online petitions themselves that create change, it's the people who do, it's the solutions they put forward."

#BringBackOurGirls

A Change.org petition currently gaining traction around the world calls for world leaders to rescue the more than 200 girls who were recently abducted from their Nigerian boarding school. The #BringBackOurGirls plea for action was started by a user called "Ify E." in Bonn, Germany.

It reads: "I am a young, educated Nigerian who believes every young child regardless of their sex, should not be denied access to education. I believe that more can be contributed to the efforts of the Nigerian government to ensure the safe return of these girls. By signing this petition we declare our solidarity with the kidnapped girls and call upon the world not to forget them."

The petition, which is addressed to world leaders, human rights groups and international agencies, has so far amassed almost half a million signatures.

"Citizen engagement has no national borders," said Paula Hannemann. "Everyone knows a petition won't bring back those girls, but what we can do is lend them our voices, because they currently don't have a voice.