New Patterns of Protest and Revolution in the Age of Social Media

• Authors: Chodak Jarosław
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The article aims to analyse the role of social media in initiating and organising protest and revolutionary movements. Social media, particularly Facebook and Twitter, are widely believed to have been used by activists involved in the global wave of protests and revolutions after 2009. However, the assessment of their role wavers between technological determinism and minimising the impact of new technologies. Considering the current state of research, the author offers his answers to a number of questions: (1) To what extent and how are social media used in the processes of political communication, mobilisation and organisation of protest and revolutionary movements? (2) What is the relation between the old and the new media? (3) What is the relation between the online and offline dimension of collective action? (4) Why has the occupation of public space become the dominant tactic of protest and revolutionary movements in the age of social media?

Keywords

EN

social media; protest movements; revolutions; ICTs; mobilization

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Marii Curie-Skłodowskiej. Instytut Socjologii
• Journal: Konteksty Społeczne
• Year: 2016
• Volume: 4
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 54–68
• Physical description: Article

Dates

published

2016-09-30

Contributors

author

Chodak Jarosław

• Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin

References

• Alterman, J. B. (2011). The revolution will not be tweeted. The Washington Quarterly, 34(4), 103-116. doi:10.1080/0163660X.2011.610714
• Anduiza, E., Cristancho, C., & Sabucedo, J. M. (2014). Mobilization through online social networks: the political protest of the indignados in Spain. Information, Communication & Society, 17(6). doi:10.1080/1369118X.2013.808360
• Ayres, J. M. (2004). Framing collective action against neoliberalism: The case of the ‘anti-globalization movement’. Journal of World-Systems Research, 10(1), 11-34. doi:10.5195/jwsr.2004.311
• Baker, K. M., & Edelstein, D. (2015). Introduction. In K. M. Baker & D. Edelstein (Eds.), Scripting revolution: a historical approach to the comparative study of revolutions (pp. 1-21). Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.
• Bastos, M. T., Mercea, D., & Charpentier, A. (2015). Tents, tweets, and events: The interplay between ongoing protests and social media. Journal of Communication, 65(2), 320-350. doi:10.1111/jcom.12145
• Bennett, W. L., & Segerberg, A. (2012). The logic of connective action. Digital media and the personalization of contentious politics. Information, Communication & Society, 15(5), 739-768. doi:10.1080/1369118X.2012.670661
• Bennett, W. L., & Segerberg, A. (2013). The logic of connective action: Digital media and the personalization of contentious politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9781139198752
• Bohdanova, T. (2014). Unexpected revolution: the role of social media in Ukraine’s Euromaidan uprising. European View, 13(1), 133-142. doi:10.1007/s12290-014-0296-4
• Boler, M., & Nitsou, C. (2014). Women activists of Occupy Wall Street: Consciousness-raising and connective action in hybrid social movements. In M. McCaughey (Ed.), Cyberactivism on the participatory web (pp. 232-356). New York: Routledge.
• boyd, d. (2014). It’s complicated: the social lives of networked teens. New Haven: Yale University Press.
• Caniglia, B. S., & Carmin, J. (2005). Scholarship on social movement organizations: Classic views and emerging trends. Mobilization: An International Quarterly, 10(2), 201-212.
• Castells, M. (2012). Networks of outrage and hope: Social movements in the internet age. Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Chadwick, A. (2007). Digital network repertoires and organizational hybridity. Political Communication, 24(3), 283-301. doi:10.1080/10584600701471666
• Comunello, F., & Anzera, G. (2012). Will the revolution be tweeted? A conceptual framework for understanding the social media and the Arab Spring. Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations, 23(4), 453-470. doi:10.1080/09596410.2012.712435
• Costanza-Chock, S. (2012). Mic check! Media cultures and the Occupy Movement. Social Movement Studies, 11(3-4), 375-385. doi:10.1080/14742837.2012.710746
• De Jong, W., Shaw, M., & Stammers, N. (Eds.). (2005). Global activism, global media. London: Pluto Press.
• Della Porta, D., & Mosca, L. (2005). Global-net for global movements? A network of networks for a movement of movements. Journal of Public Policy, 25(1), 165-190. doi:10.1017/S0143814X05000255
• DeLuca, K. M., Lawson, S., & Sun, Y. (2012). Occupy Wall Street on the public screens of social media: The many framings of the birth of a protest movement. Communication, Culture & Critique, 5(4), 483-509. doi:10.1111/j.1753-9137.2012.01141.x
• Diuk, N. (2014). Finding Ukraine. Journal of Democracy, 25(3), 83-89.
• DuPont, S. (2011). Social media in Egypt: A second public sphere. NDN. Retrieved from http://ndn.org/blog/2011/02/social-media-egypt-second-public-sphere
• Flesher Fominaya, C. (2014). Social movements and globalization: How protests, occupations and uprisings are changing the world. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Gerbaudo, P. (2012). Tweets and the streets: Social media and contemporary activism. London: Pluto Press.
• Gladwell, M. (2010). Small change: Why the revolution will not be tweeted. The New Yorker. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/10/04/101004fa_fact_gladwell
• Granovetter, M. S. (1973). The strength of weak ties. The American Journal of Sociology, 78(6), 1360-1380. doi:10.1086/225469
• Granovetter, M. (1983). The strength of weak ties: A network theory revisited. Sociological Theory, 1(1), 201-233. doi:10.2307/202051
• Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence culture: Where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press.
• Jurgenson, N., & Ritzer, G. (2012). The internet, Web 2.0, and beyond. In G. Ritzer (Ed.), The Wiley-Blackwell companion to sociology (pp. 626-648). Malden, MA: John Wiley.
• Juris, J. S. (2012). Reflections on #Occupy Everywhere: Social media, public space, and emerging logics of aggregation. American Ethnologist, 39(2), 259-279. doi:10.1111/j.1548-1425.2012.01362.x
• Kahn, R., & Kellner, D. (2004). New media and internet activism: From the ‘Battle of Seattle’ to blogging. New Media & Society, 6(1), 87. doi:10.1177/1461444804039908
• Kaldor, M., & Selchow, S. (2012). Subterranean politics in Europe: An introduction. openDemocracy. Retrieved from http://www.opendemocracy.net/mary-kaldor-sabine-selchow/subterranean-politics-in-europe-introduction
• Kavada, A. (2015). Creating the collective: social media, the Occupy Movement and its constitution as a collective actor. Information, Communication & Society, 18(8). doi:10.1080/1369118X.2015.1043318
• Kellner, D. (2011) Media spectacle and insurrection, 2011: From the Arab uprisings to Occupy Everywhere, London: Bloomsbury.
• Kellner, D. (2013). Media spectacle, insurrection and the crisis of neoliberalism from the Arab uprisings to Occupy Everywhere! International Studies in Sociology of Education, 23(3), 251-272. doi:10.1080/09620214.2013.790665
• Knudson, J. W. (1998). Rebellion in Chiapas: Insurrection by Internet and public relations. Media, Culture & Society, 20(3), 507-518. doi:10.1177/016344398020003009
• Langman, L. (2005). From virtual public spheres to global justice: A critical theory of internetworked social movements. Sociological Theory, 23(1), 42-74. doi:10.1111/j.0735-2751.2005.00242.x
• Margetts, H., John, P., Hale, S. A., & Yasseri, T. (2016). Political turbulence: How social media shape collective action. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
• Martinez-Torres, M. E. (2001). Civil society, the Internet, and the Zapatistas. Peace Review, 13(3), 347-355. doi:10.1080/13668800120079045
• McAdam, D., & Sewell, W. H. J. (2001). It’s about time: Temporality in the study of contentious politics. In R. Aminzade (Ed.), Silence and Voice in the Study of Contentious Politics (pp. 89-125). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
• McCarthy, J. D., & Zald, M. N. (1977). Resource mobilization and social movements: A partial theory. The American Journal of Sociology, 82(6), 1212-1241. doi:10.1086/226464
• Milan, S. (2015). Mobilizing in times of social media: From a politics of identity to a politics of visibility. In L. Dencik & O. Leistert (Eds.), Critical perspectives on social media and protest: between control and emancipation (pp. 53-70). New York: Rowman & Littlefield International.
• Morozov, E. (2009). Iran: Downside to the “twitter revolution”. Dissent, 56(4), 10-14. doi:10.1353/dss.0.0092
• Olcese, C. (2014). Social media and political activism: Breaking the offline and online division. In E. Avril & J. N. Neem (Eds.), Democracy, participation and contestation: civil society, governance and the future of liberal democracy (pp. 270-284). London: Routledge.
• Olson, M. (1965). The logic of collective action: public goods and the theory of groups. Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press.
• Onuch, O. (2015). EuroMaidan protests in Ukraine: Social media versus social networks. Problems of Post-Communism, 62(4), 217-235. doi:10.1080/10758216.2015.1037676
• Papacharissi, Z. (2014). Affective publics: sentiment, technology, and politics. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
• Pleyers, G. (2014). From Facebook movements to city square movements. openDemocracy. Retrieved from http://www.opendemocracy.net/geoffrey-pleyers/from-facebook-movements-to-city-square-movements
• Salem, S. (2015). Creating spaces for dissent: The Role of social media in the 2011 Egyptian revolution. In D. Trottier & C. Fuchs (Eds.), Social media, politics and the state: protests, revolutions, riots, crime and policing in the age of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube (pp. 171-188). New York: Routledge.
• Shirky, C. (2010). The Twitter revolution: more than just a slogan. Prospect. Retrieved from http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/the-twitter-revolution-more-than-just-a-slogan/
• Shirky, C. (2011). The political power of social media-technology, The public sphere sphere, and political change. Foreign Affairs, 90(1), 28-41. Retrieved from http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/67038/clay-shirky/the-political-power-of-social-media
• Sloam, J. (2014). ‘The outraged young’: young Europeans, civic engagement and the social media in a time of crisis. In B. D. Loader, A. Vromen, & M. A. Xenos (Eds.), The Networked young: Citizen social media, political participation and civic engagement (pp. 161-179). New York: Routledge.
• Theocharis, Y., Lowe, W., van Deth, J. W., & García-Albacete, G. (2015). Using Twitter to mobilize protest action: Online mobilization patterns and action repertoires in the Occupy Wall Street, Indignados, and Aganaktismenoi movements. Information, Communication & Society, 18(2), 202-220. doi:10.1080/1369118X.2014.948035
• Tilly, C. (1979). Repertoires of contention in America and Britain, 1750–1820. In M. N. Zald & J. D. McCarthy (Eds.), The dynamics of social movements (pp. 126-155). Cambridge, MA: Winthrop.
• Tremayne, M. (2014). Anatomy of protest in the digital era: A network analysis of Twitter and Occupy Wall Street. Social Movement Studies, 13(1), 110-126. doi:10.1080/ 14742837.2013.830969
• Tucker, J. A., Metzger, M., Penfold-Brown, D., Bonneau, R., Jost, J., & Nagler, J. (2014). Protest in the age of social media. Carnegie Reporter, 7(4), 8-19.
• Tufekci, Z., & Wilson, C. (2012). Social media and the decision to participate in political protest: Observations from Tahrir Square. Journal of Communication, 62(2), 363-379. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2012.01629.x
• Yesil, B. (2016). Media in New Turkey the origins of an authoritarian neoliberal state. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.

Identifiers

ISSN

2300-6277