Social Movements, Media, and Information and Communication Technologies

2014 ◽  
pp. 115-147
Author(s):  
Cristina Flesher Fominaya
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Information And Communication

scholarly journals From Pebble to Avalanche: How Information and Communications Technologies Empowered Underprivileged Actors Through Ages

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Piotr Konieczny
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Review Literature ◽  
Information And Communications Technologies ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Communications Technologies ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
International Social

Accompanied by growing literacy, information and communication technologies (ICT) have empowered states, organizations, but also – and perhaps most crucially – individuals, creating a more liberal and democratic environment. While also used as tools of social control, those technologies have often been used by revolutionaries and other agents of social change, aiding not only the surveillance state and for-profit organizations, but also individuals and non-state social actors, like social movements. In this paper I review literature on literacy and ICT, and, backed up by the results of a recent survey of international social movements, I conclude that at this pattern of empowerment, traceable throughout the human history, is continuing with the most recent information revolution.

Internetworked Social Movements and the Promise of Politics

2015 ◽  
pp. 116-139
Author(s):  
Julen Figueras
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Political Engagement ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Information And Communication

This chapter analyses the Spanish social movement of the 15M, and the influence of Information and Communication Technologies on it. Drawing a distinction between liberal and republican citizenship, the first part of the chapter discusses the interactions between technology and social movements in terms of political participation. This part compares and contrasts characteristics of online-based interactions with offline mobilisations in Spain. The second part of the chapter compiles a set of features that can be found in current Internetworked Social Movements, and its meaning from the perspective of political engagement. The chapter concludes that ICTs contributed to the recuperation of republican politics with current examples that suggest that forthcoming movements will promote this kind of participation.

Is a New Worldwide Web Possible? An Explorative Comparison of the Use of ICTs by Two South African Social Movements

2007 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herman Wasserman
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
New Media ◽  
South African ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Media Technologies ◽  
Treatment Action ◽  
Treatment Action Campaign ◽  
Worldwide Web ◽  
Information And Communication

Abstract:In this article the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), especially new media technologies such as e-mail and the Internet, by postapartheid South African social movements is explored. Following a discussion of the use of these technologies by activist groupings in international contexts, a typology suggested by Rheingold (2003) is used as a framework for comparing two South African social movements: the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and the Anti-Privatization Forum (APF).

scholarly journals Between attention and mobilisation: Proletariat political activation in a mediated Aotearoa/New Zealand

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Daniel Pickering
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Political Struggle ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
Attention Economy ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Individual

<p>Stagnant pay, increased work hours and other increasingly precarious working conditions are restricting the capacity of the working class to meaningfully participate in political processes, worsening its economic disenfranchisement and further widening the inequality gap. At the same time, political struggles have expanded beyond the economic. “New Social Movements” have for the last half century transformed politics by expanding the definition of “political struggle” to include environmental, cultural and social concerns. Information and communication technologies have also advanced considerably, to the extent that information and its transmission are no longer scarce. Instead, in an “attention economy” that operates under capitalist logics, it is the human capacity to process information that has the most limited availability. Together, these developments have fundamentally changed the ways in which people participate in politics today, with no clear consensus regarding the overall merit of these emergent means of participation for the class-based social movements looking to reverse growing economic inequality.  In this thesis, I examine the role of media in class-based social movements today. Specifically, I ask how organisers for these movements use media to facilitate political activation, or the process by which individuals disengaged from political processes come to participate in them. Using interviews with organisers from social movement organisations seeking to activate working-class audiences, I conduct a thematic analysis of those organisations’ media use and communications strategies. The findings reveal a complex imbrication of mediated and non-mediated activities designed to enable successful navigation of the attention economy. Through these findings, I propose new ways of connecting the individual to the collective in class-based movements through media.</p>

scholarly journals Between attention and mobilisation: Proletariat political activation in a mediated Aotearoa/New Zealand

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Daniel Pickering
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Political Struggle ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
Attention Economy ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Individual

<p>Stagnant pay, increased work hours and other increasingly precarious working conditions are restricting the capacity of the working class to meaningfully participate in political processes, worsening its economic disenfranchisement and further widening the inequality gap. At the same time, political struggles have expanded beyond the economic. “New Social Movements” have for the last half century transformed politics by expanding the definition of “political struggle” to include environmental, cultural and social concerns. Information and communication technologies have also advanced considerably, to the extent that information and its transmission are no longer scarce. Instead, in an “attention economy” that operates under capitalist logics, it is the human capacity to process information that has the most limited availability. Together, these developments have fundamentally changed the ways in which people participate in politics today, with no clear consensus regarding the overall merit of these emergent means of participation for the class-based social movements looking to reverse growing economic inequality.  In this thesis, I examine the role of media in class-based social movements today. Specifically, I ask how organisers for these movements use media to facilitate political activation, or the process by which individuals disengaged from political processes come to participate in them. Using interviews with organisers from social movement organisations seeking to activate working-class audiences, I conduct a thematic analysis of those organisations’ media use and communications strategies. The findings reveal a complex imbrication of mediated and non-mediated activities designed to enable successful navigation of the attention economy. Through these findings, I propose new ways of connecting the individual to the collective in class-based movements through media.</p>

scholarly journals Social media mobilisations: Articulating participatory processes or visibilizing dissent?

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lázaro M. Bacallao-Pino
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Technological Determinism ◽  
Wall Street ◽  
Social Mobilisation ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
The One

Analyses of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the internet have underlined, on the one hand, their capacity to enable processes of participation and democratic dynamics and, on the other hand, have criticised certain tendencies to a technological determinism and cyberutopianism regarding this capacity. These debates have intensified with the emergence of social media, associated with a richer user experience and architecture of participation, openness, freedom and horizontality. In the context of this dualism among utopian and dystopian visions, this study aims to examine the uses of social media in social mobilisation and their transition to sustained spaces of social participation, i.e. social movements. The study includes three cases of recent social mobilisations: Occupy Wall Street (USA), Taksim Square protests (Turkey) and #YoSoy132 (Mexico). Discourse analysis was used to compare uses of social media in the narratives associated with those mobilisations. Three main themes were analysed: 1) references to democracy, in particular criticisms of representative democracy and proposals for alternatives; 2) comments on the role of social media in social mobilisation and its development; and 3) reflections on tensions between online and offline actions as part of collective action. The findings indicate that social media are mainly used for the emotional mobilisation of individuals and visibilisation during the period of major collective action and there is a two-step development from social media to collective mobilisation and from collective mobilisation to social movements.

scholarly journals 15M: The movement in its third anniversary

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arnau Monterde ◽  
Antonio Calleja-López ◽  
Daniel Blanche ◽  
Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Sampling Procedure ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
The Social ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Perceived Impacts

The emergence of networked social movements in 2011 has opened a new door in the social movements’ literature. By adopting a technopolitical and situated approach, in this paper, we explore the case of the 15M movement three years after its formation in May 2011. Through an online survey and a nonprobabilistic sampling procedure, we pay special attention to the perceptions and opinions of the movement’s participants. We distinguish seven thematic sections: the relationship with the movement, previous political participation and motivations, the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), the emotions experienced, the evolution of the movement, its influence on elections, and the impacts on several aspects of social life. The results show that the respondents (N=1320) are to a large extent adherent to the movement and largely prompted into action due to political issues. Also, they mostly believe that the movement remains alive yet in new forms, and perceived impacts on different areas, institutions, behaviours, and ideas. We conclude by describing 15M as a case that adequately fits the concept of a networked social movement. Finally, we suggest future steps in the understanding of these movements by further applying the online survey designed for this study and complementing analyses via other research methods.

scholarly journals INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES (ICTS) AS OPPRESSORS OF SOCIAL MOVEMENTS: A POWER PERSPECTIVE

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evronia Azer ◽  
Yingqin Zheng ◽  
G. Harindranath
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Social Psychological ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
Precautionary Measures ◽  
Implicit Power ◽  
Power Hierarchy

While the literature discusses ICTs as enablers of activism, this paper discusses the manipulation of power through ICTs in activism. Power makes using ICTs in activism dangerous and risky. This paper is a product of 30 semi-structured interviews with Arab Spring grassroots human rights groups that operated before 2015 but no longer do because of oppression and how it affected them physically and psychologically. The paper explains power structures enabled by ICTs inside and outside social movements. It also discusses how the power manifested through ICTs creates much risk of different types for activists: technical, social, psychological and political. First, ICTs created more ways for authoritarian regimes to watch over activists. The asymmetry of visibility (Brighenti, 2010) is one result of the advancements in ICTs that directly affected activists’ mental health by creating anxiety among them, not knowing when and how they are being watched. This asymmetry has also endangered activists’ lives, because if they are unaware of being under surveillance and take no precautionary measures, they are an easy target for state oppression. The two conflicting sides, activists and the state, both make use of ICTs as a space for action turning ICTs into an arena for power struggle. Another side of power that this paper discusses exists within social movements that are claimed to be leaderless. Even though activists do not want to be in an authoritarian system, they create a situation whereby their refusal to decide who is in charge may lead to an implicit power hierarchy.

scholarly journals Occupy Wall Street: The movement in its third anniversary

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Blanche ◽  
Antonio Calleja-López ◽  
Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol ◽  
Arnau Monterde
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Sampling Procedure ◽  
Occupy Wall Street ◽  
Wall Street ◽  
Institutional Politics ◽  
Information And Communication

The emergence of networked social movements in 2011 has opened a new door in the social movements’ literature. By adopting a technopolitical and situated approach, in this paper, we explore the case of the Occupy Wall Street movement three years after its formation in September 2011. Through an online survey and a nonprobabilistic sampling procedure, we pay special attention to the perceptions and opinions of the movement’s participants. We distinguish seven thematic sections: the relationship with the movement, previous political participation and motivations, the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), the emotions experienced, the evolution of the movement, its influence on institutional politics, and its impacts on several aspects of social life. The results show that the respondents (N=522) are overall adherent to the movement and that the majority participated at some point. Most think that the movement still exists in one way or another, and perceive its impact on several areas, institutions, behaviours, and ideas. We conclude by describing OWS as a case that adequately fits the concept of a networked social movement. Finally, we suggest further developments in the understanding of these movements by further applying the online survey designed for this study and complementing analyses via other research methods.

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