"In times of increasing mediatization and digitalization media play an important role in political and societal transformation processes. The authors of this volume take an actor-centered perspective to shed light on current cases in Arab and Asian countries. They inquire into the ways processes of
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networking and mobilization evolve in the context of restricted media systems and state-dominated public spheres." (Publisher description)
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"This chapter employs the cyberconflict perspective (Karatzogianni 2006, 2009, 2010, 2012a: 52-73, 2012b: 221-46; Karatzogianni and Robinson 2010) to offer an in-depth analysis of Chinese dissidents in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) focusing particularly on the 2000s. A distinction is drawn
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between socio-political (or active) social movement uses of the internet – which focus on organisation, mobilisation and the networked form of the medium itself – and ethno-religious (or reactive) social movement uses, which subordinate the medium to vertical logics. These are often expressed in terms of ad hoc mobilisations and tit-for-tat defacements and cyberattacks adhering to closed and fixed identities, such as nationality, religion and ethnicity." (Page 217)
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"Was gibt es in punkto Datenschutz und Datensicherheit für Non-Profits zu beachten und wie können sie Hass, Hetze und Parolen im Netz aktiv begegnen? Wie können zivilgesellschaftliche Organisationen digitale Technik für Beratungsangebote oder NPO-Kampagnen erfolgreich einsetzen und offene Daten
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besser für gute Taten nutzen? Was können Politik und Zivilgesellschaft tun, um digitales Engagement zu unterstützen und die Chancen und Potenziale des digitalen Wandels besser für das Gemeinwohl zu nutzen? Die vorliegende Broschüre liefert Ihnen wertvolle praxisnahe Informationen, Ansätze und Tipps zu diesen Themen und Fragestellungen." (Vorwort)
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"This book offers fresh insights on digital activism and cyberconflicts through a comparison of sociopolitical and ethnoreligious movements in Nigeria. Occupy Nigeria, Boko Haram and The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) highlight the digital and organizational aspects of confl
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ict mobilization in contemporary Nigeria." (Publisher description)
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"This review looks back over 11 years of civil society advocacy in the information society – a total of 510 country reports published in Global Information Society Watch (GISWatch) from 2007 to 2017. It covers a period of important global shifts, from the exponential growth and influence of social
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media, to the turbulence and hope of the Arab Spring, to revelations of widespread state surveillance. It offers a summary of what internet rights activists wrote about, what they found important, the challenges they faced, and what they felt needed to be done to strengthen a people-centred information society." (Back cover)
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"This book explores the complex and contradictory relationships between communication and information technologies and social movements by drawing on different case studies from around the world. The contributions analyse how new communication and information technologies impact the way protests are
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carried out and controlled in the current information age. The authors focus on recent events that date from the Arab Spring onwards and pose questions regarding the future of protests, surveillance and digital landscapes." (Publisher description)
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"Ereignisse wie die ägyptische Revolution von/seit 2011 lassen sich als komplexe Medienereignisse beschreiben, in denen Medien weniger eine Dokumentationsfunktion übernehmen, sondern das Ereignis selbst zu einem wesentlichen Teil konstituieren und seinen Verlauf prägen, und die sich damit sowohl
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im sogenannten Realraum als auch zu großen Teilen im virtuellen Raum des Internets ereignen. Die vorliegende Arbeit schaut zurück auf dieses Ereignis, und versucht—in Theorie und Praxis—die ihm zugrundeliegende Medialität aus medienwissenschaftlicher Perspektive zu erforschen und seine Konsequenzen für eben diese Rückschau, also für eine zeitgemäße Geschichts- und Archivpraxis zu ergründen. In diesem Sinne verfolgt SEEING HISTORY – The Augmented Archive die sich verändernden Medialitäten des Archivs in Zeiten des Übergangs vom Speichermedium hin zum Modus des Übertragens. Hier liegt die wahre Herausforderung für eine zeitgemäße Geschichtsschreibung: "Von den Speichermedien aus kommen die Übertragungsmedien selten in den Blick denn sie hinterlassen kaum Spuren. Weil es von ihnen kein klassisches Archiv, sondern nur Momente der Zwischenspeicherung gibt, fokussiert sie kaum eine Historiographie." (Einleitung, Seite 13)
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"As individuals incorporate new forms of media into their daily routines, these media transform individuals’ engagement with networks of heterogeneous actors. Using the concept of media practices, this volume looks at processes of social and political transformation in diverse regions of the world
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to argue that media change and social change converge on a redefinition of the relations of individuals to larger collective bodies. To this end, contributors examine new collective actors emerging in the public arena through digital media or established actors adjusting to a diversified communication environment. The book offers an important contribution to a vibrant, transdisciplinary, and international field of research emerging at the intersections of communication, performance and social movement studies." (Publisher description)
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"Digital Middle East sheds a critical light on continuing changes that are closely intertwined with the adoption of information and communication technologies in the MENA region. Drawing on case studies from throughout the Middle East, the contributors explore how these digital transformations are p
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laying out in the social, cultural, political, and economic spheres, exposing the various disjunctions and discordances that have marked the advent of the digital Middle East." (Publisher description)
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"This article focuses on AKTrolls, defined as pro-government political trolls in Turkey, while attempting to draw implications about political trolling in the country in general. It examines their methods and effects, and it interrogates whether (and how) Turkish authorities have attempted to shape
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or counter politically motivated social media content production through trolling after the Gezi Park Protests that took place in 2013. My findings are based on an ethnographic study that included participant observation and in-depth interviews in a setting that is under-studied and about which reliable sources are difficult to find. The study demonstrates political trolling activity in Turkey is more decentralized and less institutionalized than generally thought, and is based more on ad hoc decisions by a larger public. However, I argue here that AKTrolls do have impact on reducing discourses on social media that are critical of the government, by engaging in surveillance, among other practices." (Abstract)
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"Explores the drastic efforts being made by elites to contain online activism, as well as how ‘fake news’, a failed digital vote-counting system and the incumbent president’s recruitment of Cambridge Analytica contributed to tensions around the 2017 elections. Reframing digital democracy from
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the African perspective, Nyabola’s ground-breaking work opens up new ways of understanding our current global online era." (Publisher description)
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"This is an empirical study which analyzes the Mídia Ninja group’s coverage of the Occupation Movement involving more than one thousand educational institutes across Brazil in 2016. This movement was in protest against Bill 241/55, proposed by the Temer government, which puts a cap on the spendin
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g for health and education for the next 20 years. Data was collected from the Media Observatory from the Federal University of Pará (UFPA). The Mídia Ninja Facebook fanpage alone had 565 posts on the occupations between November 7 and 27, 2016. We used quantitative and qualitative criteria to analyze 50 posts taken from this fanpage, which is a space for resisting and criticizing hegemonic discourse. Based on studies from Downing (2002), Motta (2005, 2008, 2013), Martín-Barbero (2009), Aquino (2009), Araújo (2011), Malini and Antoun (2013) and Bentes (2013, 2014), and others, we identify and understand the narrative modes contained within the fanpage collective content in order to observe aspects of journalistic narratives in media activism. The main results of this study point to a journalistic narrative with an activist agenda, built on the perspective of not only those who produce the news but also those who live the facts." (Abstract)
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"O jornalismo cidadão é uma das principais formas de democratizar a comunicação. A pesquisa possui o objetivo de compreender a cultura organizacional de uma das grandes representantes desse tipo de jornalismo, a Mídia Ninja. Para isso, utilizou-se a metodologia triangular com a aplicação de q
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uestionários, realização de entrevistas e a observação participante nas sedes da Mídia Ninja Brasília e Mídia Ninja Belo Horizonte. O trabalho orientou-se pelo marco teórico das áreas de Jornalismo e Comunicação Organizacional e alcançou resultados que caracterizam o objeto de estudo: a colaboração como valor intrínseco da organização, a utilização das tecnologias para a comunicação interna, a mutação constante das equipes regionais, a solidariedade como moeda social e o modelo de funcionamento horizontal." (Resumo)
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"This ethnography uses the Syrian case to reflect more broadly on how the networked age reshapes contemporary warfare and impacts on the enactment of violence through images and on images. In stark contrast to the techno-utopias celebrating digital democracy and participatory cultures, Donatella Del
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la Ratta’s analysis exposes the dark side of online practices, where visual regimes of representation and media production dramatically intertwine with modes of destruction and the performance of violence." (Publisher description)
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"This title centres around digital gender activism focusing on the implications that the phenomenon of online gender activism has for politics, society, culture and gender relations/dynamics. On December 16th, 2012, Jyoti Singh, a female psychotherapy student from New Delhi was raped by six men in a
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moving bus while making her way home with a male friend. After 13 days spent fighting for her life, Jyoti Singh passed away. Abiding by Indian laws, Joytis actual name was never mentioned by the media and pseudonyms like Nirbhaya (Hindi for fearless) were most commonly used. The brutal attack instantly triggered domestic and global criticism and widespread protests across India over the high levels of violence against Indian women and children, making it one of the biggest gender movements that the country has witnessed. The Nirbhaya case thus became a turning point in the politics of gender justice in India. The nationwide protests that followed the case also witnessed one of the first and most extensive uses of digital technologies for activism in India having far reaching changes in how gender activism is conducted. Keeping the Nibhaya case at its core, this book explores and attempts to understand experiences and social constructs and investigate the use of digital technologies and social media by civil society actors, activists and organisations specifically for gender activism in India." (Publisher description)
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"This chapter focuses on the role of Myanmar's fastest growing form of media—social media—in formulating notions of citizenship and nation amid Myanmar's transition. It begins with an overview of the history of mobile and internet access in Myanmar. The chapter explores the new social and politi
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cal opportunities, tensions and dynamics that are emerging as a result of Myanmar's liberalisation, particularly of the telecommunications sector. It explains how the technologies interact with and alter pre-existing social networks, relationships and communication practices, opening up new spheres for activism and advocacy of various kinds including the reforging of civil-military relations and notions of citizenship. The chapter discusses a call for future research to recognise the interaction between online-offline action, and how this may influence the emergence of a 'national' culture in Myanmar. In addition to enabling civilian humanitarian action, cyber-space has also become one of the primary domains through which civil-military relations are being reforged after decades of authoritarian rule." (Abstract)
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"This comparative study examined the Internet’s role and wider social media in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, three Central Asian countries in the democratization process. Specifically, this work aims to discuss how the Internet and social media are allowing Internet users wider opportuni
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ties to access and share information in a media-restricted region as well as collectively speak up in a restricted region of Central Asia. In general, Internet penetration is relatively low compared to other parts of the world. Still, the Internet has demonstrated its power in the region when presidents of Kyrgyzstan in 2005 and in 2010 were ousted. Both times, the Internet played the key role in facilitating such drastic change. While it is true that Central Asian countries have differently related policies and practices, varying from some freedom in Kyrgyzstan and total state control in Uzbekistan, it is also true that the region is experiencing an unprecedented boom in mobile phones, which brings the Internet to citizens." (Abstract)
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"What can replace the corporate walled gardens such as Facebook and Twitter? Our answer to this question is a firm and open one: a federation of organized networks, sustainable cells that operate as secret societies. Many have already identified social networks as a conspiratorial neoliberal inventi
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on that, in the end, only benefits the global elite. Think of the vampire data mining economies made possible with all your searches, status updates, likes, etc. The algorithmic modulation of networks generates patterns of data that hold economic value for social media corporations and finance capital. These extraction machines produce a subject Maurizio Lazzarato calls “indebted man.” Exodus for the multitudes, it would seem, is a futile proposition. Nearly twenty years into the 21st century we can conclude that global elites are not threatened by temporary uprisings and will only be questioned by an offensive counter-power that is capable of learning and incorporating its own trial-and-error experiments of daily struggles into the social body. But wait a minute, how does this intersect with the technological condition? Digital networks have been discredited for their short-lived character that merely reproduce the hegemonic fragmentation of desperate subjects. No matter how legitimate such structural proposals are, they often end up in a retromania of social imagination." (Introduction, pages 3-4)
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