Social Networking and Collective Action

 In my opinion, one of the very best things about the Internet is it’s potential for connecting communities and helping facilitate social change.  One of the most fundamental and simultaneously most powerful tools of organized communities is the ability to communicate quickly and effectively with one another and to act as intelligently as an informed and up to date group.  Especially in a scenario that involves direct action, specifically protests or demonstrations, social networking tools have again and again proven to be invaluable in maintaining communication and cohesiveness in the midst of a constantly evolving strategic situation.  If we wish to continue evolving the project of democracy and to see a world where authority is derived from a mandate from an informed populace, the continued evolution of open and free online community networking should be encouraged and protected. 

Clay Shirky brings up an interesting example of social demonstration facilitated by social networking in his article Fitting Our Tools to a Small World.  He describes a student-organized walkout that took place in California in 2006.  The walkout was planned and advertised completely through MySpace, completely off the radar of any of the school administrators or staff so when the action took place everyone was taken totally by surprise, unprepared and off-guard.  In addition to being a relatively stealth operation, the organization of the walkout was arguably much more effective than it may have been without the use of MySpace.  Because of the way MySpace separates and shares information, students who were likely to be interested saw the advertisements while people who would have no interest didn’t even see a single link (Shirky pp.221-222).

Another arena where social networking has been put work for social change is in the recent uprising throughout the Middle East.  Starting with the anti-government protests in Iran in 2009 (that some journalists dubbed the “Twitter Revolution” due to the heavy use of that particular network) up to and including the recent pro-democracy uprising in Egypt, social networks have played an important role.  When things began to heat up in Egypt the first thing the government did was to take a not from the events in Iran in 2009 and they immediately disabled Internet and mobile phone communication (Joudeh, 2011).  Despite this tactic, Egyptians at home and abroad were able to circumvent the information blockade and to help each other remain logged-on and tuned-in.   In the weeks that followed, culminating in the successful eviction of their unwanted president, the Egyptian people used sites like Twitter and Facebook to organize themselves an to, “… get the word out about how to bypass checkpoints, how to get across bridges, and how to get to places where people want to demonstrate” (Joudeh, 2011).             

   These are just a couple of examples of the potential social networking sites and Internet communication in general represent for community organizing and collective action.  Ideally we are constantly in a state of becoming a better world, not just technologically but socially and economically as well.  As Clay Shirky says, “Our electronic networks are enabling novel forms of collective action, enabling the creation of collaborative groups that are larger and more distributed than at any other time in history” (Shirky, p. 48).  Clearly our democracy is imperfect but it is nonetheless available to those who wish to engage with their friends and neighbors and to put effort and love into creating positive changes in their community and in the world.  Open access to the internet and to sites like Twitter and Facebook, just to mention a couple, can be quite effective if one also follows up in person to be on the streets or in the town hall or wherever it is their community calls them to be. 

References:

Joudeh, S. (2011, February 01).  Egypt:  A Social Network Revolution With a Twist.  The Moscow News.  Retrieved from http://www.themoscownews.com/comments/20110201/188383255.html

Shirky, C. (2008). Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations (pp. 47-232). New York: Penguin Group.