Reading Summation 4 – INTERNET AND SOCIAL MOVEMENT ACTION REPERTOIRES Opportunities and limitations by Jeroen Van Laer & Peter Van Aelst

Reading Summation 4 – INTERNET AND SOCIAL MOVEMENT ACTION REPERTOIRES Opportunities and limitations by Jeroen Van Laer & Peter Van Aelst

In the article, the writers point out “how the Internet has shaped and shaping the collective action repertoire of social movements pursuing social and political change.”Internet has changed the action repertoire of social movement in two ways, how to attract more people, saving time, and make the action easier in an availability usage and developing new tools for activism. However, the limitation of internet is “digital divide.” Internet cannot build a steady connection between activists because is very easy and quickly to lost interest. But in global scale, internet becomes more and more important status in political and economical power. Also, more and more activists and groups start engage in social changes and politic movements through internet. The advantage of using internet for activism is the power of mobilization and participation of the protest, such as national street demonstrations; for example, the uprising of the Zapatista movement. Internet like the linkage joint of activists, groups and organizations of social movement can communicate to each other more easily online, in cyberspace, and in the streets. Not only use traditional form for protesting in this information age, but also there are some new ways through internet, such as virtual activities, online petitions, virtual sit-ins, email bombings, and website hacking.

So, the typology two related dimensions of internet for activism are “real” actions which are supported and facilitated by internet and “virtual” actions that are internet-based (Gurak & Logie 2003; Vegh 2003). Here the authors categorized the dimension distinguishes between “internet-supported” and “internet-based” form of collective and the difficulty for “High threshold” and “low threshold.”  

Quadrant 1: The traditional form for protest, the low threshold and originality are the reasons for successful, and they can be better through internet.

Quadrant 2: Legally and practically, it involves transnational demonstrations, meeting, and obstructive action forms, and the practical barriers can be recede by internet.

Quadrant 3: mobilization and reduction of participation are the advantages of the types of protest.

Quadrant 4:  Particularly mention about protest websites, alternative media sites, culture jamming and hackivism, and how they haymaker the recent world.

            In the end, the authors also point out the weakness of internet for activism.

·         Still a digital divide: based on different developing-level countries, not everyone are using computer or internet, and not everyone the skills for using digital media.

·          Internet makes it not easy enough: because out computer IP are control by the governments that might cause some problems and the difficulty to assemble people who live in different area and countries to a real place. Also, the internet might banned by the governments, such as China.

·         Internet makes it too easy: forge sign and personal information for petition, or irresponsible adhesion might cause an unreliable reputation for protests.

·         The new media lost their newness: in recent day, internet as a protest tool is easier to guard than in the past because the opponents are more familiar with this expedient.

·          The internet only creates weak ties: trust among activist is probably a necessary prerequisite (Gerbaudo 2009). However, the internet is hard to create a strong relationship and sustainable network of activists.

Bibliography

Gerbaudo, P. (2009) ‘Get off the keyboard!” internet usage, and the continuing need

for sociability and trust in the context of anarcho-autonomous activism’, paper

presented at the 5th ECPR General Conference, Potsdam, Germany, 10–12

September 2009.

Gurak, L. J. & Logie, J. (2003) ‘Internet protest, from text to web’, in Cyberactivism.

Online Activism in Theory and Practice, eds M. McCaughey & M. D. Ayers,

Routledge, New York, London, pp. 25–46.

Vegh, S. (2003) ‘Classifying forms of online activism: the case of cyberprotests

against the World Bank’, in Cyberactivism. Online Activism in Theory and Practice,

eds M. McCaughey & M. D. Ayers, Routledge, New York, London,

pp. 71–95.