gisw13_chapters

Participatory citizenshipAnita GurumurthyIT for Changewww.itforchange.netTracing the impact of ICTs on the socialand political participation of womenThe cat is out of the bag. With the Snowden affair,it is unequivocally clear that the network society’semancipatory potential is more or less just that:a promise in the distant horizon that is weigheddown by the political-economic surveillance complex.The turn of events is deeply disturbing forglobal justice. And for the feminist project, it is asobering moment. Just as we were beginning tocreatively bend space with digital tools for buildingcommunity, forging social movements, organisingdissent and publishing perspectives on genderjustice, we begin to realise that the “network”may indeed be monolithic, pervasive and unexceptional.However, feminist activism requires an abidingcommitment to constructive, forward-looking analysisand theory that can assist action for change.There is a need to move conceptions of contemporarylife from dystopic readings of the networksociety to productive interpretations that can assistaction. What would equal participation in thenetwork society, the experience of “networkedcitizenship”, entail? How can we understand digitalspace as political terrain? What outcomes forgender equality arise through the discourse andpractice(s) of technology? How does politicalcounter-power emerge in and in spite of the hegemonicnetwork? These are some of the questionsthat need to be explored to articulate the citizenshipand public-political participation of women inthe network society.The connection between digital spaceand the public sphere: What network politicsseems to bring for womenA starting point in the exploration of a framework foraction is knowing how political discourse and practicemeet the affordances of technology and howin this interaction, gender relations are realigned. 1Indeed, politics in the network society imbues thelogic of the technological paradigm. From activistdistributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks tohackathons-for-a-cause and mass texting or tweetingto galvanise flash mobs, what constitutes politicallife has changed. This is not just about vocabulary.The social discourse of politics today emergesthrough networked pathways that are more diffuse,adaptive and decentralised. Politics seems to beeverywhere, and as Wendy Harcourt observes:Today’s vibrant, young, “unruly” movementsthat throng together over one issue and thenmove on again before analysts can catch themare not negotiating, nor seeking to build institutionalstability. They are on the streets, in the piazzas,blogging, tweeting, texting, performing,meeting on Facebook and YouTube. The size,the energy, the multiple images and words in somany languages hardly allow you to catch yourbreath. This type of civic action provides possibilitiesfor new alternatives.... 2The performance of politics today does indeed derivefrom the propensities of a networked society.Borrowing from game theory, network theorists explainhow with the use of digital technology a leapof faith occurs, when a “known” becomes a “knownknown” – a “common knowledge” – which showsyou that you are not alone in a particular set of beliefs.What then arises through the dispersed andanarchic performance of politics follows HannahArendt’s description of transformative revolutionarymoments when ordinary people abandon theirroutines – when common assumptions about theway things go are thrown out – and people cometogether to invent a new way of doing things. Thesemoments may not last, but they punctuate history1 Of course, it is equally important to look at how feminist practicesof technology transform the public-political sphere. This would beanother entry point in the analysis. But looking at politics also meanstaking into account the dynamic interplay between political institutionsand political praxis – the framing of gender by political structures anddiscourse, as well as subversive feminist interruptions in this canvas.2 Harcourt, W. (2012) The Challenge of Civic Engagement forDevelopment, Development, 55(2), p. 151-153. www.palgravejournals.com/development/journal/v55/n2/pdf/dev201211a.pdf25 / Global Information Society Watch