Strategic Use New Media Peaceful Social Change

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Strategic Use of New Media for Peaceful Social Change
to a “collective cost problem,” meaning that citizens were not collaborating
effectively because they perceived the costs to be too high (torture,
detention, censorship, restricted organization). According to Tufekci, this
“collective cost problem” was the key factor in allowing authoritarian regimes
to endure for decades.
Although Tufekci acknowledges that there were multiple factors that led to
the toppling of dictators in Egypt and Tunisia through popular revolt, she
also credits the “new-media ecology” composed of satellite TV, cell phones
with video capacity and social media platforms (Facebook and Twitter).
This “new-media ecology” made it much harder for governments to censor
and break up complex many-to-many networks of citizens connecting via
social media after expressing common preferences for change. However,
Tufekci cautions that, although new media tools have worked in creating a
“cascade” to get rid of unpopular dictators, it is not clear how those same
tools will work in the democratization phase.
She adds that huge mobilizations, organized via social media, have often
not led to changes in policies at the desired scale in countries like Egypt,
Turkey and Ukraine. The reason, she says, is that social media have had
the effect of a double-edged sword: they allow fast, large-scale and cost
efficient mobilization, but valuable time is lost that (before the advent of the
internet) was used to slowly organize and strategize, in order to identify
tactics that will sustain momentum. 19
In her critique of Morozov’s book, The Net Delusion, Tufekci asserts that
the internet has been one of the most empowering technologies in human
history, and that the problem lies not with the technology, but with “citizen
disempowerment” and “politics that has failed.” She continues to say:
I do think Morozov underestimates the ecological effect of the
Internet in potentially undermining the legitimacy of authoritarian
regimes. Crushing of dissidents individually may certainly help
an authoritarian regime remain in power in the short term, but
too much repression, coupled with an unhappy citizenry that is
able to share their displeasure with one another, can hollow out a
regime’s legitimacy, ultimately crippling its capacity for repression,
as there is almost no purely coercive regime. In other words, while
increased capacity for surveillance may be a very real threat to
individual dissidents, broadening the repressive apparatus often
ultimately backfires, especially under conditions with lower barriers
to collective action and information diffusion, both of which are
promoted by the Internet. 20
19 New York Times. Zeynep Tufekci. After the Protests. March 19, 2014.
20 The Atlantic. Zeynep Tufekci. Delusions Aside, the Net’s Potential Is Real.
January 12, 2011.