Social media and the arab spring april 23, 2018 may 1, 2018 over the horizon 3 comments arab spring, egypt, human domain, mena, middle east, protests, social media, tunisia the power of social media is that it allows people to experience current events on a personal level at a speed never before possible. Social media played a significant role facilitating communication and interaction among participants of political protests. The role of social media in the arab uprisings pew research. Finally, social media boosted international attention to local events by facilitating reporting from places traditional media has limited access to and by providing a bottomup, decentralized process for generating news stories. Social media and social movement theory social movement theory provides the lenses needed to assess how social media affected the arab spring. The role of new media in the arab spring request pdf. Because membership in civil society is more highly correlated with protest activity, the ability of social media to offer a sort of virtual civil society platform likely further boosted participation in protests during the arab spring. The authors use the term new media instead and not social media in the report. The arab spring refers to a period of protests beginning on december 18, 2010 in tunisia, which quickly spread to numerous other arab nations and resulted in regime change in tunisia, libya, egypt, and yemen, and repression andor violence in syria, bahrain, sudan, and elsewhere. This article was first crossposted on gr in october 2015. Online arab spring responds to this question, considering five countries. Social networks and internet along with cell phones played significant role in these states to uphold uprisings. This article will explore the effect of social media and internetbased communication on social movements. Social media, arab spring and its implications for pakistan 397 facebook, which has 6.
Launched by the image of the selfimmolation of the tunisian vegetable vendor mohamed bouazizi as an outcry against the humiliation of citizens at the hands of authoritarian states and their security apparatuses, the arab spring has so far resulted in a mix of hope for reform and questions about the future of the middle. This report investigates the impact of social media upon social unrest during the arab spring and is designed to test the common hypothesis that facebook, twitter and other social media outlets had a significant impact on the outbreak of protests in the mena region. The new social media and the arab spring oxford centre for. According to the 2011 arab social media report, 94% of tunisians get their news from social media tools, as do 88% of. Existing literature in this area centers on the ability of various social media platforms to unite and inspire population masses, yet does not address the important effect of social media on military forces responding. The role of social media in the arab spring pangaea. Explaining the role and impact of social media in the arab. The role of social media in political mobilisation. The event set off uprisings across north africa and the. Financial pressures top every list of catalysts and causes of the arab spring, espeeially when cormption at the hands of the mling and social elite is added. Opening closed regimes what was the role of social media during the arab spring. In saying that its role cannot be disregarded, this paper does not argue that social media caused the arab spring but was an essential tool. Subject liberal studies, arab spring, 2010, social mediapolitical aspectsmiddle east extent 1 online resource iii, 37 p. The arab spring in egypt religious literacy project.
Social media and the arab spring rutgers university. Pdf the year 2010 has seen the rise of west asia with the arab spring phenomena. Egypt and tunis are among the uppermost states of the region in which figure of internet users is elevated tucker, 2012. Description in late of 2010 and during 2011, the arab countries saw a series of large scale political uprisings. But the past five years have shown that liberty isnt the only. The role of social media in the arab spring, a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests in the middle east and north africa between 2010 and 2012, remains a highly debated subject. While the uprising in tunisia led to some improvements in the country from a humanrights perspective, not all of the nations that witnessed such social and political.
Mass media declared the arab spring as social network revolutions tucker, 2012. Students will analyze patterns, rates of change and consider the inquiry question. Toward better analysis of new media and the arab spring. This article will highlight the shift from traditional activism to digital activism. Whilst some commentators dubbed it the social media revolution and debate has continued about the eff ect of social media on the arab spring. Uprisings occurred in states regardless of their levels of internet usage, with some states with high levels of internet usage such as bahrain, with 88% of its population online in 2011 experiencing. But many of the underlying causes of the arab spring remain, such as. Social media was effective in awakening the arab people and giving them the power to fight against repressive regimes in their drive for greater freedom and independence.
Social media and the arab spring in 2011, the world witnessed unprecedented events that unfolded in the middle east and north africa that resulted to the overthrowing of the despotic arab regimes. Jan 29, 2018 the arab spring represented a rejection of the secular, socialist, panarabism, nationalist, military regimes that had come to power in the period from the 1950s through the 1970s, and which have since devolved into little more that corrupt, crony governments ruling by brute force and a pervasive security apparatus. This article examines the role of the new media in the arab spring in the middle east and north africa mena region. Since the first wave of arab spring revolution swept across parts of the middle east and northern africa more than a year ago, it has been increasingly debated whether or how much social media tools played an instrumental role in that. In arab countries, many activists who played crucial roles in the arab spring used social networking as a key tool in expressing their thoughts concerning. This article examines the role of the new media in the arab spring in the middle. The role of information communication technologies in the. Study confirms social medias revolutionary role in arab. Apr 23, 2018 social media and the arab spring april 23, 2018 may 1, 2018 over the horizon 3 comments arab spring, egypt, human domain, mena, middle east, protests, social media, tunisia the power of social media is that it allows people to experience current events on a personal level at a speed never before possible. Acknowledgement of the role of social media during the arab spring. Explaining the role and impact of social media in the arab spring. The last such great wave toppled the berlin wall and brought democracy to formerly communist countries in eastern europe and other. Aljazeera and alarabia were the important television.
Mar 22, 2018 this article was first crossposted on gr in october 2015. Jan 24, 2014 whilst some commentators dubbed it the social media revolution and debate has continued about the eff ect of social media on the arab spring, what was undeniable was the plethora of women. Explaining the role and impact of social media in the. Social media and politics and the arab spring moment iemed. The role played by the arab mass media in the arab spring is recognized by a lot of analysts. The arab springbbc two social media in the arab world. In some ways, this claim contradicts arguments put forth by howard et al. Digital media and the arab spring oxford scholarship.
Social media helped spread democratic ideas across international borders. This paper addresses these questions via an analysis of language differences in social media communication focused on the arab spring, in doing so describing new methods for the. The goal of this article is to build a conceptual framework for understanding the role of social media in the socalled arab spring, considering two different disciplinary perspectives. Social media has played a crucial role in the emergence, organization and dissemination of the. Jun 01, 2016 malcolm gladwells 2010 article in the new yorker why the revolution will not be tweeted raised debate, especially after the 2011 arab spring revolution and the part social media took in overthrowing a decade of hosni mubaraks dictatorship in egypt. Michael billig defines a social movement as a collective, organized, sustained, and inherently noninstitutional challenge. In the arab world no country could claim to be truly democratic and most were autocratic coupled with desertification 68. This paper aims to demonstrate why the role of social media in the arab spring cannot be disregarded.
Study confirms social medias revolutionary role in arab spring. Social media and its influence on the arab spring december 17, 2015 according to online activist nasser weddady, social media in the arab uprising became the peoples news agency. More specifically, it relies on literature on middle eastern political systems and on social network sites. The role of social media in the arab spring pangaea journal. Politics comes first gadi wolfsfeld 1, elad segev2, and tamir sheafer3 abstract the goal of this article is to place the role that social media plays in collective action within a more general theoretical structure, using the events of the arab spring as a case study. Pdf social media, arab spring and its implications for. Digital adoption has grown and become more mainstream, so arab youth are more connected than ever. What is the role of social media on fundamental change in arab countries in the middle east and north africa. International focus on the arab world has increased during the arab spring, and recognition of individual womens involvement in the conflicts and demonstrations has risen khamis, 2011. It argues that although the new media is one of the factors in the social. This paper discusses the effect of social media on the occurrence of arab spring.
Michael billig defines a social movement as a collective, organized, sustained, and inherently noninstitutional challenge to authority. While the arab spring may point to a phenomenon of new mass forms of sociopolitical protest facilitated by social media networks, particularly in regard to their organizational and. Social media played a central role in shaping political debates in the arab spring. As a key channel, especially in twentyfirst century middle east north africa mena, the internet has been positioned at the heart of grassroots advocacy and political interaction. Protesters used social media to organize demonstrations both pro and antigovernmental, disseminate information about their activities, and raise local. From the toppling of the autocratic governments of tunisia and egypt to the unrests in bahrain, yemen and syria, the social media has acted as an. The impact of these technologies was felt globally, affecting both developed and developing nations, if not in the same way.
The role of social media in the arab uprisings pew. The arab spring bbc two social media in the arab world. While some scholars extrapolate the role of the new media for antiauthoritarian movements 2. This paper will discuss the causes of the arab spring and how social media played a role in the middle east before the start of the revolutions in 2011. In egypt, protests and strikes began on january 25, 2011 national police day and lasted for 18 days, bringing. New media and conflict after the arab spring the web site cannot. A year of revolution a year ago, a tunisian fruitseller set himself on fire after being humiliated by a police officer.
Malcolm gladwells 2010 article in the new yorker why the revolution will not be tweeted raised debate, especially after the 2011 arab spring revolution and the part social media took in overthrowing a decade of hosni mubaraks dictatorship in egypt. Pdf the role of social media in the arab uprisings past. Six years later, little remains of the hopes that the west saw in the arab spring. A report by jeffrey ghannam to the center for international media assistance. It will do this by looking at two major processes of social movementsframing and organizingin two case studies. Pdf the role of social media in arab spring sema emiroglu. Pdf social media in the arab world before the recent revolutions had been described as marginal, alternative and elitist, and their impact minimal. The book asks why the penetration rate for social media differs in different countries. Jul 03, 2012 in arab countries, many activists who played crucial roles in the arab spring used social networking as a key tool in expressing their thoughts concerning unjust acts committed by the government. Arab spring protests in bahrain these citizen journalist news networks using social media to disseminate their information raise the question of credibility as reliable sources for the international media. Lentissocial media and the arab spring wikibooks, open. They argued that a spike in revolutionary conversations often preceded major events on the ground p. Social media and the arab spring rabindranath media watch. Subject liberal studies, arab spring, 2010, social media political aspectsmiddle east extent 1 online resource iii, 37 p.
An update on the project in 2016how it felt to live in the arab world five years after the arab spring. The role of social media in the 2011 egyptian revolution. The scientific landscape is also divided over the importance of social media during the arab spring. American university analyze the role of social media in the. Social media networks were at the centre of the dramatic events in 2011 events widely referred to as the arab spring uprising or revolution. The impact of social media on social unrest in the arab. The arab spring carried the promise that social media and the internet were going to unleash a new wave of positive social change. Social media tapped into by the traditional press, galvanized the arab spring and generated international support and awareness. Pdf the role of social media in the syrian uprising. Since january 2011, the eyes of the world have turned to the arab spring. At times during 2011, the term arab spring became interchangeable with twitter uprising or facebook revolution, as global media tried to make sense of what was going on. A number of studies have looked specifically at the role of social media in the upris. A spike in online revolutionary conversations often preceded major events on the ground. It concerns the us government role in instigating, funding and coordinating the arab spring revolutions.
The role of social media in the arab spring the role of social media in the arab spring. One of the hallmarks of the arab spring uprisings has been the role of social media in articulating demands of the popular protesters and broadcasting dramatic events as they unfolded, but it is less clear whether social media acted as a catalyst for many of the movements in the region. Egypt, libya, jordan, yemen, and tunisia, along with additional examples. Social media made the arab spring, but couldnt save it. Arab spring scholarship, with a particular focus on the significant impact of social media on events in egypt in early 2011. Social media and the arab spring al jazeera america. According to the 2011 arab social media report, 94% of tunisians get their news from social media tools, as do 88% of egyptians. Arab spring was considered a insignificant, elitist and selective because. Instead, that spring has given way to a winter of economic stagnation and political violence that has plunged syria, libya and yemen into bloody civil war, has led to widespread unrest in egypt, iraq and bahrain, and threatens to destabilize arab governments from morocco to saudi arabia. Main report over the past century, the world has witnessed waves of democratization sweep into sometimes surprising places. Social media in the arab world before the recent revolutions had been described as marginal, alternative and elitist, and their impact minimal because of the low penetration rates of the internet.
It argues that although the new media is one of the factors in the social revolution among others such as social and political factors in the region, it nevertheless played a critical role especially in light of the. Pdf the role of social media in the arab uprisings past and. The event has triggered the solidarity of at least 8 countries in the. Social media really did play an instrumental role in the wave of arab spring revolutions that swept across parts of the middle east and northern africa earlier this year, a new study has found. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Social media in the arab countries prior to the revolutions that are collectively called the. It was a spring forward for many countries in the middle east such as tunisia, egypt, libya, and seventeen others, who fought against their oppressive government regimes to put the power back in the hands of the people. Enquete sur le role des etatsunis dans les revoltes arabes investigation into the us role in the arab uprisings is an update of ahmed bensaadas 2011 book larabesque americaine. It argues that although the new media is one of the factors in the social revolution among others such as social and political factors in the region, it nevertheless played a critical role especially in light of the absence of an open media and a civil society. Yet, simultaneously, both traditional and social media cite the absence of gendered revolution or genderbased social change.