<p>How does collective action operate in digital space,
particularly for those social movements at the cutting edge of technologically
innovative contentious politics? This
dissertation analyzes activist (and hacktivist) groups engaged in what I call <i>digital contention</i> with state and
corporate institutions over the future of Internet policy and governance, or
what they see as “the freedom of the Internet.” Based on case studies of the
Digital Rights movement and the Anonymous hacktivist collective, I use a
combination of computational and qualitative analyses of online texts, along
with participant-observation at meetings and protest events, to explore how
certain collective action dynamics are changing in digital space. Specifically,
these include how movements internally perceive political opportunities and
threats, as well as how they construct frames to communicate to external
audiences. I find that: 1) Political opportunity is less important than threat
for activists in digital contention, which is likely due to the lower costs of
collective action; and 2) The digital divide and technological knowledge gap
create a barrier to frame resonance which digital activists address either
through “strategic inclusiveness” or “communities of anonymity,” both of which
encourage diversity among participants while also reifying other inequalities
in different ways. These findings have significance for the study of social
movements, communication and technology studies, and Internet policy. I argue
that they portend changing dynamics that may ultimately affect all forms of
collective action, and indeed the balance of power in whole societies, in the
future as digital technology continues to spread into every facet of our lives.</p>
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:purdue.edu/oai:figshare.com:article/12706112 |
| Date | 24 July 2020 |
| Creators | Jared M Wright (9164600) |
| Source Sets | Purdue University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis |
| Rights | CC BY 4.0 |
| Relation | https://figshare.com/articles/thesis/Digital_Contention_Collective_Action_Dynamics_in_Social_Movements_for_Internet_Freedom/12706112 |
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