Social Protest Flashcards
Examples
Guy Fawkes
London riots
Social protest/movements/collective actions
People protesting are usually a small minority within a larger group.
Thomas & Louis 2013: social protest can vary from peaceful to agressive (peaceful marches, to hunger strikes and vandalism).
- Governments may actively attempt to prevent some for of social protest.
Motivations for protest
Alberici et al (2012) argue there are four motivations that drive people to action:
- identification with a group involved in conflict with larger organisation.
- negative emotions from perception that situations of group is unfair- not true for everyone (eg. riots- most just got caught up without serious motive).
- shared belief that through joint efforts can achieve goals.
- perception that moral principles have been violated and these must be defended.
Can predict what will happen as people are driven by fairness; can be influenced by environmental cues.
Group identity
Tajfel 1986: social identity theory- groups provide source of pride/self esteem/belonging.
Before collective action, one must identify with a social group (Taylor et al).
But multiple identities in different contexts (Stryker & Burke, 2000).
Stryker- the bigger we perceive our group to be, the greater our commitment to the group.
Marques et al, 2001: motivated to maintain positive group image- may explain why stronger reaction to in-group deviances than external challenges.
Teng et al 2016: people within a neighbourhood protesting, would expect the rest to support, however support was decreased.
Predicting group identity
Conover et al- People retweet posts by those with similar ideology, but mentions/replies to those differing.
Criado et al, 2016- explored whether possible to detect group formation through analysis of online conversations.
- found it was possible to used automated language analysis to identify and discriminate between different online groups with a 99.7% degree of accuracy.
Online social protest
Meuleman & Boushel 2013: anonymity of the internet makes online protest different from traditional acts.
- few/no leaders.
- fewer/no spokespeople.
- no official documents.
- overall little organisation.
Lack of understanding how protest operates within new technologies.
Hacktivism = form of online protest.
More direct action is taken against a target.
One motivation often cited by such groups is the belief in freedom of information on the internet - Tom Cruise video.
Six degree principle (Milgram)
Idea that everyone in the world is sex or less steps away from each other through friends of friends.
One possible reason social media may facilitate social protest.
Fink et al- protest can spread quickly between groups, provided there are some links.
- many protest tweets that do not go viral.
Hashtags
Fink et al 2016- #bringbackourgirls evolved from the kidnapping of school girls.
Argues this is an example of social contagion effect; initially localised social movement goes viral (similar to domino effect).
Risks & costs
Fink et al observe social media change how risky people perceive participation to be.
- sense of greater support.
- group size and conformity.
- eg. retweeting has low cost of participation.
Prevention
CIA claimed it can predict social uprising.
If a group perceives conflict with a larger organisation, an attempt for the organisation to silence the group may only validate their sense of persecution.
Best option may be to simply do nothing; any attempts to strike may drive opponents to strike back.
