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Networks of Contention: The Shape of Online Transnationalism in Early Twenty-First Century Social Movement Coalitions

2013; Routledge; Volume: 13; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/14742837.2013.832621

1474-2837

Stefania Vicari,

Complex Network Analysis Techniques

AbstractThe study of new media use by transnational social movements is central to contemporary investigations of social contention. In order to shed light on the terrain in which the most recent examples of online mobilization have grown and developed, this paper combines the interest in the transnational dynamics of social contention and the exploration of the use of new information and communication technologies (ICTs) for protest action. In specific terms, the study investigates how early twenty-first century social movement coalitions used Internet tools to build symbolically transnational collective identities. By applying a hyperlink network analysis approach, the study focuses on a website network generated by local chapters of the World Social Forum (WSF), one of the earliest social movement coalitions for global justice. The sample network, selected through snowball sampling, is composed of 222 social forum websites from around the world. The study specifically looks at hyperlinks among social forum websites as signs of belonging and potential means of alliance. The analysis uses network measures, namely of cohesion, centrality, structural equivalence and homophily, to test dynamics of symbolic collective identification underlying the WSF coalition. The findings show that in early twenty-first century transnational contention, culture and place still played a central role in the emergence of transnational movement networks.Keywords:: social networkswebsite networkstransnationalismWorld Social Forumlinks Notes1. This was possible for South America, Asia, Europe and Oceania. As for North America and Africa, the cross-search has only, respectively, generated city forums and national forums.2. Some of the original websites have in the meantime migrated to different platforms. However, the original web addresses were the following: Moroccan Social Forum, http://www.foraocialmaroc.org; Nigerian Social Forum, http://www.dawodu.com/nsf1.htm; Corrientes Social Forum, http://www.corrientesdepie.8k.com/foro3.htm; Brazilian Social Forum, http://www.fsb.org.br; Toronto Social Forum, http://www.torontosocialforum.ca; Boston Social Forum, http://www.bostonsocialforum.org; Kerala Social Forum, http://pd.cpim.org/2004/0104/01042004_c%20p%20aboo%20backer.htm; Iranian Social Forum, http://www.iransocialforum.org; London Social Forum, http://www.londonsocialforum.org.uk; Greek Social Forum, http://www.socialforum-media.gr; Sydney Social Forum, http://www.sydneysocialforum.org; New Zealand Social Forum, http://www.socialforum.org.nz.3. The websites were downloaded in November 2005 using HTTrack Website Copier software, an offline browser. Only social forum websites were included in the sample. Hence, the 222-node sample network was designed by tracking all the hyperlinks from one social forum website to another until all outlinks were exhausted.4. Relations among network nodes can be non-directional or directional (Wasserman & Faust, Citation1994, p. 44) with the former being considered as mutual, the latter as having a specific sender and a specific receiver.5. Calling bjk the proportion of all geodesics connecting j to k through i, i's betweenness is the sum of all bjk where i, j and k are distinct (Freeman, Citation1977, pp. 36–37, 1979, pp. 221–224).6. The presence of incoming/outgoing links is based on the density of links between nodes in different blocks.7. The test is based upon the densities within each block and is similar to performing an ANOVA.8. Languages used in more than two social forum websites.Additional informationNotes on contributorsStefania VicariStefania Vicari is a lecturer in Media and Communication at the University of Leicester. She is interested in social movements, new media and any form of informal political talk, online and offline.