Case Study on Potential of the Internet for Social Movements Pursuing Social and Political Change, Case Study Example

Online communities generally referred as a kind of social network, which connects geographically spread individuals around a common interest. The utopian outlooks of a few authors emphasize the prospects of the internet to facilitate the “death of distance” as well as public spaces to encourage participation and to enhance democracy. These community spaces take the shape of websites, blogs, wikis, twitter, listservs, chat rooms, or political forums that promote public discourse and deliberation. The main goal of this case study is to enhance our practical as well as theoretical knowledge of the relationship between Internet social networks, government policy and societal change by studying particular experiences within a local perspective. Iran is such a location where a little research has been performed, and the administration discourages the expression of political opposition. The case study concentrates on the usage of social-networking technology for political campaigns in Iran.

According to Powsner, Wyatt and Wright (1998), Information Technology provides many potential advantages for storing and retrieving patients’ data. While technophiles predict that shortly all data will be saved and viewed in personal computer, some are rather skeptical. Some computer-based records might have failed because of poor information design. It is essential to look into the ways the computer systems have provided a variety of design options and indicates that design should be given special attention in computer- based records. In the current society, the Internet has a significant role in transforming the lives of individuals and social relationships. By sketching a social concept of the internet and the information society, the ecological, economic, political, and cultural systems of modern society have undergone a transformation with the emergence of new information and communication technologies.

Society and Information Technology are undergoing rapid transformations together and that too in the unbelievable manner. In this era of Information Technology, we listen to three diverse opinions on how society as well as networked information technology is modifying one another. To become socialized refers to understand the different behavior types that are relevant to a specific social scenario. The rising movement of digitizing in addition to storing our social and cerebral interactions welcomes innovative ways of accumulating and synthesizing information that was earlier disconnected. Like an immature child, information technology often ignores significant contextual cues, and awkwardly puts people into potentially embarrassing circumstances.

The Internet is progressively used throughout all countries, even the nations with authoritarian and oppressive regimes. Majority of the studies goal social theory or else technical studies of the Internet to belong to one of the polarized utopian or dystopian categories. Instead of concentrating on the interactions of social forces or confining to the technology as the only influential element, the research conducted by Ameripour, Nicholson and Newman (2009), focuses on the aspects of technical objects as well as the socio-political forces. To deal with this, Ivan Illich’s theory of conviviality of tools drawn upon. Ivan Illich’s concept made use for analyzing the critical argument that, the Internet is a convivial tool, which intends to promote conviviality in Internet communities. It extracts field evidence from case studies of two online campaigns conducted in Iran regarding women’s rights; and the other on stoning. These reveal that powerful campaigns can be developed through blogs, even under authoritarian administration. On the other hand, the state is also fighting back.

The launch of the Internet in Iran has led to cultural and social changes. While some changes enhance, the others just echo the nation’s rich culture and society. Iranians began sharing ideas with people across the world through the Internet. In other words, with the launch of the Internet in Iran, some customs, behaviors and attitudes of Iranians are affected by new ideas and attitudes from the Western and Eastern civilizations (Shoraka and Omidi, 2009). Censorship in Iran is the restricting or else stifling of the publication, public exposure, in addition to seeing of specific information available in public domain in the Islamic Republic of Iran. The majority of such censorship is executed conversely mandated by the Iranian government. Censorship in Iran is typically perceived as a standard to take caution of the stability of the country as well as the command of the Islamic government. Censorship assists check unapproved reformer, counter-revolutionary, or else religious supporters, peaceful conversely in other ways, from establishing themselves and extending their epitomes. In current years, Internet service suppliers have been ordered to stop path to political, human rights as well as women’s websites in addition to weblogs extracting dissension conversely considered to be pornographic in addition to anti-Islamic. The ban has also chosen such preferred social-networking sites like Facebook, YouTube, Twiter as well as news sites. Censored information often comprises information that connects to freedom of speech, pornography, women’s rights, democracy, specific religious content, and reliable news sources along with many other websites.

The study conducted by Ameripour, Nicholson and Newman (2010), focused on the relationship between Internet social networks and societal change, and investigated the case studies of the effect of Internet-based campaigns in Iran. Ivan Illichs theory of Conviviality of Tools helps in carrying out an analysis of the conviviality of the Internet. Consequently, this conceptual lens is used to study experimental data from two Internet-based campaigns. It contributes theoretical as well as practical insinuations with reference to conviviality of Internet social networks in addition to the accomplishment of conviviality in society. Their conclusions demonstrate that Internet conviviality cannot be considered as an autonomous variable accompanied by deterministic consequences on society, although as a technology that is formed by ongoing economic and political forces. The Internet social networks of Iran are not generally accessible, frequently bring about fragmented, illogical, along with enraged discussion as well as its prospective as a tool of liberation is tempered by the Iranian government adaptation of systems of surveillance in addition to censorship. Ameripour, Nicholson and Newman (2010), debate that the results of this study have some universal implications of value to researchers analyzing computerisation movements and Internet social networks in various other nations.

Web 2.0, which is the second stage in the Web’s evolution, is drawing the attraction of IT professionals, businesses, and Web users. Web 2.0 is also referred to as advanced wisdom Web; participative Web; people-centric Web; and read/write Web. In the past few years, Web 2.0, ignited by the booming Web 2.0, which is primarily based social applications such as Flickr, MySpace and YouTube, has been shaping new applications that were earlier considered impossible (Murugesan, 2007).

In the opinion of Beer and Burrows (2007), the main concept of Web 2.0 to a sociological audience is a critical example of a cultural digitization process that is moving rapidly than our capability to analyse it. It provides a definition, a formal overview and a doctrine of the idea as part of an assurance to a renewal of description in sociology.

With the emergence of the Web 2.0, where web users are invited to contribute as well as interact on web sites, the Social Networking Sites (SNS) have become progressively more popular. However, many SNS receive criticisms for privacy issues, majority of their users share more and more personal and sometimes intimate information on these communities. This offers new opportunities for them to interact as well as communicate with their friends, acquaintances or even with anonymous people who are ready to interact with (Joly, Maret and Daigremont, 2009).

Social movements are an important social force changing societies through their interaction with new media, like the Internet, Web 2.0, in addition to digital connections, which are considered capable enough to facilitate new power structures. It can be concluded that new media does offer significant opportunities for inexpensive networking, informative framing, mobilization, and ranges of protest action. Though their adoption does not signify the establishment of completely new virtual social movements, it offers a new way of providing existent social movement establishments, local activist networks, as well as street-level protestation with a trans-national potential to cooperate, exchange information, and interact with a broader audience. These new media-enabled social action is more congruent with a politics of identity and also progressively more challenging in a media environment filled with user-generated content (Loader, 2008).

References

Ameripour, A., Nicholson, B. and Newman, M., 2009. Internet Usage Under Authoritarian Regimes: Conviviality, Community, Blogging and Online Campaigning in Iran. IDPM Working paper 43.

Ameripour, A., Nicholson, B. and Newman, M., 2010. Conviviality of Internet social networks: An exploratory study of Internet campaigns in Iran. Journal of Information Technology, 25(2), p.244-257.

Beer, D. and Burrows, R., 2007. Sociology and, of and in Web 2.0: Some Initial Considerations. Sociological Research Online, 12(5), p.1-15.

Joly, A., Maret, P. and Daigremont, J., 2009. Context-Awareness, the Missing Block of Social Networking. International Journal of Computer Science and Applications, 4(2), p.50 -65.

Loader, B.D., 2008. Social Movements and New Media. Sociology Compass, 2(6), p.1920-1933.

Murugesan, S., 2007. Understanding Web 2.0. IT Professional, 9(4), p.34-41.

Powsner, S.M., Wyatt, J.C. and Wright, P., 1998. Opportunities for and challenges of computerisation. The Lancet, 352(9140), p.1617-1622.

Shoraka, M. and Omidi, M.R., 2009. The Internet in Iran. IEEE Technology And Society Magazine, 21(1).