Mobile Activism and Contentious Politics in Contemporary China
(2013) Networked China: Global Dynamics of Digital Media and Civic Engagement- Abstract
- Digital telecommunication technology has expanded the mobile phone’s role for being increasingly used as a weapon against authoritarian regimes around the world in recent years. The proliferation of mobile phones in China also nurtures growing mobile-phone–facilitated popular protests, with the increasing use of mobile media as a key resource for not just proliferating censored information, but also facilitating demonstrations and triggering “mass incidents” (quntixing shijian). Nevertheless, very few studies address systematically the role of mobile phones in conventional forms of popular protests, let alone communication via mobile phones and its political implications for contentious activities and public engagement in contemporary... (More)
- Digital telecommunication technology has expanded the mobile phone’s role for being increasingly used as a weapon against authoritarian regimes around the world in recent years. The proliferation of mobile phones in China also nurtures growing mobile-phone–facilitated popular protests, with the increasing use of mobile media as a key resource for not just proliferating censored information, but also facilitating demonstrations and triggering “mass incidents” (quntixing shijian). Nevertheless, very few studies address systematically the role of mobile phones in conventional forms of popular protests, let alone communication via mobile phones and its political implications for contentious activities and public engagement in contemporary China. To fill this void, this study examines spontaneous mobilization via mobile phones, with a focus on several concrete popular protests in rural and urban areas. It investigates how Chinese citizens have expanded the political uses of mobile phones to initiate, facilitate, and empower offline popular protests. Drawing upon more than 40 in-depth interviews, this study demonstrates that the dynamic of mobile-communication–facilitated contentious activities lies both in the incorporation of more interpersonal, horizontal communication and in the articulation of social experience in people’s everyday lives. It concludes and theorizes that the dynamic of mobile activism lies both in the incorporation of more interpersonal, horizontal communication and in the articulation of social experience in everyday lives. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/3768449
- author
- Liu, Jun LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2013
- type
- Contribution to conference
- publication status
- unpublished
- subject
- conference name
- Networked China: Global Dynamics of Digital Media and Civic Engagement
- conference dates
- 2013-10-16 - 2013-10-19
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 82315b6d-42cb-4fe8-a1a2-b37a3f489bf5 (old id 3768449)
- alternative location
- http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2258519
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-04 14:00:47
- date last changed
- 2018-11-21 21:17:45
@misc{82315b6d-42cb-4fe8-a1a2-b37a3f489bf5,
abstract = {{Digital telecommunication technology has expanded the mobile phone’s role for being increasingly used as a weapon against authoritarian regimes around the world in recent years. The proliferation of mobile phones in China also nurtures growing mobile-phone–facilitated popular protests, with the increasing use of mobile media as a key resource for not just proliferating censored information, but also facilitating demonstrations and triggering “mass incidents” (quntixing shijian). Nevertheless, very few studies address systematically the role of mobile phones in conventional forms of popular protests, let alone communication via mobile phones and its political implications for contentious activities and public engagement in contemporary China. To fill this void, this study examines spontaneous mobilization via mobile phones, with a focus on several concrete popular protests in rural and urban areas. It investigates how Chinese citizens have expanded the political uses of mobile phones to initiate, facilitate, and empower offline popular protests. Drawing upon more than 40 in-depth interviews, this study demonstrates that the dynamic of mobile-communication–facilitated contentious activities lies both in the incorporation of more interpersonal, horizontal communication and in the articulation of social experience in people’s everyday lives. It concludes and theorizes that the dynamic of mobile activism lies both in the incorporation of more interpersonal, horizontal communication and in the articulation of social experience in everyday lives.}},
author = {{Liu, Jun}},
language = {{eng}},
title = {{Mobile Activism and Contentious Politics in Contemporary China}},
url = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/6259376/3814337.pdf}},
year = {{2013}},
}