Morozov: Virtual vs. Real Protests or, Dream on Public Diplomacy 2.0

NYT Virtual vs. Real Protests - Evgeny Morozov, New York Times
Updated September 29, 2010, 08:10 PM

Evgeny Morozov is a visiting scholar at Stanford University, a Schwartz fellow at the New America Foundation and the author of the forthcoming "The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom."

The impact of the Internet on activism is twofold. First, the Internet affects conventional activism, usually by making it more affordable and accessible. Second, it gives rise to brand new unconventional “digital activism,” which may eventually displace the older type.

We should not confuse mobilization with organization -- someone still needs to direct the long-term strategy. Social movements – spearheaded mostly by non-governmental organizations – have engaged in activism long before the Internet. Call them “civil society 1.0.” Most such movements are centralized; they have hierarchical organizational structures, pursue well-defined strategic goals, and are run as bureaucracies (even when led by very charismatic leaders.)

For many such organizations, the Internet, with its ability to reach and involve millions of people, is a godsend. Obama's electoral juggernaut is a good example of how a rigid and highly centralized campaign managed to leverage the highly decentralized nature of the Internet to its great advantage.

However, this new ability to mobilize the public around certain issues does not automatically enhance democratic life; had Facebook and Twitter been around in the early 1960s, the Ku Klux Klan would have made great use of them as well. (In the context of non-democratic states, there are many other risks as well: any online campaign to topple an authoritarian government is likely to attract the attention of the secret police, who would be quick to write down the names of all such "digital revolutionaries.”)

Much of the current excitement about the power of the Internet can be explained by its promise to bypass the hierarchies and rigidities associated with the older model of activism and usher in what Hillary Clinton has dubbed “civil society 2.0”: initiatives that are leaderless, decentralized, and not bound by any organizational structures. “The young people who ... have a URL or a Website instead of an office, [who] have followers and members instead of a paid staff, and [who] use open-source platforms instead of having a robust budget," is how another State Department official described these new actors.

It's not clear how effective these new initiatives will prove to be in toppling undemocratic governments or defending human rights. Many of the supposed gains of this new model -- the “Twitter Revolutions” in Moldova or Iran – are illusory and are based on wishful thinking rather than concrete evidence.

From a policy perspective, the question is: do we want to push traditional organizations to make better use of the digital tools or do we want to spend more resources on nurturing new kinds of virtual movements?

If one believes that effective social change, especially in tough authoritarian conditions, can't succeed without getting citizens to participate in old-school political processes – showing up to political marches, risking one's life defying the police, getting beaten up and thrown in jail – then the ability to sign online petitions and retweet links to news articles may not seem impressive. In fact, it may even give the young people living in those countries the wrong impression that politics driven by virtual rather than real protest is actually preferable to the mundane and often corrupt world of traditional oppositional movements.

But we should not confuse mobilizing with organizing. The Internet excels at mobilizing people to rally behind political causes (obviously, not all of them democratic) – but someone still needs to engage in long-term strategic organization.

As Angela Davis puts it, “The Internet is an incredible tool, but it may also encourage us to think that we can produce instantaneous movements, movements modeled after fast food delivery.” And she's right: effective social change requires more than just purchasing cool URLs – someone does need to show up at the office after all.