#8M women’s strikes in Spain: following the unprecedented social mobilization through twitter

ABSTRACT

The first general women’s strikes to demand gender equality in Spain took place on 8 March 2018 and 2019. Both calls were an amazing success, becoming world references for feminism. This research investigates how the strikes were dealt with through Twitter by a Collective Symbolic Coping (CSC) process. Discourses on Twitter were analysed on both years, 4,384 tweets were selected and their content was analysed by lexical analysis. The results from 2018 indicated the CSC phases of 1) awareness; 2) divergence, where feminist demands and the role of men in the strike were debated; and 3) convergence, where the success of the strike was highlighted. However, in 2019 the feminists on Twitter were forced to cope with a great deal of trolling against them. This trolling was maintained in the awareness and divergence phases, making it difficult to reach a convergent discourse regarding the success of the strike. Moreover, the results also demonstrated that there was no reference hashtag in the strikes. It is concluded that discourse on social networks has become a key factor in feminist social mobilizations and that this feminist digital activism will be critical in the continued dissemination of the claims for gender equality in Spain. 

KEYWORDS:

• Collective symbolic coping
• digital activism
• feminism
• social mobilization
• social psychology
• trolling
• twitter

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Aknowledgements

‘KideOn’. Basque Government Research Group (Ref.: IT1342-19/‘A’ category).

Author biographies

Nahia Idoiaga Mondragon holds a PhD in psychology and degrees in psychology and educational psychology; her main fields of research are the analysgis of feminist issues from the perspective of social psychology, communication psychology, health psychology, youth psychology and the study of public understanding of science. She is now a lecturer in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) and a member of ‘KideOn’ Research Group of the Basque Government (Ref.: IT1342-19/‘A’ category).

Maitane Belasko Txertudi is a PhD student on the postgraduate programme, Psychodidactics and a graduate in Early Childhood Education. Her main field of research focuses in feminist perspective studies and also early care studies. She is currently a lecturer in the Department of Didactics and School Organization at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU).

Dr. Naiara Berasategi has a Master Degree in Primary Education, Special Education Teacher, Sociologist, Political Scientist and is Doctor with international mention by the University of the Basque Country. Her main research subjects are related to the field of social and educational inclusion, specifically in the immigrant population, youth and children, women, the elderly and people with special educational needs.

Dr. Nekane Beloki Arizti has a Degree in Political Science and Sociology and Doctorate from the University of the Basque. Her research career has focused on the field of Education, in general, and, specifically, in the field of Social Education since 2003. This has led her to participate in different projects and research groups, which have worked on the socio-educational inclusion of different groups, nowadays is the principal investigator of KideOn Research Group of the Basque Government, Ref.: IT1342-19 (A category).

Notes

1. The Civil Guard (Guardia Civil) is a Spanish armed institute of a military nature with police functions, dependent on the Ministries of the Interior and Defence, which fulfill functions of citizen security and public order.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Basque Government by KideOn Research Group, Ref.: IT1342-19 (A category).

Notes on contributors

Naiara Berasategi Sancho

Naiara Berasategi Sancho has is Doctor with international mention by the University of the Basque Country. Her main fields of research are subjects related to the field of social and educational inclusion, specifically in the immigrant population, youth and children, women, the elderly and people with special educational needs. She is now a lecturer in the Department of Didactics and School Organization in the Degree in Social Education and Teaching at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) and member of “KideOn” Research Group of the Basque Government (Ref.: IT1342-19/“A” category).

Nekane Beloki Arizti

Nekane Beloki Arizti holds a PhD in psychodidactics and degrees in Political Science and Sociology. Her main field of research is on the socio-educational inclusion of different groups. She is the principal investigator of “KideOn” Research Group of the Basque Government (Ref.: IT1342-19/“A” category).