New media, new movements? The role of the internet in shaping the ‘anti‐globalization’ movement

Abstract

Collective action and social movement protest has become commonplace in our ‘demonstration‐democracy’ and no longer surprises the media or the public. However, as will be shown, this was not the case with the recent anti‐globalization protests that attracted demonstrators from countries all over the world. The battles of Seattle, Washington, Prague and Genoa, with an unforeseen mixture of nationalities and movements, became world news. Interestingly, the new media seemed to play a crucial role in the organization of these global protests. This article maps this movement‐in‐progress via an analysis of the websites of anti‐globalization, or more specifically anti‐neo‐liberal globalization organizations. It examines the contribution of these sites to three different conditions that establish movement formation; collective identity; actual mobilization and a network of organizations. This ongoing, explorative research indicates signs of an integration of different organizations involved and attributes an important role to the Internet. However, whilst both our methodology and subject are evolving rapidly, conclusions, as our initial results show, must be tempered.

Key words:

• ICTs
• social movements
• anti‐globalization
• websites