ABSTRACT
Facebook might changes our conceptions of activism, but there's little discussion of how it does so. This chapter argues that Facebook encourages a mobilization over topics that are personal and are thus removed from impersonal core power centers and institutional dynamics. Despite this, there are times when the personal is essential to challenge power, particularly when the "search for the self" is repressed. Facebook's celebrated status as a tool for activism is a direct results of the Egyptian revolution of 2011. The very act of Facebook mobilization can become an identity in and of itself. A large gap in Internet use existed between the college-educated and non-college-educated throughout the developing world. The gaps were particularly large in the Middle East and North Africa. Facebook's emphasis on creating a "network of intimates" is exactly what is needed for mobilizing totalitarian states.
