ABSTRACT
The growing ubiquity of mobile technology and internet-connected devices around the world has led to a burgeoning literature on the political role and implications of information and communication technologies (ICT) in contentious politics as an increasing number of people are appropriating and domesticating their digital applications for the initiation, mobilization, and coordination of contentious activities (e.g., van de Donk et al., 2004; Mercea, 2012; Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Tufekci & Wilson, 2012; for a review, see Garrett, 2006). In the spring of 2011, for instance, the world watched as internet and mobile phone-facilitated revolutionary fervor swept the Middle East (e.g., Howard & Hussain, 2011). As one of the latest examples of eye-catching ICT-facilitated activism, the ‘Arab Spring’ not only mobilized widespread offline protests and toppled dictators but also stimulated further studies into the role of ICT in demonstrations and protests, in particular in authoritarian regimes, in the wake of increasing use of digital devices in political activism and contentious politics.
