ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses President Barack Obama's observations in three case studies of Middle Eastern social media use, which, in limited ways, give powers once reserved for states to individuals in their demand for better governance. It focuses on small acts of opposition to authoritarian states, using social media as a new public sphere in which communicative acts strive to redefine power relationships and to encourage civic engagement in the service of better governance. The chapter explains that new media micro-empowerments enable ordinary citizens to disrupt the status quo, thus neutralizing the effects of authoritarian rule in small ways, even if the effects of such disruptions are hard to sustain and measure. The contexts in which digital resistance occurs are increasingly fragile. While citizen resistance to bad governance intensifies with the diffusion and use of social media, the shortand long-term effects remain murky at best.
