Social Media and Political and Social Mobilisation

Since the emergence of new media, it has been widely accepted by the scholars that new media strengthens democracy, freedom of speech and social movements; however, they have mostly ignored new media's potential for narcotizing. This study examines social media from a critical perspective and applies Lazarsfeld and Merton's " Narcotising Dysfunction Approach " to social media to see whether or not social media helps people's active participation to the social movements. In this study, it is argued that although new media can be a useful tool for helping users to get organized, generate contents and spread these contents out to their peers, increasing dosages of mass communication, during the times of unrest, may transform the energies of citizens from active participation to passive knowledge and this may lead people to become passive protesters. This study, for the first time in the literature, will apply the " Narcotising Dysfunction Approach " to social media and will discuss the concepts of " clicktivism " and " slacktivism " to put forth 'the dark sides' of social media.

This article addresses the reframing of Hindu history, mythology and rituals in a WhatsApp group as part of a larger social movement called the ‘Mahishasur movement’ arising from a nation-wide controversy around a religio-political ritual. It addresses the mediatized controversy that led to the movement, the creation of this particular social media network, the material circulated on it and the nature of hierarchy between different participants. Contrary to existing scholarship, the findings from my fieldwork in different parts of India show that non-elite precariat groups involved in identity politics at different levels participate in social media activism which has so far been understood as a domain of Anglophone middle classes. The article shows the possibilities and challenges generated by the participation of these non-elite political activists in rural and small town India in social activism alongside their urban counterparts on social networking sites particularly WhatsApp.

The popular demonstration in Maputo (2010) against the expensive life marked a new page in the history of collective mobilisations in Mozambique. This demonstration caused seven deaths and it was promoted by text messages. Since that event, there has been an evolution to use several spaces of participation to express opinion about many issues in the daily life in Mozambique, a tendency that contributed for the emergence of collective conscience on the importance and the use of social networks (Facebook and WhatsApp) as tools for political participation. Focused on understanding the trend of opinion and youth engagement at urban level, this paper answers one question: how the urban youth use social media to promote civic engagement and political participation in Mozambique?

Ever since, social media platforms have emerged to be viable tools of political engagement around the world. Since, Nigeria is stepping up to the current wave and leading in the internet penetration metrics in Africa, it is therefore very important to study how social media platforms have affected the election process.