Connected countryside: The inhibiting effect of social media on rural social movements
By: Schuler, Paul and Truong, Mai
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Material type: 
BookPublisher: Comparative Politics Description: 52(4), Jul, 2020: p.647-670.Subject(s): Social movement, Vietnam, Social media, Protest, Authoritarian regimes
In:
Comparative PoliticsSummary: While much research focuses on social media and urban movements, almost no research explores its potentially divergent effects in rural areas. Building on recent work emphasizing the multidimensional effects of online communication on vertical and horizontal information, we argue that while the Internet may facilitate urban movements, it inhibits rural movements. Because social media increases vertical information flows between government and citizens, the central government responds quickly to rural protests, preventing such protests from developing into a large-scale movement. By contrast, social media does less to change the vertical information flows in urban areas. We explore the plausibility of our argument by process tracing the evolution of protests in urban and rural areas in Vietnam in the pre-and post-Internet eras. Our theory addresses a critically overlooked effect of social media within authoritarian regimes. – Reproduced
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Articles
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Indian Institute of Public Administration | 52(4), Jul, 2020: p.647-670 | Available | AR126047 |
While much research focuses on social media and urban movements, almost no research explores its potentially divergent effects in rural areas. Building on recent work emphasizing the multidimensional effects of online communication on vertical and horizontal information, we argue that while the Internet may facilitate urban movements, it inhibits rural movements. Because social media increases vertical information flows between government and citizens, the central government responds quickly to rural protests, preventing such protests from developing into a large-scale movement. By contrast, social media does less to change the vertical information flows in urban areas. We explore the plausibility of our argument by process tracing the evolution of protests in urban and rural areas in Vietnam in the pre-and post-Internet eras. Our theory addresses a critically overlooked effect of social media within authoritarian regimes. – Reproduced
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