Johanna Schell

Were the Arab Revolts 'Social Media Revolutions'?: The Impact of the Global Digitisation on Mass Mobilisations Johanna Schell

Essay from the year 2014 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Near East, Near Orient, grade: 1,7, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, language: English, comment: Note waren 68 Punkte im Britischen System. Das entspricht einem 2:1 und in Deutschland ca. einer 1,7, abstract: This essay aims at analysing the impact of globalisation on the Arab Revolts. It does so by focussing on one of the most influential outgrowths of globalisation: the digital revolution and the thereof resulting emergence of social media. Instead of carrying out a general approach the analysis will focus on two selected countries, namely Egypt and Bahrain. Although trying to find an answer to the well known question if the Arab revolts were or weren't a social media revolution the present paper tries to concretise this initial question in splitting it into sub-question which reflect the three possible meanings it implies: First, did the Arab revolts start in social media? Second, was social media a means to the end for the Arab revolts? Last, was social media the main venue of the revolts?