Protest and the Media, Westminster University 12-13 June 2013
18. Juni 2013 von Mundo
Impressions from the fifth Annual Conference of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
Prof. Couldrys opening speech on his latest book (chapter 5, especially) described the current media change as an ambivalent process. While we certainly witness an end of the traditional mass media’s undisputed role as the single and central access points to society, he also warned about detached and unpolitical clicktivism or a reduction to counter-democracy (Rosanvallon). Instead, protest and democratic participation needs to be more sustainable and politically connected. Couldry refered to authors like Latour, Hardt/Negri, Goodwin, Shirky, Benkler, Castells, and others and he asks for the specific emergence of meaning that is the necessary underpinning to make the technical infrastructure of the internet a cultural force of empowerment.
On June 13th, Lance Bennett gave his presentation, based on his forthcoming book >The Logic of Connective Action< (with Alexandra Segerberg, Cambridge University Press). Bennetts speech gave a broad picture of current research asking for the role of protest mobilization that takes the form of individualized networked action. While in the German academic discourse the notion of individualization mostly refers to an affluent middle-class, freed from poverty and insecurity, Bennett’s starting point is the structural change induced by what many other speakers named as the world-wide neoliberalism. Examples such as works of legofesto (http://legofesto.blogspot.de/2009/04/g20-death-at-protest.html)
And the >Eat the Rich< visual activism pointed out that across the globe many protest movements are motivated by problems of social inequality at the moment.
Correspondingly, occupy-some-place-on-this-globe of course was one of the most frequent topics during the short panel presentations of the conference. However, organizers managed to attract a broad spectre of speakers, especially in geographic terms. Works on online campaigning for same sex rights in the caribbean or the Chilenian students‘ movement allowed for the impression that Castells might be right. There might in fact be a global trend towards networks of outrage and hope, although we still pretty much lag behind in theorizing this development, as Christian Fuchs (University of Westminster) pointed out offline at the conference as well as online before.