Johan Örestig

Extending the local : activist types and forms of social media use in the case of an anti-mining struggle

Abstract As political activists increasingly use social media in local protests, scholars must redirect attention from large-scale campaigns to scrutinize the ways in which geographically confined actors use social media to engage in protests. This paper analyses how a 2013 anti-mining campaign in Kallak, Sweden, combined on-site resistance with social media strategies via Facebook pages. The study examines which activist roles and forms of social media use that emerged and aims to explore what larger practical and theoretical implications one can derive from this specific case of place-based struggles. Results show that three typologically distinct activist roles emerged during the protests: local activists, digital movement intellectuals and digital distributors. These different types of actors were involved in four different forms of social media use: mobilization, construction of the physical space, extension of the local and augmentation of local and translocal bonds. Based on our findings, we argue that the coming together of these different activist roles and the different uses of social media added a translocal dimension to the peripheral and physically remote political conflict in Kallak. Media users were able to extend a locally and physically situated protest by linking it to a global contentious issue such as the mining boom and its consequences for indigenous populations.

Local moral economies : the space, place, and locality of social media mobilisation

Abstract This study is a case study of a locally rooted environmental campaign on the Swedish island of Gotland. We aim to enhance the understanding of how locality is manifested in social movements that emerge in today’s networked world. We analyse how the double goals of speaking to, as well as beyond, the local context came into expression in the movement’s social media activities. We draw on data from tweets and Facebook posts and include interactions between activists and critics as well as the resources linked to in the posts. Analysis indicates that the conflict must be seen as spanning across local, national and global levels. In line with earlier research, activists used social media to link their struggle with other struggles. Also, it was used to charge the local struggle with symbolic content by framing it as one of many struggles between local communities, authorities and multinational corporations. Beyond this, posts from the island signalled dedication to the history and long-term interests of the community. We argue that future studies should recognise the crucial role that reciprocity norms in the local community can play for outcomes of conflicts and that the notion of a ‘local moral economy’ can be used to reach a deeper understanding of this.