CALL FOR PAPERS - Panel: Digital politics:
Collective action born in and from the Internet
6th ECPR General Conference, University of Iceland, 25th - 27th August 2011
DEADLINE for submission of paper abstracts: February 1, 2011
PANEL PRESENTATION: So far, political science
research has focused on the use of the Internet
by collective political actors that had their
main operational base in the offline realm.
First studies on the Internet and politics
mainly concentrated mostly on well-established
and traditional actors such public
administration and political parties. Then the
cope of research widened to include interest
groups, NGOs and social movements looking at the
impact of the Internet and the type of Internet
use carried out by those groups. In particular,
given the growing importance of political
campaigns and other forms of collective action
that are launched and carried out by networks of
political actors, that mainly, if not completely
operate and mobilize for their issues
online, the debate on the Internet and politics
could benefit further from considering actors
who mainly operation with an online base.
Interestingly, the emergence of collective
action in online environments apparent
ly follows new forms of "networked" forms of
action and collaboration that are said to be
different from political actors with a mainly
offline base. The panel "Digital politics" aims
to iniciate a discussion on the main
organizational and democratic logic of the
collective action born in and from the Internet
addressing questions such as: What are the main
characteristics of participation in online base
collective action? How are boundaries drawn
between the individual and the collective in
such forms? How can we deal with the dialectics
of individualization on one hand and the
effects of de-personalization on the other hand
that are inscribed in online spaces? How is the
online space governed and how does its
architecture structure online interaction?
Finally, which methods are best suited to
analyze the practices and dynamics of collective action online adequately?
As you may note from the ECPR guidelines, panel
organizers are advised to select no more than 5
papers (and no less than 4) as well as 2 further tabled papers.
For more information on the panel and submission of paper abstracts,
please visit:
http://www.ecprnet.eu/conferences/general_conference/reykjavik/panel_details.asp?panelid=542
Co-chairs: Mayo Fuster Morell (European
University Institute) and Johanna Niesyto (University of Siegen)
Discussant: Sigrid Baringhorst (University of Siegen)
Contact e-mail: (mayo.fuster /at/ eui.eu)
About the co-chairs:
Mayo Fuster Morell recently concluded her PhD
thesis (Governance of online creation
communities: Provision of infrastructure for the
building of digital commons) at the European
University Institute in Florence under the
supervision of Professor Donatella della Porta.
She explores the democratic logic of the
Internet in knowledge-making processes and the
relationship between governance models,
participation and collaboration growth. She
combined a large N statistical analysis and case
study comparisons (World Social Forum, Flickr,
Wikihow and Wikipedia). In 2008, she was
visiting researcher at the School of Information
â?? University of California Berkeley (sponsored
by Howard Rheingold and Coye Cheshire) and
provided teaching assistance at the
Communication Department â?? Stanford
University. Mayo co-wrote the books
â??Rethinking political organisation in an age
of movements and networksâ?? (English and
Italian version XL Editorial, Rome 2007; Spanish version, Icaria Editori
al, Barcelona 2008); "Activist research and
social movements" (In Catalan, El Viejo Topo
Editorial, Barcelona 2005); and, "Guide of
social transformation of Catalonia" (In
Catalan, Edicions Col.lectives, Barcelona, 2003).
Johanna Niesyto is PhD student in political
sciences. She works as research fellow in the
project â??Changing Protest and Media
Culturesâ?? at the Collaborative Research Centre
â??Media Upheavalsâ?? at the University of
Siegen (Germany). Her key interests cover
globalization, public spaces, democracy,
political campaigns, contentious politics,
political consumerism, cyber culture and social
web. In her thesis she looks at Wikipedia as
translingual public space of political knowledge
production. Johanna is co-editor and author of
"Politik mit dem Einkaufswagen" (Politics with
the shopping trolley) and "Political Campaigning
on the Web". Also, she has helped organizing
several conferences such as CPOV
(http://networkcultures.org/wpmu/cpov/). For
more information see: http://transnationalspaces.wordpress.com
About the discussant:
Sigrid Baringhorst (Prof. Dr. phil.) is working
as professor at the department of social
sciences in the field of comparative political
studies and political sociology. She is director
of the research project â??Changing Protest and
Media Culturesâ?? at the Collaborative Research
Centre â??Media Upheavalsâ?? at the University
of Siegen (Germany). Her key interest cover
political communication, social movement studies
and politics and policies of migration. She is
co-editor and author of numerous publications
such as "Politik mit dem Einkaufswagen"
(Politics with the shopping trolley), "Political
Campaigning on the Web" and "Politik als Kampagne" (Politics as campaign).
