Social Media Uprising in the Chinese-speaking World [Kindle Edition]

Hong Kong In-Media has published the e-version of its research work on Social Media and Mobilization at Amazon under the title: Social Media Uprising in the Chinese-speaking World.

This book is an elaborated study of the use of social media in grassroots struggles in China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and Malaysia by local researchers and activists. We would like to work out a self-finance model for research and publication of social movement and media activism experience in Asia, in particular among Chinese speaking communities. Please support us by buying a copy.

You may also download a sample preview copy here [pdf].

Below is an introduction written by Jack Qui, a scholar on New media and politics from the Chinese University of Hong Kong:

Social media has become an integral part of our lives, personal or public, for good or for bad, in the Asia-Pacific region and the rest of the world. Yet, most books dealing with social media and its sociopolitical dimensions tend to be written by authors based in western societies, writing from western perspectives: Howard Rheingold, Cass Sunstein, Clay Shirky, Evgeny Morozov. They publish great work, but what about Asian experiences with social media and mobilization? Are western writings sufficient in describing and explaining what is going on in the Asian Pacific?

This book addresses the first question in an unprecedented manner. It gives a clear answer to the second question, which is, no. By putting together rich materials from Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macao, and mainland China, this book, the first of its kind, shows not only how Asian experiences are collectively unique. The book succeeds in demonstrating how the convergence of recent Web 2.0 technologies with existing social causes takes shape in the particular contexts of each society, in drawing from specific local and regional repertoires of political culture, energizing ongoing civil society movements and responding to urgent needs for action from the bottom up. In so doing, grassroots mobilization facilitated by social media is redefining the trajectories of history, both in the region and on a broader level.

Globally speaking, netizens in the Asia-Pacific region have been vanguards in the evolution of Internet-based social mobilization. Long before the Twitter Revolution of 2009, the flames of the 1998 Reformasi movement swept across Malaysia and beyond to support Anwar Ibrahim after his dismissal from office. Before Mubarak lost power in 2011, protesters in The Philippines, equipped with mobile phones and SMS, brought down the Estrada presidency in 2001. Two decades before Obama joined Twitter, activists across Southeast Asia were using mailing lists to join the 1989 Tiananmen pro-democracy movement.

The Asian story began to unfold years before Julian Assange became a household name in the West; when WikiLeaks first appeared in 2006, it claimed that overseas Chinese dissidents were the most prominent among its founders and that “our primary interests are oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, but we also expect to be of assistance to those in the West” (AFP).

Measured in Internet time, Web-based mobilization in Asia has more than a long history. In recent years, it has also become very popular and extremely colorful along with the spread of social media. Newer platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, are more influential in other parts of the world than is often understood. Older platforms have developed uniquely Asian characteristics as a result of language differences, such as campus BBSes in Taiwan, Cantonese-language Internet radio in Hong Kong, or online forums in Macao. Further still, there are the peculiar species of social media in the dark shadows behind China’s “Great Firewall” such as Sina Weibo, Renren, and Youku, which, respectively, are imitations of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, but in technical aspects are designed to try and minimize use of their platforms in political mobilization.

Despite their idiosyncrasies, and despite attempts of political suppression and commercial marginalization, social media as analyzed in all chapters of this volume have stood out as new platforms of mobilization. Drawing on existing resources of social movements in each society, the particular causes in social networking service (SNS) mobilization vary from the protection of landmarks to environmental movements to freedom of speech, from labor politics to gender equality, to the exposure of official corruption. The multiplicity of these causes and their sustained growth, in both number and strength, signify the coming of a new era in which traditional authorities and their mass-mediated communication channels can no longer dominate discussions of public policy and the shaping of collective memory, especially among disenfranchised social groups such as youth, migrants, ethnic minorities, and dissidents of every kind.

But how effective is the power of social media not only in the spontaneous mobilization of netizens, but also in organizing them democratically to enable sustained social change? Does citizen journalism really offer a solution to the lack of reasoned responses in online deliberation? What about “regime change”? Is that feasible, or even desirable, in these Asian societies?

Authors in this edited volume are all leading experts in their respective fields, individuals who have observed and, in many cases, participated in social media-based mobilization in their own territories and larger social movements in the Asian Pacific. They offer accounts that are richly descriptive yet ideologically open, historically optimistic yet empirically cautious. After all, their analyses focus on alternative modes of mobilization that are by, for, and of the grassroots of society; approaches to participation in society which differ fundamentally from institutionalized party politics dictated by senior politicians or sponsored by business elites.

The greatest benefit this volume brings is that it allows readers to first appreciate the singularity of each society and key incidents of mobilization in it, and then compare them across space and across time, not only with each other but also with parallel developments in other world regions. This is a truly exciting task that is long overdue. I am, therefore, most delighted to see the publication of this excellent volume, which should be of interest to anyone who would wishes to learn about social media and the democratic future of Asia, and of the entire human race. Enjoy!

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