Internet Use and Protest in Malaysia and other Authoritarian Regimes

This book investigates the impact of internet use on anti-government protesting under authoritarian rule. By breaking up the causal chain into various steps, it provides a thorough and nuanced understanding of internet's role in different stages of the mobilization process. It argues that the impact of internet use on anti-governmental protesting differs per step in the 'mobilization chain', and also that the effect depends on both the on- and offline repression of the regime, as well as on the type of internet that is available. While staying far away from any technologically deterministic claims about the internet, the book demonstrates that the internet especially plays an important role in the early stages of the mobilization process: By exposing citizens to alternative political information online, internet users are more likely to become sympathetic towards anti-governmental protest movements.

Argues that social media platforms can play an important role in facilitating and protecting the circulation of alternative online political information in authoritarian cyberspace and anti-government mobilisation? Combines large N- country level analyses to understand wider patterns among authoritarian regimes with an in-depth case study of Malaysia Includes original interview and survey data to empirically trace the causal mechanisms in more detail

Autorentext

Kris Ruijgrok is Lecturer at the PPLE Multi-Disciplinary Institute (Politics, Psychology, Law and Economics), University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Inhalt
Chapter 1. Introduction.- Chapter 2. The Mobilisation Chain under Authoritarian Rule.- Chapter 3. The Direct Effect of Internet Use on Anti-Government Protest.- Chapter 4. Step 1) Internet Use and Sympathizing with an Anti-Government Protest Movement.- Chapter 5. Step 2) Internet Use and The Informing of Protest Sympathisers.- Chapter 6. Step 3) Internet Use and Being Motivated to Join an Anti-Government Protest.- Chapter 7. Scaling up the Malaysian Findings.- Chapter 8. Conclusions and Reflections.