Feature image via creativecommons.org: A man during the 2011 Egyptian protests carrying a card saying “Facebook, #jan25.
On June 3 and 4, 2016, SMEX will participate in a workshop, co-sponsored by the Arab Studies Institute’s “Media Project,” Notre Dame University, AUB Media Studies, and the Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship at the American University of Beirut, to discuss the role of digital activism in promoting civil and political rights and to address the obstacles to digital advocacy.
The role of technology and internet tools in activism—such as social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, blogs—is not limited to short-term campaigns. They can also be used to build lasting movements.
Movement building is a long-term process that aims to sustain an active social movement that aims to realize structural societal change. It includes more planning, creating strategies, and collaboration with people of similar interests, values, and agendas than short-term campaigns, but helps to build power and all-important coalitions.
There is a lot of room to strengthen movement building using digital tools. There is relatively little focus, for example, on building and segmenting constituencies, a key component of developing regular communications with supporters who will be not only more informed but more likely to activate their support when challenges arise.
With this in mind, during June, the Tasharuk team will identify and share resources that we think can strengthen our capacity to build movements. We’d also love to hear from you about tools you use to bring people together and push for more systemic change.
Tasharuk now includes more than 1,300 Arabic and English resources These resources are produced by many organizations such as the International Journalists’ Network, Gender and Technology Institute, Amnesty International, United States Institute for Peace, Sawtna, and others. Resources are organized in 42 categories, such as Digital Rights, Community Building, Privacy and Surveillance, Social Media and Networking, etc.
Users who register can also submit and save resources to a personal library. Soon, organizations will also be able to have a profile page, where they can share and promote all their resources in one place.
Please sign up on Tasharuk and share your relevant resources. You can also follow us @tasharuk and tweet your own movement building resources using the hashtag #MovementBuilding and #DigitalActivism.