In summer 2009, public discontent around the outcome of the Iranian elections sparked a worldwide response, largely because of the visibility these protests gained through social networking sites. What happened in Tehran retrospectively can be seen as an early sign of larger unrest in the region, which gave rise to the so-called Arab Spring which started in late 2010 and reached its fullest scope in 2011. Journalists, bloggers, and other cyber-enthusiasts have celebrated the use of sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube by protesters in each of these countries and by their supporters from the West as a decisive sign that grassroots communicators might be able to route around government censors and that citizen journalists might be able to force international concerns onto the agenda of the professional news media. And this perceived value of social media platforms as potential tools for political change were further fueled in the U.S. by early 2011 protests against the Wisconsin governor, who was pushing to end collective bargaining for government employees in in the state, and by the emergence of the Occupy movement in fall 2011.
In each case, the capacity of everyday people to circulate information and opinion online—rather than going through professional journalists—was key in shaping and mobilizing public opinion. A full account of these efforts would require a book of its own. However, here, I want to explore some key lessons from the Iranian example and to point to some of the larger questions it raises about the value of social media for political activism.
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