Social Media and the Arab Spring

On December 17, 2010, a young unemployed man set himself on fire in Tunisia.

Mohammed Bouazizi took that desperate step in protest, after officials had blocked his attempts to make a living selling fruit on the street.

His self-immolation sparked a wave of anti-government protests, first in Tunisia, then all across the Middle East.

And technology and social media have played key roles in many of the pro-democracy movements of the Arab Spring.

Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Zeynep Tufekci, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a coproduction of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH in Boston. A year ago today the Arab Spring hadn’t started yet, but it was about to. On December 17, 2010, a young unemployed man set himself on fire in Tunisia. Mohammed Bouazizi took that desperate step in protest after officials had blocked his attempts to make a living selling fruit on the street. His self-immolation sparked a wave of anti-government protests, first in Tunisia, then all across the Middle East. The Arab Spring is now without a doubt among the top news stories of 2011.

Unknown Male: [speaking Arabic]

Lisa Mullins: The violent unrest in Tunisia has raised concerns about instability in the wider Middle East. Today there were reports of…

Werman: In Cairo today thousands of anti-government protestors clashed with riot police. The demonstrators were chanting slogans against President Hosni Mubarak.

Male Reporter: Coming across the bridge into Tahrir Square there are small groups of people and they’re engaged in pretty intense discussions about the future of Egypt.

Egyptian Male: We want to see our country free like your countries. We feel like slaves here!

Protestors: Hosni Mubarak…Mubarak has decided to step down from…first time victory, we’ve never felt this feeling of dignity and freedom and for once in our lifetime it’s our right.

Werman: A brief look back at some of the events of this past year’s Arab awakening. Technology and social media have played key roles in many of the pro-democracy movements of the Arab Spring. Zeynep Tufekci is an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina and a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. She recalls seeing a social media response to a call to help injured protestors in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.

Zeynep Tufecki: And I noticed just you know, sort of corner of my eye, this Twitter feed called Tahrir Supplies. And I’m like what is that? And they started saying okay, we’re going to help coordinate field hospitals get their stitches, they need [inaudible 2:12], I’m just following this. And it turns out a couple of 20-year-old kids setup a Twitter feed, a website, some Google documents, and managed to coordinate 10 field hospitals.

Werman: Wow.

Tufecki: And I talked to them and I said, “What gave you the idea that you could coordinate 10 field hospitals?” I mean this is the kind of problem that Hannibal’s Army was bogged down. This was the kind of problem that defeated Napolean. This was the kind of problem you know, that Hitler faced and couldn’t overcome. And I said, “What inspired you?” He said, “Cupcakes.”

Werman: What?

Tufecki: They were, they had watched a Cairo cupcake store get the word out through social media and become really popular, and coordinate which cupcakes were gonna be sold and which flavors, so he thought if this can work for cupcakes, we can coordinate field hospitals.

Werman: Well, let’s look to the coming year. I mean one would think that social media will only continue to change the political and social environment within the Arab world in 2012. But I’m wondering if you think whether the less fluent users of social media will get more fluent and kind of push back against what’s been started by the activists?

Tufecki: Well, obviously, social media is going to increase participation in the public sphere by wider and wider portions of the population. It doesn’t necessarily mean that that participation is going to end up with what the activists who started this would like to see. And this is what always happens. Movements get started by small numbers of people. Revolutions, historically rarely had participation of more than 5-10% of the population. But afterwards, here comes everybody and that is a different kind of game.

Werman: Hm, you’ve been critical of conventional journalism and the groupthink that goes along with it. Social media on the other hand is also a kind of groupthink, but it can also be very inaccurate, as can conventional journalism. But in terms of telling the story of the Arab Spring do you think social media achieved something the Western journalists were unable to do?

Tufecki: Well, I have to say it wasn’t, it’s a new media ecology. It’s not just social media by itself, but social media in combination with traditional journalism, like Al Jazeera. What happened was a news organization like Al Jazeera or CNN cannot necessarily have a journalist at every troubled spot of the region, but in every troubled spot of the region there’s almost certainly someone with a cell phone capable of at least taking pictures or videos. So once the news director of YouTube (and YouTube has a news director, which is amazing enough), told me that within an hour of something major happening anywhere in the world, they have video on YouTube of this.

Werman: That is extraordinary.

Tufecki: That is extraordinary, but it doesn’t mean anything if nobody can see this.

Werman: Right.

Tufecki: So this is where traditional journalism and traditional craft of journalism comes into this because somebody has to say this important. Somebody has to say this looks like it’s actually true. This looks like it’s not a fake, this looks like an important story, and then bring the story to people because what social media also does is drown us information, also drown us in videos. And also, certainly things that aren’t necessarily true. So I think what we should see is not necessarily sort of social media versus traditional journalism, but a future in which we need the kind of skills traditional journalists have brought to the table now being applied to this new medium so we can have the synergy between all these eyes and ears citizen journalists around the world, and us, who can say okay, so tell me what’s important, what’s verified and how do I follow this better?

Werman: It’s been a tumultuous year to say the least in the Arab world. What for you, Zeynep, will be the most lasting memory of the power of social media in the Arab world in 2011.

Tufecki: I remember I turned on television maybe once or twice during the January 25 uprisings. And one of them was when it was announced that Mubarak had resigned. And I turned on television and I remember looking at that big picture of Tahrir erupting in celebrations. And I also had my laptop out. And I was thinking the people I have been talking with are on my screen also, and they’re making history, but I’m also talking with them and they’re talking with the world. And I thought that was really amazing to see that combination of inner personal connection and I was very happy for that, but I was also seeing history being made on every television channel focusing on Tahrir and the amazing achievement.

Werman: Zeynep Tufekci, an assistant professor at the School of Information at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard. Thanks very much.

Tufecki: Thank you.

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