Cyberactivism and the Arab Spring: Textual Analysis of Social Media in the Light of Communication Power Structure, Transnational Learning and Regional Development

Abstract

The political upheavals in Arab countries in late 2010 and early 2011 mark a turning point in world politics in the end of the first decade of the 21st century. They are an example of the role of social media in transnational learning that resulted in regional development.

The thesis aims through textual analysis of social media posts to examine the role of cyberactivism in the Arab Spring for transnational learning and regional development. The analysis uses Egypt and Tunisia as cases in point since they are the pioneers of the Arab Spring.

The thesis studies the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt from the perspective of transnational learning in the light of the theories of Manuel Castells’ theories of communication power structures as well as Lundvall and Johnson’s principles of regional development and Nonaka’s notions of embedded space highlighted in Mariussen and Virkkala’s Learning Transnational Learning (2013). In order to trace the process of transnational learning, the thesis adopts Van Dijk’s concepts of Critical Discourse Analysis and Julia Kristeva’s notion of intertextuality to present textual analyses of selected YouTube videos and blog posts from 9th June 2010 to 6th February 2011. The videos and posts are paired from Tunisia and Egypt.

The thesis shows that the protests in Tunisia and Egypt share similarities that can exemplify transnational learning. In addition, the analysis finds that cyberactivism through social media played a crucial role in the cross-border learning process. Therefore, the study concludes that cyberactivism, by challenging communication power structures, facilitates the process of transnational learning leading to regional change.