Prashant, I think the sparking of social movements and protest patterns in Arab Spring and prior to that Pakistan’s black movement are somewhat similar in nature. All three countries have been an early adopter of information communication technologies and are perceived as leaders in the adoption of mobile technologies. Political speech was highly suppressed in Pakistan during Musharraf regime, in Egypt during Mubarak regime and in Tunisia during Ben Ali regime but political discourse was very evident in the blogosphere and through SMS in all three countries. Lack of employment among youth, nepotism, rising corruption and state repression also made all three countries ripe for a people’s revolution and ICTs especially mobile phone activism and social media such as Facebook contributed in letting the youth share their frustration and anger over the system by organizing street protests and million march. The protests in Egypt and Tunisia begin from high unemployment, poverty, and increasing food prices making life of ordinary people very difficult. The regimes had been in power for an extended period, in these cases almost three decades. Similarly, in Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf a military dictator was in power for almost a decade and a close ally of the West in the not so popular war on terror having brought havoc for the country with suicide bombings, target killings, drone strikes, high unemployment, rising corruption, nepotism and economic crisis. All these factors and others combined to bring an end to the Musharraf regime like in the case of Tunisian and Egyptian regimes. The national uprising was fueled by decades of government misrule and corruption and ultimately new communication technologies helped the masses in mobilization and collective action against totalitarianism. Best, Arzak Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2012 22:50:26 -0700 From: [email protected] To: [email protected] CC: [email protected] Subject: Re: [liberationtech] Peter Theil On Arab spring Prashant,I think Thiel's view is way too simplistic. He is correct about the rise in food prices, but there were long simmering frustrations over bad, corrupt, abusive governance and the lack of freedom and human dignity that contributed to these explosions. And in any case, he is confusing causal triggers and means of mobilization. I think all the tools of Liberation Technology--from the Internet and social media to mobile phones and yes, in some places Twitter--made an important facilitating contribution to the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, and the uprisings in a number of Arab countries that followed. See for example the article by Philip Howard and Muzammil Hussain in the July 2011 Journal of Democracy. As they conclude, "In each country people have used digital media to build a political response to a local experience of unjust rule. They were not inspired by Facebook; they were inspired by the real tragedies documented on Facebook. Social media have become the scaffolding upon which civil society can build, and new information technologies give activists things that they did not have before: information networks not easily controlled by the state and coordination tools that are already embedded in trusted networks of family and friends." This article can also be found in the new book I have c-edited with Marc Plattner, Liberation Technology: Social Media and the Struggle for Democracy. Thanks,Larry Diamond From: "Prashant Singh" <[email protected]> To: "liberationtech" <[email protected]> Sent: Sunday, July 22, 2012 10:02:44 PM Subject: [liberationtech] Peter Theil On Arab spring Hi Guys Recently at Fortune Brainstorm Tech in Aspen, CO, there was a debate between Eric Schmidt and Peter Thiel about Contribution of Technology in Our Society . They touched upon many topic but at one point of time during the debate while discussing role of technology in enabling Arab Spiring and other revolution Thiel said "*When you talk about the Arab spring, you can say that it's evidence of > Google and Twitter ‑‑ ‑‑ liberating the world through information. But, > the actual facts on the ground are that food prices rose by 30 to 50 > percent in the previous year and you basically had people who had become ‑‑ > you had desperate people who had become more hungry than scared, who > revolted.*" is he being too simplistic ? was there more to the revolution than just Food Price ? Would like to know your thoughts . you can see the whole debat online at http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/07/17/transcript-schmidt-thiel/ thanks -- Prashant _______________________________________________ liberationtech mailing list [email protected] Should you need to change your subscription options, please go to: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech If you would like to receive a daily digest, click "yes" (once you click above) next to "would you like to receive list mail batched in a daily digest?" You will need the user name and password you receive from the list moderator in monthly reminders. You may ask for a reminder here: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech Should you need immediate assistance, please contact the list moderator. Please don't forget to follow us on http://twitter.com/#!/Liberationtech _______________________________________________ liberationtech mailing list [email protected] Should you need to change your subscription options, please go to: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech If you would like to receive a daily digest, click "yes" (once you click above) next to "would you like to receive list mail batched in a daily digest?" You will need the user name and password you receive from the list moderator in monthly reminders. You may ask for a reminder here: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech Should you need immediate assistance, please contact the list moderator. Please don't forget to follow us on http://twitter.com/#!/Liberationtech
_______________________________________________ liberationtech mailing list [email protected] Should you need to change your subscription options, please go to: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech If you would like to receive a daily digest, click "yes" (once you click above) next to "would you like to receive list mail batched in a daily digest?" You will need the user name and password you receive from the list moderator in monthly reminders. You may ask for a reminder here: https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech Should you need immediate assistance, please contact the list moderator. Please don't forget to follow us on http://twitter.com/#!/Liberationtech
