WHAT CAN SOCIAL MEDIA TEACH US ABOUT PROTESTS? ANALYZING THE CHILEAN 2011-12 STUDENT MOVEMENT’S NETWORK EVOLUTION THROUGH TWITTER DATA García, C., Chauveau, P., Ledezma, J. & Pinto, Ma. Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile’s School of Business 4860 Vicuña Mackenna Avenue Santiago, Metro Region, 7820436, Chile e-mail:
[email protected] Keywords: Social movements, protests, repertoires, social media, twitter; Chile. ABSTRACT of social uses on technology. Internet has evolved “from organizational business tool and Using social media data—specially twitter—of the communication medium to a lever of social Chilean 2011-12 student movement, we study their transformation as well” (Castells, 2002, p.143). social network evolution over time to analyze how However, technology is a necessary, albeit not leaders and participants self-organize and spread sufficient condition for the emergence of a new form information. Based on a few key events of the student of social organization based on networking, that is, movement’s timeline, we visualize the student the diffusion of networking in all realms of activity network trajectory and analyze their structural and on the basis of digital communication networks. semantic properties. Therefore, in this paper we: i) describe the basic network topology of the 2011-12 Changes in the technologies, economic organization, Chilean massive student movement; ii) explore how and social practices of production in this networked the 180 key central nodes of the movement are environment have shaped new opportunities for how connected, self-organize and spread information. We we create and exchange information, knowledge, and contend that this social media enabled massive culture.