The Role of Social Media in the Rise of the Mexican Social Movement #Yosoy132
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The role of social media in the rise of the Mexican Social Movement #YoSoy132 Master Thesis in Information Science Universitetet i Bergen Spring 2015 Written by: Diana Itzel Hernandez Lopez Acknowledgements I want to thank the following people that made this thesis posible: My supervisor Ole Johan Mjøs for guiding me througth the master thesis process and for all his help a long the way. My husband Terje Hines Helland, for always supporting me regarding questions, traductions and every small detail in my thesis. Interviewees for providing me with valuable information and for taking their time to meet me. And finally, all my family and friends for being a constant source of motivation. “In all cases in history social movements are triggered by emotions. These emotions are sheared collectively through a process of communication”. Castells, 2014 “I look at them (social media) more like an extension of human capacity. They don’t generate new human capacities or new necessities, they just extend and magnify them, and this creates new tonalities. There are no new colors coming out of the social media, there is only one palette of colors, what you do with it is up to you” Brito, 2014 CONTENT Content ...................................................................................................................................... Acronyms .................................................................................................................................. Chapter 1: Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1 The case of the study and it’s context .......................................................................................................... 3 The #Yosoy132 movement ........................................................................................................................ 3 Media in Mexico ....................................................................................................................................... 6 Chapter 2: Theoretical Framework ......................................................................................... 8 Social Movement .......................................................................................................................................... 8 Weak and Strong Ties ............................................................................................................................... 11 Vertical vs. horizontal structure ................................................................................................................ 12 Social Media ................................................................................................................................................. 13 Public Sphere Theory ................................................................................................................................... 15 Traditional media as a public sphere ...................................................................................................... 15 Internet as a public sphere ..................................................................................................................... 16 Agenda setting ............................................................................................................................................. 18 Chapter 3: Methodology ....................................................................................................... 20 Case Study .................................................................................................................................................... 20 Qualitative Interviewing ............................................................................................................................... 21 Quantitative method - newspapers ............................................................................................................ 25 Qualitative method – Newspapers ............................................................................................................. 25 Ethics .......................................................................................................................................................... 26 Chapter 4: Analysis I ............................................................................................................ 27 In which way were the social media used by the #YoSoy132 movement? ................................................ 28 Emotion and identity ............................................................................................................................... 28 Organizational tools ................................................................................................................................ 31 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................ 36 Did the movement have a horizontal structure, and if so, how did this affect it? ................................... 38 Why leaderless? ....................................................................................................................................... 38 Actually leaderless? ................................................................................................................................. 39 Ephemeral? .............................................................................................................................................. 42 Control – operational and of message ................................................................................................... 43 Efficiency of the movement ................................................................................................................... 44 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 46 Chapter 5: Analysis II ........................................................................................................... 48 To what degree did the movement succeed in becoming a part of the public agenda and what role did the use social media have? ......................................................................................................................... 48 Social movements vs traditional media ................................................................................................ 48 The coverage of the #YoSoy132 movement – Perspectives from the interviewees ............................ 50 Coverage by two newspapers: La Jornada and Excelsior ..................................................................... 52 Coverage by television ............................................................................................................................ 55 Significance of social media .................................................................................................................... 59 How does social media expand the public sphere in Mexico? .............................................................. 61 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 62 Chapter 6: Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 65 Generalization ............................................................................................................................................. 69 Limitations of the thesis ............................................................................................................................. 69 Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 70 Appendix .............................................................................................................................. 75 ACRONYMS AMIPCI Asociación Mexicana de Internet AMLO Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (candidate for the PRD party in 2012 elections) EPN Enrique Peña Nieto (candidate for the PRI party in 2012 elections) IFE Instituto Federal Electoral ITAM Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México UIA Universidad Iberoamericana INEGI Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía e Informática PRD Partido Revolucionario Democratico PRI Partido Revolucionario Institucional UNAM Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México COFETEL Comisión Federal de Telecomunicaciones CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Social media has during the last ten years become an important part of the everyday life of people around the world. One can maybe argue that a large part of the use is largely for entertaining and self-promotion. However, by enabling people to communicate and publish whatever they would like to on the web, these tools have gotten a wide range of roles in society. One of the most discussed topics related to social media in the mass media has been regarding these tools role in social movements. This coverage, at least from western journalists, has tended to praise the role of the social media with words like “Facebook protests” and “Twitter protest”. The technology is given a lot of credit and hyped as promoting political change. This triggered my interest and made me wanting to find out myself. Are the social media the blessing for activism that some claim it to be? And if so, what influence do they have on