The Role of Social Media in Political Mobilisation

In light of the Arab Spring revolutions of early 2011, the Internet and its tools of social media have been heralded as instrumental in facilitating the uprisings. This dissertation will look closely at the extent to which Egyptian activists used social media networks such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and weblogs as tools for organizing and generating awareness of political mobilisation,

in the uprisings that took place in Egypt in January and February 2011. This dissertation will use established theories of communication that were developed long before the advent of social media, to place its use within a wider context of communication, and to explain how the inherent characteristics of social networking that made it appealing to the activists in Egypt.

The discussion will focus on the uprisings in Egypt, which have been widely publicized and followed by the international community, and aim to demonstrate that while possessing enormous potential to facilitate and expedite political mobilisation, the Internet is an inherently dialectical force that should not be treated solely as a liberator or oppressor.