Networks and Resistance

Investigating online advocacy networks as a modality for resisting state surveillance

Bibliographic Data

ID12729552
AuthorsLucas D Introna (0000-0001-6713-4204, Lancaster University, corresponding author), Amy Gibbons (0000-0001-8584-5499, Lancaster University)
Year2009
Volume6
Issue3
Pages233-258
Publication date2009-04-26
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSurveillance & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1477-7487 • E-ISSN: 1477-7487
PublisherSurveillance Studies Network (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.24908/ss.v6i3.3283
OpenAlexW1523671328
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited11

This paper explores the network of relationships that emerge from the online activities of privacy advocates. It argues that this advocacy network, through its linking practices, may potentially become a network of meta-surveillance that has the potential to transcend the agency of the individual actors. By reducing the degrees of separation between the actors, through their linking practices, the network can foster links between different sets of data, create links between information about incidents, corroborate information (making it more credible), direct the attention of the public and the traditional media to particular state surveillance practices, and so forth. Through these linking practices the network can draw upon the emergent positive network externalities to realise an information politics that is beyond what any single actor can achieve. Through the use of social network analysis and a webometrics methodology (supported by web-based crawling applications) we attempt to reveal this emerging online advocacy network. Through our data collection and analysis we show that the online advocacy network seems somewhat fragmented with a relatively small but stable, and geographically biased, core. This tentative analysis and conclusion may have important implications for the way privacy advocates view their online practices

Agency (philosophy · Crawling · Internet privacy · Network analysis · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Resistance (ecology · Social media · Social network (sociolinguistics · Social network analysis · Sociology · State (computer science · World Wide Web · Complex Network Analysis Techniques · Computer Science · Engineering · Law · Social Media and Politics · Web visibility and informetrics

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Open DOIOpen Access