The Purple Movement: How Facebook’s design undermined the anti-Berlusconi protest in Italy

This article assesses the relationship between the use of Facebook and the development of social movements by focusing on the case study of the Italian movement Popolo Viola/Purple People and its organizational structure. The findings of this study show how Facebook proved to be an efficient mobilizing structure for the social movement only on a short-term basis. After this initial success, the incompatibility between the commercial interests behind Facebook design and the ideology of Popolo Viola became manifest. Facebook failed to provide the movement with the necessary instruments in terms of a shared democratic management of its resources. The inability to manage Facebook pages and groups according to commonly agreed values promoted vertical power structures within the movement, contributing to a controversial management of the Facebook page and to internal divisions that hindered significantly the potential of the anti-Berlusconi protest.