Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture - Volume 5, Issue 3, 2014

The article offers an overview of key contingencies that shape the use of the web for democratic participatory purposes. I begin by probing the notion of participation, suggesting that we need to be specific in what we mean by it and how different contexts accord it very different significance. From there I examine the main parameters of the web’s structural contingencies, taking up its political economy and technical architecture. These parameters are bound up with power relations, an important feature too often ignored, with the result that the web erroneously is seen as a neutral terrain of communication. Thereafter I turn to the web’s subjective contingencies, looking first at the relationship between subjectivity and discourse. The subjective contingencies – the ‘inner realities’ of political actors – derive in part from the web’s structural power relations, but cannot merely be reduced to them, since human agency can never fully be predetermined. Further, I take up the theme of reason and emotion, as well as the notion of affect. This latter term points to experiential reality beyond the immediately personal/private one. I conclude with some brief reflections on the relationship between offline and online forms of participation.

The article presents a recently developed typology of the diversity of online media practices in and by Belgian civil society organizations (CSOs) to enhance social engagement. Framed by the ambition to move away from utopian (and dystopian) discourses of certainty and potentiality, the article’s objective is to access the enormous diversity of ways the online is put to use, without imposing normative expectations about, for instance, participatory intensities. To generate this overview, the structuring logic of the typology is used, despite the loss of detail and nuance caused by the use of this bird’s-eye view-generating method. The construction of this particular typology took place in different iterative phases, each with its own methodological approach. These were a theoretical phase, a case study phase and a CSO survey phase. Through these iterations, a two-dimensional typology was constructed, grounded in the distinctions between internal, internalexternal and external use, and between access, interaction and participation. Showing the vast diversity of civil society’s online media practices not only increases our understanding of their online use, but also facilitates a more nuanced discussion of the use and importance of participatory online practices that will move away from exclusively utopian approaches or discourses of potentiality.

The advent of social media has revived the discussion on media engagement/participation and the role of citizen-user in the democratic innovation, in terms of both building divergent cultures of communality and experimenting, individually and collectively, with new ways of ‘claiming’ and ‘doing’. In this context, the article probes into the interplay between social and technological, public and private, collective and individual, civic and commercial practices at networked platforms, reviewing relevant challenges and questions set for the enhancement of the democratic activity. It draws on the deliberative and the radical democratic approaches, evaluating discursively the dynamics of civic engagement/participation in the realm of mediated and networked communication, in regard to the interactional dimension of the public sphere (and the connections with the private sphere), as well as on the lines of the development of a new sociality (a mixture of both the personal and the political). From this perspective, the article critically reflects on the normative principles of rational deliberation and goal-directed action as exclusive arenas of the constitution of the democratic process, proposing instead a broader and dynamic framework that takes into account the intersection of differing and conflicting forms of engagement, both deliberative/active and monitorial/reactive ones.

The concept of diversity has always been an underlying principle in media policy-making and the era of participatory media has not changed that core concern. However, dramatic changes in contemporary media systems suggest a need to reconsider how this complex principle is conceptualized and applied. Social media have brought about a seemingly infinite amount of sources and content by lowering the barriers to participation in the fields of media and communications. Much hope has been attributed to their democratizing potential. However, empirical evidence indicates that much digital media consumption focuses on content provided by few actors, and is becoming polarized. And while the rapid diffusion of new media technologies facilitates more participatory communication, persistent digital divides hinder opportunities for access and production. This article argues that diversity as a policy-making principle needs to be refocused to address these opportunities and challenges regarding the role that media systems can play in fostering citizenship, civil society and participation. Based on existing academic and public/policy discourses, the article constructs a framework of participatory modalities and discusses their relationship with the conventional dimensions of diversity, as well as their relevance in terms of policies and regulation.

This article is based on our research, in which we examine the interplay between political protest and street art practices in Turkey with specific reference to the recent ‘Occupy Gezi’ movement and its aftermath. We propose to conceive street art as a participatory political practice with a full range of different forms and styles (graffiti, stencils, posters, installations, performances, etc.), which employs three interconnected strategies: (1) utilizing urban public space as a privileged site of political visibility; (2) renegotiating the boundaries between art, political activism, and communication; (3) inviting its audience to engage in political agency. Our research necessarily takes into account methods of reapproprating and disseminating works of street art – particularly via digital media, which, in this era of networked social movements, serve to expand the scope of public space from the streets to online communities. After tracing the blossoming of street art in Turkey within the creation of an oppositional political aesthetics from the 1970s to the present day – in the historical context of a changing political milieu – we analyse the specific case of the Gezi Park protests, where street art became visible for a wider public and significantly contributed to the rebellious character of the movement in distinct ways.

Produser interaction through fan fictions (fanfics) results in expansions of the narrow range of stories provided by the increasingly consolidated production companies, and is therefore an important contribution to meaning-making discussions about love, gender and sexualities. Fanfic authors rework the romance of Twilight in ways that question its unequal gender power relations, the abstinence and hetero-norms, and the romantic staple of one true love. Given their potential influence on commercial producers, fanfics are more than mere ‘interaction’ yet are not full ‘participation’ according to Carpentier’s AIP model.

Since the digital revolution in the 1990s the cultural industries have been shaken by profound changes in the traditional relationships between producer and consumer. In the networked digital community, many have seen the possibilities for amateurs to attain power through access to the tools of production and distribution. Online interaction and self-presentation opportunities add to the participatory aspect of amateur film-makers’ culture. However, boundaries of participation exist and constrain the opportunities of participation for amateur film-makers. The amateur film-makers interact with their surroundings and actively engage in shaping the circumstances of their activities. Indeed, participation includes an increased potential for interaction, but the level of participation is determined by the network of interactions and the restrictions defined by power relations within the media environment. This article focuses on the developments of the online communities of Nordic (Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish) amateur film-makers seen from the point of view of access, interaction and participation.