January of 2001 saw the strangest of revolutions taking place in Phillipines, when their president Joseph Estrada was overthrown by a citizen movement, initiated by an SMS campaign! This is an example of a peaceful collective action, which took help of technology, and was held under excessive media coverage. The movement was ignited after an expose that revealed an exchange of millions of pesos in the form of illegal trade, involving the family of the incumbent president. The popular movement has been given the name EDSA Movement after the name of the main highway that the demonstrations took place on.
rajat, 30029
5 comments:
Another incident that highlights the role played by media in determining which protests are relevant ( read "important" ) and which are not. News of a protest through SMS would naturally attract huge viewership and ratings would just sky rocket. Sometimes, I feel people underestimate the kind of influence media has in breaking/making riots and protests.
The fact that it snowballed into a nationwide protest ensured that the cost of protest for each protester went down thus encouraging participation. However many of the participants may have joined just for the sake of participation, seeing their peers do so. As they were unrecognizable from others who have joined for allegiance to the cause; they served the purpose of giving an impression of a large single-mindedly devoted collective. Such an impression increases the chance of success of the collective action.
Media is a very good collective action agent in this age of IT.This incident shows that with good technology taken in apt way can make great things happen like a coup without bloodshed.we can learn a lot from this to evolve such technologies for collective actions and hope for a better future.
Here comes the power of the person who first triggered it through technology. Technology came later to what came first to mind of that person who dared to think going against the authority-the leader. When anything goes wrong a critical factor is needed to ignite the revolution always,otherwise it won’t be possible for any movement to come up. So kudos to those persons who have given their thoughts to go against the flow when anything goes wrong, unfair in the history of world and made a great change!!
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