1. A new constitution written by the people
2. The establishment of a new body that has authority to investigate and hold to account economic, political and social violations, including the return of stolen public wealth and reversal of political naturalistion, in order to reach national conciliation.
And the youth of Bahrain are not alone.
Then there is Syria and the "The Syrian Revolution 2011" Facebook page.
Until recently Facebook, twitter, and the like were banned in Syria. But the recent Tunisian revolt and Egyptian protests have made way for a relaxing of these policies.
As the popularity of Facebook spreads around the world it is now also influencing Middle Eastern governments.
For example, Omar al-Bashir, the president of Sudan and an indicted war criminal for his involvement in the Darfur genocide, has recently begun promoting his own pro-Sudan Facebook page. The purpose? To use Facebook to overcome opposition to his rule (according to this Sudanese site).
Sudan has 41 million people - with only about 10% having internet access. Yet al-Bashir still grasps the power of this medium because he is working to give more of his countrymen internet access. (Does he realize this may come back to bite him?)
It is also well known that Facebook activities have been heavily involved in the protests in Egypt.
It would appear that this technology and the use of social networking for revolutoin is far stronger than anyone realized.
But how is this different than, say, the invention of the printing press and movable type by Gutenberg in 1440? Before that time if someone wanted to perform a mass communication of some sort it would require that all the notices be literally "written by hand". However, with the printing press operational, it was possible to produce up to 3,600 pages per day of printed content (see Wikipedia).
I think we are literally witnessing a repeat of history. Only this time the cellphone and computer screen are unwittingly taking on the role of paper and press.
In 1440 it would have cost a significant amount of money to produce those 3,600 pages on the Gutenberg press. Today, to create a Facebook page, requires only a cellphone or web browser, which is well within the reach of the average Middle Eastern middle class citizen. Even more interesting is that governments like Syria installed the technology in the first place.
Yet how could they avoid it?
And if you think about it, just installing this technology in the hands of the elite is still asking for trouble. For example, though you're faithful government employee might not use the technology against his employer his college educated child just might. So, like Pandora's box, once the technology is in place things can slip away very quickly.
Clearly the Syrian government foresaw the potential for Facebook mischief because they initially banned it along with twitter and other similar sites.
For sixty years, according to CNN, there has not been a successful Arab revolt. Yet in only 23 days Tunisia's government was toppled. Whether this was as a direct result of the internet or not is hard to say, but the message cannot be lost on Mubarak, Assad, al-Bashir and others.
Extrapolating beyond what we see today its going to become harder and harder to imagine any sort of world where instantaneous "trash mobs" cannot immediately sprout up to torture the status quo. Take the rioting in Britain over the University tuition increases in recent months as an example.
And Britain is not a dictatorship; yet the same principles are being applied - angry youth attempting to change the status quo based on technological rabble rousing.
The problem here is that technology doesn't care what kind of meme its spreading - whether for good, as in Bahrainian youth wishing for a more democratic state, or for bad, when that democratic wish is high-jacked by a wannabe dictator.
No comments:
Post a Comment