Is the Chilean Student Movement a New Type of Social Movement? Society, Organization, and SNS

• In Event: Movimientos sociales y políticos en el sur

Abstract

In recent years, a new type of social movement, which is called “connective action” or “networked movement” and characterized by personal frames and social media rather than collective identities and organizations, has received much attention in social movement studies. Contrary to the rise of the new type of social movement, the recent Chilean student movement claiming for higher education of free tuition has been regarded as a classical type of social movement depending on strong student organizations.
However, through the content analysis of the use of Twitter in the Chilean student movement, this paper shows that the scale of demonstrations of the movement becomes larger when participants have personal frames rather than collective identities in spite of the existence of strong student organizations. Does this situation, which can be called “personalization” of the movement, mean that the Chilean student movement has been becoming a new type of social movement? What factors trigger this new situation?
This paper examines three hypotheses from macro, meso, and micro perspectives based on both quantitative and qualitative analysis. (1)The neoliberalization of the Chilean society as a whole triggers the personalization of the movement. (2)The change of the mobilizing structures and strategies of student organizations triggers the personalization of the movement. (3)The change of the way of using SNS (Social Networking Service) by each participant triggers the personalization of the movement. This paper will contribute to reconsidering the concept of the new social movement and the relationship among social movement, society, organization, and SNS.

Author

• Kota Miura