The dark side of social networking. The internet and (des) politization of the Brazilian youth

• In Event: Entre el hacking y el cíber-ciudanía: la participación democrática en la época digital II

Abstract

Abstract: New media technological advances are powerful inductors of youth´s political attitudes and behavior. A case in point is the internet, which produced new forms of social interaction through the creation of virtual social networks. They are responsible for the involvement of the youth in different contexts, such as the occurrences catalyzed by “the Arab spring”, and specifically in Brazil where protests proliferated triggered by the youth against the government in July 2013. Thus, we cannot longer ignore the internet and social networks in structuring youth´s collective identities, and their potential for organizing youth´s political mobilizations. The central question we seek to address in this paper is if there is sufficient evidence to assert that this “new” virtual political involvement is contributing for the construction of a youth’s assertive and participant political culture. We hypothesize that in political systems, such as Brazil, where historical-structural factors have an important influence in molding the youth´s political personality, the use of internet while it helped to create collective identities, it has at the same time generated political intolerance and virtual verbal aggressions that paradoxically seem to be producing youth´s despolitization and a hybrid political culture. We analyze this problem utilizing quantitative data from a survey research conducted from November 2014 to March 2015, with 635 youngsters 16 to 24 years old, and qualitative open interviews in June 2015 in Brazil.

Authors

• Cesar Marcello Baquero, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul

• Jennifer A Morais