Listed here are some of the key readings, listed under each section of discussion, recommended for the seminar in Berkeley. Each article has a brief abstract. You can either download each article individually or download the full reader here and print out the relevant articles. Please post any further recommended reading in the comments section.
> Download full reader Pdfs not included in the full reader: + Worden + Turner + Douglas
First Line of discussion: Platforms for participation.
The goal of this section is to analyze and compare the organizational structure of Social Forums and of online communities experiences, in order to understand something more of the organizational logic of collective action, based on voluntary and decentralized coming together of people.
Second line of discussion: When do new social media and political activists converge/match?
It seems that social movements are no longer at the forefront of innovation in the use of the new media and are not able to promote large online communities. Efforts to intentionally build techno-political tools, have, in general, had limited success. Meanwhile, the proliferation of “successful” experiences of online communities - whilst sharing some values and organizational principles with social movements such as connecting diversities, participation, collaboration, openness - also have many differences. The goal of this session is to analyze different cases of building tools for political participation and democratic organization. These experiences will be compared with and related to those of other web communities.
Third line of discussion: New institutions: the rediscovery of the commons.
There is an increasing emphasis on the concept of common goods in many different contexts and by many different social movements. Whilst in the global South it is based on defending natural resources that form the basis for existence for a huge number of poor people, it has recently emerged – with distinct arguments – as an important concept in the FOSS movement, in open knowledge movements, in environmentalist movements, in the debate about the governance of complex infrastructures of communication (including the Internet), and in many movements against the privatization of fundamental goods or services, etc.
Participants Bios
