dr. bart cammaerts - the mediation of dissensus
TRANSCRIPT
The Mediation of Dissensus
Dr. Bart CammaertsLondon School of Economics and Political Science
Opportunity Structures
Social Movement Theory:
the agentic opportunities as well as structural constraints that impact on the success or failure of social movements
fits with structuration theory (Giddens), but also with the idea that resistance is integral to understand the dynamic between generative and restrictive power (Foucault)
Mediation
Media and Communication Studies:
dialectic concept as well:Production/ReceptionAlternative/MainstreamPublic/PrivateTraditional Media/New MediaSymbolic/Material
also implicates the (active) audiences and the user of technology in the mediation process
Mediation Opportunity
Structure
Made up of four inter-connected components:
Performance of resistanceSelf-mediation practices
Mainstream media representationsResonance and public opinion
Performance of ResistanceThe Spectacle of Protest in the Society of the Spectacle (Guy Debord)
Disruption of elite-organised media eventsCreation of DIY-Spectacles
Resistance and the Carnivalesque (Mikhail Bakhtin)
Temporary transgressionsworld upside-downMockery
Performance of Resistance
Performing Dissensus
Insurrectionary Symbolic Violence
Antithesis of Bourdieu’s Symbolic ViolenceIsolated, Targetted and insignificant without its mediationOccupations of elite spaces, damage of property, disruption and seeking confrontations with police
Self-Mediation Practices
Technologies of Self (Foucault, 1997: 234-47)
Disclosure of Self: : ‘the cultivation of the self’
Examination of Self: ‘taking stock’ and self-reflexivity
Remembrance of Self: ‘memorizations of deeds’
Technologies of Self-Mediation
Logics of Self-Mediation
Disseminate movement framesMobilise for direct actions
Organise the movementCoordinate direct actions
Record protest eventsArchive protest artefacts
Disclosure
Examination
Remembrance
Media Center - Occupy Wall Street (US)
Twitter-Graffiti - Gezi (Turkey)
Technologies of Self-Mediation
Mainstream Media Representation
Mainstream media remains important (cf. Rucht, 2013)
To reach beyond the like-mindedTo increase the scope of conflictTo legitimise a struggle
Processes of adaptation to the media logic
Mainstream Media Representation
Negative Bias?Usually yes, but…mainstream media is not a unified actorConstruction of dichotomy of the good - peaceful - protester and the bad - violent - protesterAlso a focus on police violenceActivists increasingly develop strategies to manage the media
Reception and Audiences as Publics
Mediation is not merely constituted in the production of frames in text and images, but crucially also in the way in which these are received.
Those in whose name protests are organised and democratic decisions takenBlack-boxedOften represented as passive actors, juxtaposed by the active audience and the user of technologyThe Spivakean Subaltern which is heterogeneous, disparate; ceases to be subaltern when they speak
The Mediation Opportunity
Structure
• Should be seen as semi-independent from other opportunity structures
• Relates to discursive struggles (war of position)
• Includes the production, dissemination, and reception of movement frames
• Is dialectic and has a spatial as well as temporal dimension