Regime change can be a bloody, brutal business, as current events in the Middle East have once again confirmed. Sound communications are key to this process, but whether that includes social media is open to major doubt.
When detailed accounts of the Middle East upheavals are written, how likely is social media to be seen as a necessary component of the upheaval?
After the remarkable events that transpired across a slew of Middle East countries in recent months, many people would think, according to some accounts, that all it takes is social media plus anger to have local quasi-dictatorial regimes readying their private planes for a flight to the nearest tax haven.
Of course, it doesn't quite work that way. Lenin's observation that electricity + Soviets = communism (he should have added maniacal sociopaths too) was fatuous and so are the over-exaggerations of the power of Facebook and Twitter. Indeed, it's amazing to think that Martin Luther kick-started the Reformation without a Twitter account or Facebook profile. But I digress.
Assessing the Big Reasons
Asserting the power of social media to mobilize crowds as a necessary condition for pursuing political objectives makes for easy headlines, but anyone who actually believes that ignores what makes protests happen and tick. For example, consider anger at perceived injustices, reaction against unfair treatment, and an opportunity to nudge change along.
Social media may have made communication between and among protesters, protest groups, and rebels in Libya, Yemen, Syria, Egypt, and other countries easier than might have been the case otherwise. But Shashank Joshi, Associate Fellow at Royal United Services Institute, a defense think tank, weighs in on the issue. He has researched the impact of social media on the protest movements and uprisings in the Middle East.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
"They (social media) have played a modest and enabling role," says Joshi, "but by no means a decisive nor necessary one and are absolutely on the sidelines. ... The single most important fact that proves this is that the Egyptian government was incredibly successful in shutting down internet activities but the crowds continued to gather unabated."
This echoes the views by social media commentator Evgeny Morozov in his book The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, in which he argues against the efficacy of the internet as a tool for achieving social and political change.
Regimes of dictatorial leanings tend to control the media and means of communications (think of the old Soviet bloc), and protest-ridden Middle Eastern countries are no exception to this iron rule.
Cell phone, internet, and social media access in those Middle Eastern countries facing protest and rebellion is relatively low by Western standards. It tends to be state-controlled, but it is growing.
At least until the recent uprisings gathered pace, the media in Libya were controlled and monitored by the Gadhafi regime. This includes the cell phone network run by two government-owned operators, Al Madar and Libyana. Internet and telecoms provision is run by the Libyan government via a semiprivate company, Libya Telecom & Technology.
High Cell Phone Usage
According to sources such as the ITU (International Telecommunication Union) and the CIAs World Factbook, cell net penetration in Libya is fairly high with about 5 million users out of a population of about 6 million. The Tripoli regime suspended cell phone access to overseas numbers in March, but the rebel forces succeeded in setting up their own network, thanks to equipment supplied by friendly states and some ingenuity, according to reports. Communications in two other protest-ridden Middle Eastern states, Yemen and Syria, follow a similar pattern to Libya in that they are ultimately state-owned and controlled.
Yemen has a rapidly growing population of about 25 million. More than 8 million of the population have cell phones, about 1 million have landlines, and about 2.35 million are internet users. TeleYemen, the sole provider of international communications, is one of two ISPs; the other is YemenNet. There are two statecontrolled TV and radio stations.
Syria's population, which is about 22 million, has access to about 10 million cell phones and about 4 million landlines, while TV and radio stations are state-controlled. Internet users are estimated at about 4.5 million. State-owned Syrian Telecommunication Establishment controls landlines while cellular serv ices are provided by two operators, Syriatel and MTN Syria. Facebook penetration in these troubled lands is relatively low.
Facts and Figures
According to the recent "Arab Social Media Report," published by the Dubai School of Government, Syria has 20.4 internet and 1.07 Facebook users for every 100 people. Yemen has nearly 10 internet and 0.74 Facebook users for every 100 people, and Libya has 5.51 internet and 3.74 Facebook users for every 100 people. Revolution trendsetter Egypt musters just more than 24 internet and 5.49 Facebook users per 100 people. In contrast, Facebook penetration in the U.S. and U.K. is about 50% of each of the populations.
In Joshi's view, Facebook and other social media are useful tools for making and spreading personal accounts of events, especially as independent journalists are thin on the ground. He points out that dissident groups, such as the April 6 Youth Movement and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, have been around for years though. So there was an infrastructure able to mobilize protest when the mood was right.
"In Libya it's utterly absurd to say social media played a role. Initially protesters were families of victims of [Gadhafi's] regime mobilized by old fashioned person-to-person contact. It was nothing to do with [T]witter or Facebook. Crowds amassed because of old-fashioned reasons such as public funerals," according to Joshi.
Joshi believes that satellite television, especially Al-Jazeera, has played a far more important role than social media in spreading news of protest and rebellion to viewers in the Middle East.
Risky Options
Social media and cell phone use is very risky in military communication where security is an absolute necessity. If regimes shut down cell phone networks (a double-edged sword), then rebels can turn to satellite phones instead. This can also be very risky. In 1996, Chechen rebel commander Dzhokhar Dudayev made a satellite phone call that was rumored to have been intercepted by Russian reconnaissance. His location was discovered and a missile strike was then launched, killing him. Similar, if more sophisticated, techniques are reportedly used by NATO in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Libyan rebel forces have struggled for secure communications kits. In April, the U.K. government reported it would supply military communications to the Libyan insurgents, but it refused to give any more details.
Bjoern Rupp is CEO of GSMK CryptoPhone, which supplies secure communications kits to individuals, agencies, and charities working in hostile environments. For Rupp, "Secure mobile communications can only be achieved by employing end-to-end encryption, since a malicious party with the necessary equipment and expertise can locally intercept cellular and satellite phone calls alike."
He adds that satellite networks "have the added advantage that their call data records are generally not available to the intelligence support systems of smaller nation states, thus making it more difficult for a local/national party to analyze overall traffic and call patterns."
For now, the jury is still out in deciding on the importance of social media and cell phone networks in the Middle East upheavals, but a mass and continuous tweet isn't all it takes to trigger turmoil, revolt, and political change.
Links to the Source
Facebook and Twitter stats
www.haaretz.com/news/international/did-a-google-managers park-the-egypt-revoltwith-a-facebook-page-1.341898
The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom
www.nytimes.com/2011/02/06/books/review/Siegel-t.html
Tripoli regime http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/ 2011/04/13/libyan-rebels-restore-cell-phone-access with-daring-technical-gambit/comment-page-1
Yemen www.escwa.un.org/popin/members/yemen.pdf www.theodora.com/wfbcurrent/yemen/yemen_communications.html
Syria www.internetworldstats.com/me/sy.htm
"Arab Social Media Report" www.dsg.ae/NEWSANDEVENTS/UpcomingEvents/ ASMRFactorsAffectingFacebookPenetrationPI.aspx
John Charlton writes about technology, law, and education for several publications. He spent 20 years working in the IT press in the U.K. covering technology, financial, and business matters. Send your comments about this column to itletters@infotoday.com.
