Title: The shape of the project : Using Net for Social Change
Author: Nishant Shah
Source: www.cis-india.org
Publisher: Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore
Date (published): 13/01/2010
Date (accessed): 14/01/2010
Type of information: research article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
The rise of the commercial Internet in the 1990s was accompanied by great expectations with regard to its democratising potentials. In several parts of the world, such potentials seemed to materialise when social movements snatched up new technologies to further their aims through revolutionising their methods. The emergence of Web 2.0 seemed to only multiply the possibilities, and since then, the use of social media for social change has received widespread attention worldwide. A consolidated study of this phenomenon in the Indian context has, however, been lacking hitherto. Under what conditions did the use of technologies for social change emerge in the Indian context? Who were and are the groups and individuals behind such initiatives? What shape does their online activism take? And how does it fit into the larger background, including that of organised activism, in which it is located? It is these questions that this research seeks to answer.
Using the Net for Social Change: Online Activism in India