=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-1395/paper_14
|storemode=property
|title=A Research Design for the Analysis of Contemporary Social Movements
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1395/paper_14.pdf
|volume=Vol-1395
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/msm/CoelhoLRM15
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==A Research Design for the Analysis of Contemporary Social Movements==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1395/paper_14.pdf
A Research Design for the Analysis
of the Contemporary Social Movements
Isabel Colucci Coelho, Vinicius Ramos Fabio Malini
Andrea Lapa UFRJ/Brazil UFES/Brazil
UFSC/Brazil vfcr@cos.ufrj.br fabiomalini@gmail.com
isabelcolucci,decalapa@gmail.com
ABSTRACT Technologies (ICT), especially the political activism catalyzed in
social networks, have shown the potential to subvert established
In the ordinary debate about the political culture decline, social
power structures and point to alternatives for social
networks have recently changed the social scenario, showing its
transformation.
relevance in down-up social movements. Therefore, social
networks are taken here as a potential place for the existence of The latest popular mobilizations that occurred worldwide made
active citizens - ones that are able and keen about political action vigorous use of social networks in protests and showed a political
in a common world or community. Such recent political vitality that calls for a deeper study of this phenomenon (for
revitalization demonstrates the relevance of understanding net instance: the Arab Spring - held in many Arab countries, 2010;
activism as a precondition for an active citizenship in the digital Occupy Wall Street - USA, 2011; Indignados 15M, 2011 - Spain;
culture, where new forms of communication and social June Days - Brazil, 2013; Umbrella Revolution - Hong Kong,
interaction seem to influence the democratic relationships in ICT 2014).
mediated public spheres. The main objective of this article is to
present a research design for the identification of elements that The political action developed both in social networks and city
promote social empowerment in digital culture. It proposes streets constitute a distinct (and hybrid) public space for
research procedures for the study of political net activist groups democracy, In the debate about the decline of civic and political
in social networks. Methods, instruments and resources were culture, there are divergent points of view [2]. On one hand, it is
created and articulated for the collection and treatment of big data argued that the internet trivializes culture and politics, making
and for further qualitative analysis of content, by successive steps people not able to carry out meaningful citizen participation [3].
of data mining. In addition to contributing to the internet studies On the other hand, there are optimistic speeches that argue that
field, by proposing a qualitative investigation of social networks, the internet itself can promote a more inclusive and participatory
this research design also brings innovation to the Education field citizenship (especially among excluded minorities) [4, 5, 6].
as the results of the application of this research design (the Flowing in between, there are varied practices that show the
identification of important elements for citizens' empowerment) limits of any exact understanding [2].
will be used to ground the development of guidelines to teachers The political action developed both in social networks and city
and to teachers' education on critical appropriation of social streets constitute a distinct (and hybrid) public space for
networks in active citizens' education. democracy, even when recently the general discourse regretted
the fading or even the end of politics.
Categories and Subject Descriptors
J.4 [Social and Behavioral Sciences]: research design for net Notwithstanding, to engage young people in politics and civic life
activism, education and citizen empowerment. again, new means of communication must take place to transcend
the limits of traditional politics and also enhance the political
General Terms dimension of everyday life interests [2]. Arguably, there are new
Design, Human Factors. alternatives of political and civic culture under development,
which involve more informal methods of participation and
Keywords collective action that have been disregarded in the attempts to
quali-quanti methodology; social network analysis; citizen's conceptualize political action in actuality [7]. The key question
education; digital culture; net activism. that arises is if this political vitality in social networks could also
indicate important elements needed for the empowerment of
1.INTRODUCTION citizens and their critical education.
Contemporary societies have witnessed a destabilization of older Critical education is an educational movement that aims at
forms of control and power [1]. Information and Communication helping students to develop consciousness of freedom, to
recognize authoritarian tendencies, and connect knowledge to
power and the ability to take constructive action [8]. The
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for challenge to critical education is described by Hannah Arendt [9],
personal
Copyright or classroom
c 2015 helduse isbygranted without fee provided
author(s)/owner(s); that permitted
copying copies are according to whom schools could not promote a critical
not
onlymade or distributed
for private for profit
and academic or commercial advantage and that
purposes. understanding of the world if they insist in defining a project to
copies bearasthis
Published notice
part and#Microposts2015
of the the full citation on the first page.
Workshop To copy
proceedings, the future, which should remain in charge of the new generation.
otherwise, or republish,
available online as CEUR to Vol-1395
post on servers or to redistribute to lists,
(http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1395)
Critical education recognizes the future as a process, a becoming,
requires prior specific permission and/or a fee.
#Microposts2015, May 18th, which depends on these new subjects as authors of their own
#Micropost2015 WWW’15, May2015,
18–22,Florence, Italy. Italy.
2015, Florence,
Copyright 2015 ACM 1-58113-000-0/00/0010 …$15.00. stories.
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Therefore, a broad conception of education is required, beyond • Its strong presence in the public space as the virtual
that which is limited to formal education. Illich [10] is a key networks;
reference for reflections on unschooling. He argues that • Its crucial role for the start of the June Days - public
traditional schools turned out to stimulate social inequality, demonstrations that dragged millions of people to
especially in poor countries, since it marginalizes those who do Brazilian streets in June of 2013.
not follow it: a class of poor helpless beside an educated elite. At the moment, we are currently applying this research design to
More recently, Nóvoa [11] defended a public educational space mine 70,000 posts published on Twitter during the first month of
where many institutions and places take responsibility in the protests (June to July 2013), with the term "Passe Livre".
education. From this perspective, to overthrow the school walls
and recognize the various educative spaces, communication The major challenge of this research is the qualitative data
practices in social networks are a legitimate and fertile analysis, since it deals with large volumes and varieties of data
alternative. Also, these innovative and emancipatory actions take that are produced in a high speed in social networks. The
place in defiance of the teachers' own education in the unfeasibility of a manual, laborious and time-consuming process
perspective defended here, and still, as adopted in general of analysis has been overcome through a partnership with Labic/
education system, too instrumental and content-oriented. Nóvoa UFES and the adaptation to the context and objectives of this
therefore advocates a revolution in teachers’ training to overcome research, of the Perspectival Method of Network Analysis
their fragility, which is based on: a) a more open and diverse (PMNA) developed by them [13]. Although their method makes
organization of spaces and times in school; b) a curriculum use of automated and quantitative data treatment, the manageable
centered on student learning and not on teaching knowledge and data resulted of these processes allows a qualitative analysis.
skills; and c) a strongly collaborative pedagogy that uses the
networks as communication. The Perspectival Method of Network Analysis is grounded on the
fundamentals of Complex Network Theory and aims to
Castells [12] identifies the connection of what he called the demonstrate the different points of view that rise within a topic of
autonomy culture of internet with the social movements that politic mobilization on social networks. PMNA was crucial for
emerge in the network, "they partake of a specific culture, the the comprehension of the many clusters of ideological
culture of autonomy, the basic cultural matrix of contemporary positioning existing during the demonstrations that took place in
societies" (p. 167). Thus, the network is a fertile place of research Brazil, in June 2013. The analysis of retweeted messages with
for those who seek an educational model that aims to contribute the hashtag #vemprarua1 allowed the identification of seven
with emancipation, autonomy and collaboration in the major points of view: activism, hacking, media, politic mocking,
contemporary world. Our intention with such research design is human rights, clicktivism and fandoms. The method brings to
to have the means to analyze data published on Twitter during light the idea that networks on Twitter are not an entire body, but
moments of intense social mobilization, in order to find answers, are side-by-side parts [13].
or at least clues, on how to create more democratic and
participatory school practices in digital culture. In other words, With PMNA, it is possible to handle posts exchanged in social
how the scenario described above could inspire new critical networks in successive stages of extraction, mining, processing
education models. and visualization of large volumes of data. With the data resulted
from this method, we were able to add new steps of observation,
2.RESEARCH DESIGN according to categories derived from previous phases of our own
research. As a result, we developed a model of investigation that
This work is part of a major project, conducted in Brazil, which
allows the discursive analysis from posts generated on net activist
investigates how social networks can be used for the education of
groups.
active citizens. That broad study settles researches in three
different contexts: in theory (grounded in Critical Thinking); in Three new steps to analyze the data provided by PMNA were
case studies of net activism; and in pedagogical practices using added, in order to obtain more in-depth qualitative results: (a)
social networks (at elementary and high schools, and also at first, the creation of procedures to identify the moments within
universities). the dataset with potential to reveal the process that should be
observed according to the research purposes. These specific
The research design presented here is restricted to the observation
contexts are named Spaces of Possibility. In our case study, they
of net activism in social networks, which integrates the case
represent moments of dialog and social interaction; (b) secondly,
study context along with interviews held with key actors of those
the analysis of the Spaces of Possibility identified in the previous
net activist groups (not presented here). It was originally created
stage, in order to find examples of predetermined categories,
for the study of the Free Pass Movement's political action. The
brought from the review of literature. These categories are the
Free Pass Movement (Movimento Passe Livre - MPL in
social process we aim at observing and are referred to as Relevant
Portuguese) is an activist group that advocates for free public
Processes in this research design. The two procedures described
transportation across Brazil and presents itself as an autonomous,
above substantially reduce the amount of data to be analyzed, and
nonpartisan, independent and horizontal social movement. Five
they also make it possible to retrieve the relevant political dialog
main factors led to the selection of MPL's political action the
in the dataset in a viable quantity for qualitative analysis; c) in the
object of this research:
final step, we gathered the dialog thread of the selected potential
• The maturity of the group, that has over ten years of posts and started the content analysis.
existence;
The procedures briefly introduced above are detailed as follows:
• Its derivation into horizontally organized groups, active
data collection (Section 2.1); data treatment, comprising the
throughout the country by a federative model;
mining procedures, processing and visualization (Section 2.2);
• Their final object of claim: the right to the city, or to the
and data analysis (Section 2.3).
public space;
1 The hashtag #vemprarua, in Portuguese could be translated to "come to the streets".
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2.1.Data Collection investigating; b) discussion and alignment among researchers
about the election of categories and their consensus about
The posts are collected by a search and monitor engine that filters
meaning.
the Twitter stream by keywords and hashtags, and stores the data
in a CSV format text file. Similar tools are in market today, such PRODUCT: A library of terms and words linked to the spaces of
a s To p s y ( h t t p : / / t o p s y. c o m ) a n d F l o c k e r ( h t t p : / / possibility. For instance, to identify dialogs, we select terms that
flocker.outliers.es). Most of these engines are built on top of the demonstrate exchange and sharing of ideas, personal exposure,
Twitter API (https://dev.twitter.com/overview/api). For example, absence of hierarchy or leadership, multiple authorship,
to capture tweets based on the hashtag "#brasil", the software opposition of ideas, conflict, use of the first person (singular),
captures all tweets containing the terms "#brasil" at the same time which can present willingness to negotiate different points of
it is being posted (not allowing past time data collection) and view.
stores these data into a dataset that contains: a) UserID, the
identification of the user that sent the tweet; b) Time, the date and Table 1 - Example of the Library of Terms and Words linked
time that the tweet was posted; c) Tweet Text, the tweet's content; to spaces of possibility in the MPL case study
d) Geolocation, the geographic location of the user (only if the Dialog Social Integration Online/Offline
user agreed to share it); e) Image, if it is tweeted an image its confluence
location is stored as an URL.
Conversation; Represents me; Live now;
After this phase of extraction, a script developed as part of
PMNA is run and the dataset is processed to create 20 different Open to talk; Group; Protest;
text files, in which each of them contains different statistics about Did you know Fighting; Occupy;
the tweets. The script, written in python language, is open and that...; Supporting; Happening now;
free for usage and modification according to one’s own purpose2. Meeting; Fear; On the street/In
Report; Collective/ Friends; front of;
These files are organized according to the post date, hashtags Against/ For; Itinerary/Walk;
Volunteers;
used, user activity, locations and other criteria. In our research,
Let's talk; Help; Meeting point;
two of them have substantial importance: "top words" (the
relation of the one thousand words more frequently used in posts Comment; Support; Now;
containing the selected hashtag or keyword); and the "top Debate/ Idea. We are/ We all. It’s today;
hashtags" file (set of one thousand hashtags most commonly
associated with the hashtags and words used in the dataset). Second Step: Mining for Spaces of Possibility
Three other files from the dataset were also created, containing a OBJECTIVE: To select and separate posts that trigger processes,
sample of one third of the full amount of tweets, collected from spaces where there is a probability of finding political action and,
the beginning, the middle and the end of the posts collection. with it, elements that promoted it. From the library of terms and
Thus, our research deals with data organized in five text files: the words that identify spaces of possibility, a script is run to filter
three sample selection, plus the "top words" and "top hashtag" the entire dataset through the categories of spaces of possibility
files. defined in the previous phase.
2.2.Data Treatment DATA PROCESSING: a) adaptation, testing and application of
Due to the large quantity of data and the necessity of a qualitative PMNA data mining script; b) filtering the whole dataset by
filter to reduce it to a suitable amount, the data treatment is categories (defined in the library of terms and words).
separated in three steps: (a) Data Mining through Spaces of PRODUCT: Graphical interface with featured posts nestled by
Possibility; (b) Data Mining through Relevant Processes; (c) and the selected categories.
Compilation of Dialogs.
Picture 1 Graphical interface - posts nestled by spaces of
2.2.1.Data Mining through Spaces of Possibility possibility (posts literally translated from Portuguese)
The first methodological procedure (added to PMNA) is to
identify the categories in the dataset which can possibly contain
relevant processes for observation. These categories were called
Spaces of Possibility, since they hold the potential of occurrence
of the processes that are relevant to the study. For our research
purposes, our theoretical grounding suggests that these would be
moments of dialog, social integration, conflict and debate among
controversial issues, as well as confluence of online and offline
action.
First Step: Identification of categories
OBJECTIVE: To define terms and words for a first filtering of
the dataset. To determinate what words and terms indicate the
existence of a space of possibility.
DATA PROCESSING: a) manual reading of the five documents
(three samples of tweets, topwords and tophashtags) to select
words and terms that are often used in posts that can potentially
show the social processes the present research aims at !
2 It can be found at https://github.com/ufeslabic/parse-tweets.
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In the picture above, we see posts that demonstrate social
integration and Online/Offline confluence. In social integration,
for instance, we bring posts regarding the union of a community Table 2 - Table of Analytic Categories developed by Andrea
of over 4,000 lawyers volunteering to obtain habeas corpus Lapa, Isabel Coelho, Simone Schwertl, Andreson Lopes.
(great writ) for the detained protester. The other posts
Relevant Process: Plurality
demonstrate a sense of belonging to a social group. In Online/
Offline Confluence, we have examples of posts that refer to Description Indicators
events taking place on the streets.
Shared space of exchanging
2.2.2.Data Mining: Relevant Processes Constitutes the public.
ideas (equality) (visible and
First Step: Identification of categories Welcomes the individual’s
audible active beings);
singularities on equal terms. It
OBJECTIVE: To select relevant social processes that may harbor diversity of perspectives in
has two aspects: a) Equality -
the political action to be investigated. Bring from reviews of the debate (distinction);
we are all equal; and b)
literature some predetermined analytical categories as relevant welcome in the group (and
Distinction - the uniqueness
processes that may guide the identification of posts to be studied. authorities support) of various
of each person revealed by
perspectives that are included
DATA PROCESSING: a) To develop indicators and metrics to discourse and action [14].
in the debate.
identify these processes in the spaces of possibility. Three
relevant processes, relating to our object of research, were Relevant Process: Communicative Action
highlighted to demonstrate the proposed data treatment in this
phase, as shown in Table 2: Description Indicators
Second Step: Mining through Processes There is no goal to be Motivation for understanding;
achieved, but the agreement language used as a source of
OBJECTIVE: To identify where/whether the searched processes between participating social integration (search for
existed in those spaces of possibility. To select, highlight and subjects, that is, all those dialog, exchange - to generate
separate them. The purpose of this step is to identify some involved in the dialog are the debate that leads to an
potential posts within the spaces of possibility and extract the considered qualified to agreement); argumentative
dialog it may have generated for analysis. interfere in the process. The exchange between the
DATA PROCESSING: a) Manual analysis of the dataset; b) To language is not used as a published messages; search
mine the posts with a script according to the metric that was mean of transmission of for a common sense, not just
defined in the previous step and separate them into the pre- information (strategic action) the exposure of individual
selected categories. but as a source of social understandings.
PRODUCT: Graphical interface with featured posts nestled by integration (communicative
Relevant Processes (similar to the interface presented for spaces action) [15].
of possibility).
Relevant Process: Common World
2.3.COMPILATION OF DIALOGS Description Indicators
OBJECTIVE: From the potential posts identified in the previous
World of shared existence. Sense of inclusion in the
phase, the relevant processes, find and bring the thread of this
Participant actors try group; move from an
post. That means, from the selected post (that is yet a fragment),
cooperatively to define their individual vision to a
bring the other posts that were generated from it, as mention,
action plans, taking into collective one.
retweet or response to it.
account each other, the
DATA PROCESSING: a) to develop and run a script to collect horizon of a shared world in
other posts connected to the one selected. b) To bring the threads the basis of a common
of the dialogue that have come to light from potential posts interpretation of situations
selected in relevant processes. [15]. Most people enter a
social movement with their
PRODUCT: Document containing the threads of all messages own goals and motivations,
regarding the selected posts, separated by analytical category and come to find common
(Relevant Processes). denominators in the
movement’s practice itself.
2.4.DATA ANALYSIS The data analysis is a content analysis of the dialogs. There are
At this stage, with an adequate amount of data, it is proposed a several computer packages for qualitative data [16], for example:
more qualitative approach with an in-depth, interpretative and AQUAD; ATLAS.ti; Nvivo; Textbase Alpha, ETHNOGRAPH,
inferential analysis. From the selection of the dialogs, the which do not perform the analysis but can assist it by organizing
objective is to identify what, in the Space of Possibility and the and structuring text for subsequent analysis. For the MPL case
occurrence of Relevant Processes, allowed and promoted the study we chose WebQDA, which allows features such as to
existence of an active citizen. This phase deals with an search for text, codes, nodes and categories; to organize and filter
immersion in the data to pick up clues for critical education. In them presenting grouped data according to criterion desired; to
other words, it makes meaning and understanding out of the run boolean and proximity searches; to present data in sequences
relevant processes in terms of participants’ definition of and locate the text in surrounding material providing context; to
situations, important themes, elements that may have generated classify subjects and subsets, to enable memos and also treatment
or promoted the political action in social networks. of non numerical and unstructured data; and to question data by
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crossing categories, codes and subjects. Most of all, due to the of diverse ideas) in a space of possibility (social integration), it
collaborative work of analysis through cloud computing that showed an important mediation of some key actors, not a single
counted on the presence of many Brazilian researchers, the one. In the content analysis of the dialogue, their role can show to
software privileged runs in Portuguese, the same language as in teachers how to promote these elements in educational practice.
the database.
4.ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This analysis phase involves: coding, categorizing (creating This work was developed as part of the project “Education and
meaningful categories into which the units of analysis – tweet Technology: investigating the potential of social network for the
posts – can be placed), comparing (categories and making links active citizen’s education” (Comunic/UFSC/Brazil). It is funded
between them), and concluding (drawing theoretical conclusions by CAPES, through the postdoctoral fellowship of Andrea Lapa
from the text). The codes (Relevant Processes framework), and also the support of the project “Public Politics and Education
organize the understanding of the problem in a specific context Networks (RPPE)” which is coordinated by Tamara Egler. We are
that structures the categorization, which is exploratory and based grateful for the partnership with Labic (Laboratório de Estudos
on emergent themes and patterns. The description of the sobre Imagem e Cibercultura /UFES) and also the research
phenomena, its association with other categories, and the design review of Stefano Renzi, Jane Klobas and Michel Menou.
identification of relations between variables allow the
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