Author Arianna Giovannini

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“Kony2012” — the potential of weak ties in the age of the Internet.

Apr 3, ’12 8:00 AM

Over the past month, much has been written about the Invisible Children’s campaign “Kony2012” and the 30minute film made to raise awareness of the activities of the Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony. Leaving aside comments on its content and the ends, from a sociological perspective a very interesting aspect of the video concerns its virality, and how this unveils the potential of weak ties in network in the age of the Internet. In a recent article published on the Guardian, John Naughton reflects on this.

Certainly, viral dissemination has always been one of the key features of the Internet, but it is only in recent times (e.g. with the launch of YouTube in 2005) that its deliberate exploitation has been reached. On the one hand, the ‘explosion’ of the Internet has allowed for any kind of information to be virtually available to anyone across the globe. However, in the midst of such abundance of inputs, ‘attention’ and the ability of ‘getting noticed’ have become two of the scarcest and most sought after commodities in the cyberspace, and ‘virality’ something that every hackers, politicians and advertisers long for, but only few achieve. In this sense, the “Kony2012” meme stands out possibly as one of the most successful cases of exploitation of virality to date.

As Naughton aptly reminds us, the viral dissemination of the video can be understood looking back at one of the precepts of network theory developed over 30years ago by the sociologist Mark Granovetter—the strength of weak ties in networks. This refers to the crucial role played by links among people who are not closely bonded, to spread ideas and help people join together for action. From this angle, the prominence reached by the “Kony2012” video seems to owe much to one particular weak tie—a tweet by Oprah Winfrey in support of the film. Having 9.7million (!!) followers on twitter, her comment created a chain of reactions (or, better, twits and YouTube clicks) amongst her ‘virtual acquaintances’ which boosted the dissemination of the video and its message, allowing it to reach 26million views in less than six days.

Such level of dissemination has exposed the film to all sorts of criticisms, especially due to the rather simplistic ideology and analysis behind it. In spite of this, what is truly remarkable about the “Kony2012” meme is how it has exposed the power of the weak ties in networks, and the way in which these can allow for an idea (good or bad) to spread across the globe via channels beyond the reach and control of established media outlets. This raises crucial questions not on the content of this specific campaign, but rather for the future diffusion of ‘alternative information’ by any campaign able to instigate such virality. Following the view of positive hyperglobalisers, this kind of development could put pressure on democratic politicians, opening up the way to morally driven interventionism. As in the case of the Arab Spring, there comes a point when unremitting shouting that “something must be done” can no longer be ignored. In practice, however, it still remains to be seen whether this great potential will be fulfilled, unleashing an era of network power where the weak ties that populate the Internet can successfully spread across the globe not only videos of cats and celebrities, but democracy.

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Breaking the ‘Fukuyama taboo’— a journey through the global crisis with Slavoj Žižek.

Jan 30, ’12 8:00 AM

Love him or hate him, Slavoj Žižek is no ordinary thinker, with a reputation for his always provocative and take-no-prisoners approach to social analysis. In an interview for Al-Jazeera released at the end of the year just passed, the Slovenian philosopher takes the audience through an intellectual journey across the momentous changes and the subsequent upheavals that have shaken the global financial and political system. As ever, his analysis is controversial and yet fascinating. It starts from the protests movements, and goes on touching the widest possible span of issues, from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the rise of China, challenging our understanding of the world order as we (think we) know it.

In the wake of the most severe global crisis of our times, Žižek suggests that the much needed ‘revolutionary change’ will not come about in the form of a miraculous solution. Change is already taking place, and it is manifesting itself though the growing, fast-spreading awareness that the difficulties we are all confronting are neither temporary nor compartmentalised. The current global issues have not been merely caused by some bad, greedy guys operating in an otherwise good system—they are part and parcel of the system itself, and the recent protest movements have clearly shed light on this. Hence, what really matters in this specific conjuncture is not to find fast solutions, but to break what Žižek calls ‘the iconic Fukuyama-taboo’—the so far largely unquestioned “unabashed victory of economic and political liberalism” and its assumed irreplaceability.

From this angle, the very remarkable achievement of the protests lies in the way in which they have exposed how the system is not simply ‘faulty’ and needing fixing but, rather, it is likely to implode— because it has lost its self-evidence and ‘automatic legitimacy’. This is why, in Žižek’s view, it is beyond the remit of protest movements such as ‘Occupy’ to make realistic demands or to suggest for stable solutions to the global crisis. Their truly revolutionary aim has been fulfilled: they have removed the lid of one of the most cumbersome Pandora’s boxes of our age—they have revealed the limits of the “End of History”, and released a large flux of energy of protest in this way. However, Žižek concludes, what the future has in store for us is uncertain, because it will depend on the result of the final and most difficult of the battles— the struggle for who will appropriate such great energy.

To find out more about Žižek’s work, check out our Žižek bundle

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I Shop, Therefore I Am – consumerism and the riots.

Sep 6, ’11 12:00 PM

The riots that spread across the country this summer have left a strong impression in the public imagery. From London to Birmingham, the British society has showed and shouted the presence of a deep-seated malaise which appears to affect mostly its youngest members. Many commentators have tried to give a name and an explanation to this outburst of social disorder. However, one of the most lucid and precise analysis of the events has been provided by arguably the foremost sociologist of our times – Zygmunt Bauman. In a short yet sharp article, Bauman unfolds the sociological dimension of the riots, explaining how capitalism and consumerism have changed and distorted not only our social values and beliefs, but also the idea itself of (be)longing.

In an era where shopping malls have become our temples and pilgrimage’s destination, and shopping lists are our breviaries, fullness of life can be achieved only by being an ‘accomplished consumer’. I shop, therefore I am. This creates a critical divide between have and have-nots, whereas defective consumers find themselves bearing the stigma of a life un-fulfilled – with no human dignity, no meaning and, consequently, lack of respect for themselves and others around them.

Contemporary have-nots are outcasts banished from the Temple of Consumers. They see shopping malls as outposts of the enemy erected on the land of their exile. Armed, closely watched and haughty, these fortifications bar access to a life accomplished. In this sense, have-nots long for the heavily guarded goods kept inside the Temple in the hope that they will grant them access to the congregation. Daring to force the gates of the temple, thus, seems to signal a forlorn attempt at winning a seat on the pew, a place among the members of the Church of Consumerism.

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From learning to earning – the changing ethos of English Higher Education

Jul 22, ’11 8:00 AM

The publication of the White Paper on Higher Education emphatically entitled ‘Students at the Heart of the System’ opens the doors to one of the most radical transformations in the UK education system. The perverse and socially destructive potential of the document is vividly reported in a recent article written by Des Freedman and Natalie Fenton. As the authors suggest, in its attempt to introduce a consumer-oriented and competitive market of HE institutions, the White Paper shows its highly ideological and financial nature – whilst the (supposedly essential) educational component is left completely out of the picture. Students are to become active consumers, skilfully searching the higher education market for degrees able to place in their hands a good job after completion. Such assumption is aimed at justifying the raise in the fees to be paid by the student-consumer, since the best ‘product’ may be expensive but cost efficient in the long run.

Unfortunately, this view eludes any consideration of the process of erudition that should be at the very heart of any HE system, as the idea of learning is replaced by that of earning. The simple swap between these two terms in the lexicon of HE is not a secondary matter, whereas the original meaning of learning as a ‘acquiring knowledge of or skills in something by study or being taught’, is changed into learning as ‘gaining knowledge of or skills in something that will buy you a wealthy future’. Simply put, the leitmotif of the White Paper is that the pursuit of profit will become the only determinant of value in choosing a degree, whilst the idea of pursuing knowledge is demoted to the status of a mere means to achieve that goal. Such distortion taints the whole ethos of English Higher Education to the roots, and epitomises the spineless free market approach endorsed by Mr Willets and his colleagues in the Cabinet.

 

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The uncertain future of Higher Education: prisoners in an age of hyper-adversarial political culture?

Jun 6, ’11 8:00 AM

Many words have been recently spent on the future of Higher Education under the auspices (and diktats) of the coalition government. However, further attention should be given to the wider political scenario within which this modern tragoidía is taking place.

In this sense, Peter Scott’s article for the Guardian underlines how the real obstacle to a fairer Higher Education system lies in the hyper-adversarial culture which is increasingly permeating the UK political arena. According to the author, in recent years none of the mainstream political parties has seriously endorsed the cause of a “free” and fair higher education system funded out of general taxation.

With hindsight, it is now clear that at the last general election higher education was deliberately kept off the agenda, because none of the competing parties was able to offer a credible policy on the issue. Since then, the situation has deteriorated, policy vacuity has taken over from each side of the political spectrum and, finally, the tragedy of HE has unfolded according to the plot penned by Mr Willetts. Therefore, despite its direct responsibility, the current government is not the only one to blame for the threats posed to the higher education system – rather, what really lies at the heart of the problem is the culture of reluctance spread throughout the entire political class.

Overall, what it would take to get Higher Education out of the slippery slope on which it has been pushed by the coalition government is not a mere change of political direction, but a wider and much more ambitious shift in the modus pensandi of the whole political system.

While we wait for such a cultural change to happen, Higher Education will continue to agonise.

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The (lost) soul of the post-92 Universities

Jun 3, ’11 8:00 AM

The long-term effects of the cuts to Humanities and Social Science subjects are now starting to surface, especially for the Universities that are not part of the Russell Group. In a recent article, Professors Gavin Poynter and Michael Rustin reflect on the case of the University of West London, where the Vice Chancellor has recently produced a Green Paper which in practice proposes to atomise the School of Social Science. The story of the UEL is interesting because it sheds light on the kind of scenario that most of the post-92 universities are likely to face in the near future, whereas university senior managers seem inclined to subject themselves to the agenda of the coalition government by marginalising and disbanding the “low cost disciplines” departments that no longer attract state funding.

In their strive for survival, most of the former polytechnics curricula are now staring to favour vocational training over research and teaching in the social sciences – a choice which seems to be at odds both with the current national economy and labour market and with the ethos of the institutions involved. In doing so, the post-92 Universities are in fact sealing their own fate by reducing the opportunities available to students who may want to study social science whilst charging up to £9000 tuition fees per year. What’s worse, though, is that by yielding to the principles imposed by the government they are also loosing their soul – their primary mission of making higher education accessible to students who are either coming from less affluent backgrounds or unable to enter elite institutions.

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Sociological Imagination – that’s what the political class needs

Jan 18, ’11 8:00 AM

One of the very paradoxes of the tuition fees and education cuts’ odyssey that has heated the political debate over the past few months lies in the way in which political leaders seem to be utterly shocked by the anger and uproar that their measures have generated throughout the public.

Following the sharp analysis of Les Back, such incomprehension is rooted in the filters that class privileges place on politicians’ ability to understand and make sense of the social world. Once empowered and invested with the privileges of their role, it seems, politicians develop a pronounced detachment from the social reality of the country. As a consequence, they become unable to face up with sober senses what they are doing, and what could be possibly wrong with it.

From this angle, the widening of the class divide, which is likely to become the new rationale of the UK education system, is both symptom and symbol of the inherent lack of socio-logical perspective within the political class. Recently, Sociology has been classified by Conservative and Liberal Democratic politicians as a ‘low cost’ discipline – however, one might wonder how much (social and political) value their own policies could actually gain if only a pinch of ‘sociological imagination’ was added to them…

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University reform – assessing the potential for changes from within

Dec 6, ’10 8:00 AM

In the aftermath of the recent students protest and the consequent wave of occupations in University campuses across the country, it is interesting to assess what could be done to change and ameliorate the UK higher education system from within, and not only from without. In this sense, the role of academics could be crucial in reforming and restructuring the teaching and research systems, as intelligent reforms could have the effect of reducing the need for university fees.

For example, according to Michael Collins, one way to overcome the much feared discrimination between art & humanities and STEM (science, technology, engineering & maths) subjects could be that of embracing the ‘liberal arts’ academic model found in the USA.  In the author’s perspective, the combination of vocational and humanities subject could avert the emerging view of students as ‘cogs in an economic machine’. In practical terms, it is argued that this approach could have the potential of saving money and increasing both the personal and the public value of university degrees. Crucially, these changes should be started off from within academia.

Certainly, the view provided here explores just one of the many possible options to improve the UK Higher Education institutions – nonetheless, it can be valued for shedding light on the fact that intellectual activity is not a mere product sold on the market, and should not be based on measurements of value derived from sheer market competition.

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From students to customers – neoliberalism and the UK teaching landscape

Nov 4, ’10 6:05 AM

It is official: Sociology is a ‘low-cost’, ‘non-priority’ discipline, the government says.

It is now clear that the cuts on higher education included in the Comprehensive Spending Review are going to hit harder the disciplines that have been put under these headings (i.e. arts, humanities and social science). In short, if the government proposal to remove statutory funding to ‘secondary’ and supposedly ‘cheap’ subjects becomes reality, there will be a remarkable increase in the tuition fees for the students intending to study, say, Sociology.

On the one hand of this argument certainly stands a general line of criticism on the commonsense mantra that science-based subjects are more important than others to the economy of the country (and are therefore worth a higher level of government investment). But there are further implications on the government’s rash decisions. Crucially, the cuts could instil a transformation of the teaching landscape, by introducing a new(-liberal) approach to higher education revolving around the rather disturbing idea of ‘customer-students’. If students in the ‘low-cost’ disciplines will have to pay much higher fees than their colleagues in other fields, then they could start rising their level of expectation on the ‘product’ (knowledge, that is) they choose to purchase.

On the positive side, students could certainly start taking their studies more seriously. However, there is a wide range of negative effects and attitudes that could lure into the education system if study starts to be regarded purely as a form of consumption. For example, the students-teachers relationship could be affected – and transformed into a customer/service-provider rapport. Moreover, a further risk could be that humanities, arts and social science subjects may increasingly end up being squeezed out from smaller and less-funded institutions which cannot afford their (financial and human) costs.

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Beyond Immigration – the impact of the permanent cap on Higher Education

Oct 22, ’10 8:00 AM

Over the past few months, Tory-LibDem Higher Education policies have been under the spotlight, mainly due to the controversial issue of students’ fees. However, there are also other, less apparent, aspects implicit in the political plans of the coalition which could have a huge impact on Universities. One of these concerns immigration. By April 2011, the government aims at introducing a permanent cap on immigration. Whilst consultations on the final draft of the bill are still taking place, an increasing number of commentators are now emphasising how the policy could pose a serious threat on the UK Higher Education system, by limiting altogether the number of ‘skilled workers’ coming to the country.

If no amendments are made to the proposal, UK Universities will have to face both major cuts in funding and a significant reduction in the ability to recruit students and staff from abroad, especially if they are non-EU. The negative impact of this “double whammy” on Higher Education seems to have been largely underestimated by the government.

An immigration system that does not support the efforts made by UK Universities to attract talents from abroad, would affect and undermine such aspects as academic quality, research excellency and the economy of universities. Moreover, the new arrangement could encourage a brain-spill from within the UK. The long-term effects of such a short-sighted approach could be devastating, as the cases of other countries (Australia and Italy, for examples) clearly illustrate.

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