Social Mobilization in the Net Space: Re-Constructed Communication, Identity and Power

The internet as a communication platform for netizens has become the hybrid space for social mobilization to forward political agenda. A take-off from Manuel Castells’ hypotheses on power and counter-power in the network society, this paper is a reading of “Boycott SM Baguio” Facebook Group Page as a space and site for social mobilization. Using textual analysis as a method, reading of the selected posts revealed that the spatial conditions present in the net space effected the reconstruction of identity, group and public and re-shaped the communication process. Elaborating on these two main points elicited a different kind of social mobilization located in the online space that emerged discourses on power, counter-power, political legitimacyand exacerbated questions on sustainability