The Arab Networked Public Sphere: Social Mobilization Post-Revolutions
Special guests: Lina Attalah, Rob Faris, Jazem Halioui, Fares Mabrouk, Dalia Othman and Nagla Rizk
Monday, April 27, 2015 5:00 pm - 6:30 pm
Harvard Law School campus
Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East C (second floor)
RSVP here
Event Hashtag: #ArabNPS
Join us for a round-table discussion on the networked public sphere and social mobilization post-revolutions in the Arab world. Researchers working with Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society, the American University in Cairo’s Access to Knowledge for Development Center, Innova Tunisia and the Arab Policy Institute will discuss current research conducted on the evolution of the networked public sphere in Egypt and Tunisia.
The networked public sphere has emerged as an influential medium for sharing news, disseminating information, and mediating collective action. Many have pointed to the impact of digital media on politics and public affairs, particularly in promoting and coordinating popular protests. Digitally mediated collective action continues to play a prominent role in the political landscape in Egypt and Tunisia. Nevertheless, rigorous assessments of the networked public sphere’s impact, modalities, and relationship to collective action offline are still rare.
In this session, we will present and discuss research that focuses on tracking and analyzing the socio-political topics in online content and their interplay with offline networks based on fieldwork research in Egypt and Tunisia.
This research is part of a joint effort by the Berkman Center, the American University in Cairo’s Access to Knowledge for Development Center (A2K4D), Innova Tunisia and the Arab Policy Institute.
Lina Attalah is the chief editor of Mada Masr, a Cairo-based news website. She is also a research fellow with the Access to Knowledge for Development Center.
Rob Faris (moderator) is the Research Director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University.
Jazem Halioui is the CEO of Innova Tunisia and an entrepreneur with eighteen years of experience in bootstrapping and managing companies in Tunisia and France.
Fares Mabrouk is the Director of the Arab Policy Institute, a Tunis-based think tank. He also leads Yunus Social Business (YSB) global acceleration programs.
Dalia Othman is a Berkman Fellow and Visiting Scholar at MIT's Center for Civic Media.
Nagla Rizk is a professor of economics and founding director of the Access to Knowledge for Development Center at the American University in Cairo.
