Effect of Social Media in Egypt during and after the 2011 Revolution

Introduction

Social media was a fundamental bearing factor in the success of the 2011 Egyptian revolution and the expansion of democratic space in Egypt. By 2011, a large segment of the Egyptian population had smartphones, a fact that expanded internet usage in the country. The proliferation of direct access to the Internet limited the government’s control over the flow of information in Egypt. Further, a new and younger crop of leaders, such as Asmaa Mahfouz, managed to use social media to a great effect in mobilizing the public to participate in revolutionary events as outlined in Wall & El Zahed (2011). Thirdly, leaders used social media to coordinate revolutionary events and activities, which increased propensity for success (Lotan et al., 2011). By the time the government realized the need to interfere with Internet connectivity, the crowds were already gathered (Attia et al., 2011). Finally, the initial protest gathering on January 25, 2011 was a protest, which gradually evolved into a revolution due to the violent reaction of government agents. Social media contributed to the evolution due to the transmission of news and evidence about the excessive use of force by police and other government agencies against protestors (Chebib & Sohail, 2011). After the revolution, social media continued to play a key role in the expansion of democracy, as the masses continued to protect their freedom. In current times, social media is an integral component of the political process in Egypt. Social media played a crucial role in the calling together of protestors at the advent of the revolution, in the coordination of protests, and the eventual transformation of the protests into a revolutionary movement. 

Literature Review

According to Shearlaw (2016), social media was included in the strategic planning of the revolution. Facebook was to be the center of the rallying call, where leaders would appeal to the masses to join the revolutionary call. Secondly, leaders of the protests used Twitter to coordinate the crowds and organize activities during protests (Lotan et al., 2011). Through the micro-blogging site, leaders would inform revolutionaries on where to go and what to do. Finally, YouTube would be the instrument of communicating to the world about what was going on. The Egyptian government applied propaganda tactics as a tool for disinformation to disorganize the protest. However, the revolutionaries could counter the propaganda by showing the world what was happening through actual video recordings of the events. 

Social media did not cause the 2011 Egyptian revolution, but it provided an avenue for overcoming the barriers and increase the propensity for success. According to BBC (2012), Egypt has been in a state of emergency since 1981, after the assassination of Anwar Sadat. The State of emergency suspended most civilian rights and gave exponential powers to the police. Before the advent of social media, leaders of opposition groups would have to expose themselves by speaking in meetings or through mass media leading to their arrest and detention (Sowers & Toensing, 2012). Social media provided an avenue for leaders to communicate without placing themselves in danger. Social media thus provided means to overcome the barrier created by the state of emergency (Sowers & Toensing, 2012). Secondly, due to social media usage, protestors were able to organize and mobilize protestors virtually without creating gradually expanding meetings. Without social media, the protests would have started with small crowds increasing the chances of government agents breaking them up successfully. However, the 2011 protest grew online without major physical meetings (Attia et al., 2011). The government only realized how large the movement had grown when the meetings began. 

After the meetings began, social media played a crucial role in the coordination of the protests, mainly through Twitter (Borge-Holthoefer et al., 2015). In 2011, the government deployed the divide and rule strategy by organizing counter-protestors mounted on horses and camels against the protesters (Sowers & Toensing, 2012). The leaders of the protest were able to communicate to the crowds about such attacks thus minimizing their impact. Through Twitter, revolutionary leaders could guide and control their followers, thus increasing their ability to resist the efforts of the police and counter-protestors to break up the protests (Borge-Holthoefer et al., 2015). 

Finally, through social media, the initial protests grew into a revolution when the masses learned about the cruel reaction of government forces against protestors. The protests started on January 25, 2011; the day set apart as a Police Holiday in Egypt. Police reacted violently, leading to the deaths of hundreds of protestors. Under normal circumstances, government propaganda machines would change the narrative by exponentially underreporting the number of casualties and presenting protestors as the perpetrators of violence (Sowers & Toensing, 2012). However, through social media, protestors were able to counter the government narrative through video-evidence on viral YouTube posts (Sheedy, 2011). The ability of the protestors to record and publish evidence of police brutality had two critical implications. First, the images and videos sparked the anger of the populace who joined the protest in gradually increasing numbers (Tusa, 2013). Secondly, police became cautious when they realized that the protestors were recording their actions and publishing it to the world. The crowds of protestors continued to rise in places such as Tahrir Square in Cairo, while contemporaneously, police violence reduced (Sheedy, 2011). The crowds continued to swell into hundreds of thousands of protestors. Eventually, the armed forces could not break it up, leading to the revolution as outlined in Choudhary et al. (2012). 

The 2011 revolution led to the fall of the Mubarak presidency in less than a month. Due to a large extent to the contribution made by social media, Egyptian protestors were able to accomplish in a few days what they had failed to accomplish in three decades. The value of social media was not lost to the protestors and their leaders (Pratt & Rezk, 2019). As the new government took shape through democratic elections in 2012, social media became an important avenue for the sharing of information in Egypt. The importance of social media would come to the fore again in 2013. The new Muslim Brotherhood government under President Mohamed Morsi ought to make Egypt an Islamic nation (Alexander & Aouragh, 2014). The president gave himself powers to make decrees that Egyptian Courts could not review. Once again, youthful opposition leaders turned back to the Internet and organized another revolution in June 2013. Similarly, the Morsi Administration sought to quash the protests, but police excesses only fueled the protests into a second revolution (Alexander & Aouragh, 2014). 

After the fall of the Morsi government through a Second Revolution, there was a series of democratic elections, which led to the government of Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in June 2014 (Farahat, 2019). The public continued to monitor the new government and communicate through social media. As el-Sisi is a former military leader, he has the potential to be a dictator like Mubarak or Morsi before him. However, el-Sisi has avoided the temptation to revert to the extremities and excesses of his predecessors, as he is aware that the populace is watching and sharing information. Social media is an important source of news and political commentary in Egypt through to the current times. The Mubarak government excelled by the combination of limiting the sharing of information and controlling the narrative through propaganda. Moreover, social media has ensured that there is a secondary source of news and political commentary (Abdalla, 2018). Due in part to social media, Egypt is gradually becoming a functional democracy. 

Research Method and Ethics

Research Method

The research aims to investigate the effect of social media in Egypt during the 2011 revolution until now. The primary research aspect will investigate the cause and effect relationship between social media and the initial revolution in 2011, the second revolution in 2013, and the expansion of democratic space in Egypt. As is evident from the literature review above, there is a vast amount of research regarding the relationship between social media and the revolution in Egypt in 2011. Further, researchers have also evaluated how social media continues to impact Egyptian political processes. However, there seems to be a research gap on the nature of the role played by social media in the political events above, based on how it came into the picture. There is already evidence of a cause and effect relationship between social media and political events. However, there is no clear evidence regarding whether social media caused the revolution, or the revolutionaries picked up social media as an instrument along the way. For example, did the crowds join the revolutionary movement after hearing about it on social media or did they join social media when they were already part of the movement? Only the Egyptian people can answer this question. 

The suitable research method to answer this question is a mixed-method research study, undertaken through an online one-shot survey. Among the important questions in the survey would be the age of the participant, the role the participant played in the 2011 and 2013 revolutions, and continued role in the political process. Finally, the survey would ask the respondents about the cause and effect relationship between political activity and social media. For example, ‘did you join political activism because of social media, or did your social media usage drive you towards political activism?’ The study would aim to get as many responses as possible then select suitable responses for the evaluation of relevant trends and patterns. 

The research analysis component of the research process will combine a qualitative and quantitative process. The quantitative process will focus on the cause and effect relationship. The said process will seek to establish the number of social media users who joined the political protests after hearing about through social media. On the other hand, the process will establish the number of social media users who joined social media in order to participate in the protests that have already learned about the political movement. The qualitative component of the research analysis will seek to establish the effect of social media on political beliefs and how social media influences participation in political activities. 

Ethical Issues 

Whereas Egypt has an expanded political environment, the current government still seeks to limit public participation in political processes, more so for those people who are opposed to the government (Farahat, 2019). Participation in the research process may thus pose some challenges for some participants. From an ethical perspective, it is important to ensure that the research process does not place participants at risk. First, there is a need for informed consent for each participant (Golder et al., 2017). Informed consent in the case involves communication on the potential dangers of participation. Secondly, there should be absolute confidentiality on the part of the participants. The survey questionnaire should also not include any personal details that can reveal the identity of the participants. Finally, the information gathered during the research process should serve academic processes only and be destroyed when it serves that purpose. Ethical issues also extend to cyber security and ensuring that the process of data collection, transmission and analysis is secure from data breaches. 

Conclusion

Social media not only played a crucial role in the 2011 Egyptian Revolution but also remains an important component of the Egyptian political process until now. By 2011, Egypt had been in a state of emergency for over three decades, with the government having overall control of most instruments of mass media. The continued state of emergency is evidence of the fact that the populace had always been uncomfortable with the Hosni Mubarak’s government. The said government had the appearance of a democracy, complete with regular elections, which Mubarak always won. Indeed, at the advent of the Revolution in January 2011, the government had scheduled another presidential election for September the same year, with Mubarak expected to win. If the scenario in 2011 mirrored what had been happening in Egypt for decades, it raises a question on what bearing factors enabled revolutionaries to succeed in 2011, where predecessors had failed earlier. After the revolution of 2011, the Egyptian public did not discard the invaluable tool social media was to them. It is evident that social media played a crucial role in the second revolution in 2013. Since 2014, social media has continued to play a role in the protection of the rights of Egyptian people and their democratic space. 

References

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