THE YOUTH-LED REVOLUTIONS OF 1968 AND 2011
a reactionary movement that emphasises autonomy and local community. These six approaches to internet-assisted activism should not be seen as exclusive and contradictory, but rather overlapping and complementary. Many of the same young activists who paint guerilla crosswalks on Saturday afternoon are also lobbying congress on Tuesday and visualising government data on Thursday. In 1968 images of youth raising their fists in angry defiance splashed across television screens and created the world’s first global social catharsis. The protests of that year now seem minor compared to what has taken place so far in 2011, led by the first generation of youth to grow up with computers. Still, it remains to be seen what, if anything, we will achieve with our growing networks of activists as we face economic inequality, youth unemployment, food shortages, and climate change. Some, like Michel Bauwens, see “the start of a process towards deep transformation of our civilization and political economy” while others predict much more of the same political infighting and government secrecy. What young activists have already shown is that there is agency in their activities. They have already overthrown dictators, repealed unjust laws, and called the world’s attention to stories that the mainstream media were too willing to ignore. As George Landow once remarked, “technology always confers power to someone. It gives power to those who possess it, those who can use it, those who have access to it”. A slightly simplistic interpretation is that technology confers power to young people. What we will do with that power will be for future historians to contemplate.
This essay is not a blanket criticism against anti-power activism. Indeed, in countries such as Egypt and Tunisia, the old political class must be removed in order to create spaces for new forms of accountability and participation to blossom. Too often, however, anti-power mobilisations lose their strength and unity once the old political class is forced out. Though “good governance” is not nearly as sexy as revolutionary slogans, anti-power activism must
go hand in hand with movements for transparency, constituency building, and smart policy to bring about a truly progressive future.
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