COST Action:
Transforming Audiences Transforming Societies
A Cross-Working Group Initiative
Global Protests: Active Audience Voices and their
Alternative Multimedia
Initiators: Miri Gal-Ezer (miri-gal@012.net.il)
Hillel Nossek (hnossek@colman.ac.il)
Summary of First Meeting, Milan 21 September 2012
Participants
Milan meeting participants (alphabetically by first name):
Boris Mance (Slovenia); David Mathieu (Canada/Denmark); Francesca (Italy); Hillel
Nossek (Israel); Miguel Vicente-Marino (Spain); Miri Gal-Ezer (Israel); Sirin Dilli (France/
Turkey); Viktorija Car (Croatia).
Participants which joined later: Anne Kaun (Sweden); Jose Manuel Noguera Vivo
(Spain); Julie Uldam (Denmark); Lilia Raycheva (Bulgaria).
*Email participants: Nico Carpentier (Belgium); Xabier Landabidea Urresti (Spain).
Summary of Milan meeting
The initiators, Miri (WG3) and Hillel (WG1), presented a brief introduction of the
initiative. The aim of the COST research initiative is to assemble a group for a
comparative cross national research collaboration aimed at studying the phenomena of
Global Protests—Active Audience Voices and their Alternative Multimedia.
Next, the participants were presenting their general research interests. They then
described their presumed research with the group in context of: their country of origin,
country of residence, and possible research access to other countries.
The opening remarks were followed by a short round of participants' illustrations of
local/national public protests, activities, demonstrations, and other struggles for
change. Boris described the short duration of the Slovenian students' protests against
university tuition hikes; Miguel gave the example of the Spanish M15, which was
initiated on the web and then took place at the city squares; Mathieu described
student protests in Canada; Francesca said the Occupy movement in Italy was weak and
there were less large demonstrations there than elsewhere; Viktorija described six or
seven waves / cases of protest by pupils and their parents against the Croatian Ministry
of Education, which was pushing through policy changes; Sirin said that in Paris there
weren't major Occupy demonstrations, though in Turkey, the gay parade in Istanbul was
using the Occupy title and slogans; Miri and Hillel described the sizeable though very
peaceful first wave of Israeli protests, by and large without police intervention (summer
of 2011), and the police brutality during the second protest wave (summer of 2012),
which was controlled, neutralised, and tranquilised by the protesters' live stream media
similar to the New York Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.
The next round comprised a preliminary discussion about the essential criteria of
comparative cross-national research. It was very clear that the shared theoretical
framework and research questions should provide the base structure for such research.
The participants suggested sharing links, articles, and citations about relevant research
theories and empirical data on these topics.
Regarding methodology, the group agreed that this kind of research, whether
qualitative or quantitative, needed a universal-shared methodology, perhaps with
common questions and criteria. The group also agreed that the researchers could
conduct in addition to the common framework, their autonomous local/national
research as part of the transnational comparative research, and use different research
questions and methodologies in an effort to uncover the deep, cultural, moral, and
other, unique ideologies, norms, and values of the different societies.
Preparations for next meeting in Tampere
The next meeting will be held on April 17-19 in Tampere. Preparations for the meeting
will include:
1) Sending relevant data — the suggestion is to work through the research group
emails and send all participants relevant links to articles, mainstream news
about protests, links to the movements' news, blogs, net, etc. If you have PDFs it
would be nice if you sent them. The topics should not relate just to media fields,
but also to other relevant related fields, such as governance & politics, sociology,
economy, political-economy, ethnography, urban studies, history, cultural
studies, feminism, etc.
2) A brief description and a preliminary analysis of local/national phenomenon —
a preparation of a short description and a preliminary analysis of the
local/national phenomenon the participants wish to study (500-1000 words); by
use of simple criteria: place, duration, citizens' demands; number of protesters;
modes of activities: offline-online, demonstrations, public lectures, petitions,
graffiti, performances etc.; mainstream media coverage, protesters media;
international connections; relative successes of the protests; effects on public
opinion, on political-economic field; persistence of protests; police / security
forces violence and other control measures: political arrests, monetary fines,
delegitimisation; violence from opposing groups, etc.
The descriptions should be based on local/national academic research into the
local/national phenomenon, including its methodologies, if any exist, and on
such records as the protesters' media, journalistic and police records,
government committees, public opinion polls, your participation as protesters in
the movements, etc.
We hope you can accomplish these by the end of January, so that everyone has
enough time to elaborate on possible methodologies.
3) Suggestions for methodologies — we welcome any ideas regarding possible
joint cross-national research methodologies and parallel criteria, and criteria and
methodologies for the special local part of the research.
4) Any suggestions — any other suggestions are welcome.
5) Participant citizens or "participant observations" — The recent protests in
Europe makes the significance of this cross national research very obvious;
therefore in light of the recent waves of protests, we suggest that if you have
any access to the protests, it would be very important to be there, as participant
citizens or to conduct "participant observations" of this phenomenon.
6) The public intellectual engagement question – this observant participation can
enhance our understanding of the diverse complexities of this type of research
and the researcher's attitudes towards it – the continuum between neutral
objective stand vs. public intellectual engagement.
7) The research group is open till Tampere — we would like to remind you that the
research group is open to new members until the meeting in Tampere. If you
want to suggest a new participant you are welcome. It is also possible for few
colleagues who are not COST members to join the initiative (without any
reimbursement by COST). Each country should have one united group of
researchers and might include one, two, or three participants.
And finally we would like to thank you all for the very pleasant, interesting, and
fruitful discussions that we had in Milan.
All the best,
Miri & Hillel
Email list: anne.kaun@sh.se (Anne Kaun – Sweden); boris.mance@fdv.uni-lj.si (Boris Mance –Slovenia);
Maria.murru@unicatt.it (Francesca – Italy); jmnoguera@ucam.edu (Jose Manuel Noguera Vivo – Spain);
ju.ikl@cbs.dk (Julie Uldam – Denmark); mvicentem@yahoo.es ; miguelvm@soc.uva.es (Miguel VicenteMarino – Spain); Mathieu@ruc.dk (David Mathieu – Canada/Denmark); nico.carpentier@vub.ac.be (Nico
Carpentier – Belgium; sirindilli@hotmail.com (Sirin Dilli – France/ Turkey); viktorija.car@gmail.com
(Viktorija Car – Croatia); xlandabidea@deusto.es (Xabier Landabidea Urresti – Spain).
*Email participants: Have asked to be kept informed and if commitments allow, would like to participate
actively.