Candlelight Vigils and Citizen Activism

Abstract

Abstract This chapter focuses on modern political and social collective actions in South Korea to illustrate how changing information ecosystems have influenced the ways protests and candlelight vigils have been organized over the past several decades. In particular, the chapter explains how Internet and digital communication technologies began to be used to facilitate collective actions in South Korea in a series of candlelight vigils beginning in 2002, when two South Korean teenage girls were killed by a U.S. armored vehicle. It also covers other major candlelight vigils, including 2004 vigils against the impeachment of President Roh Moo-hyun and 2008 vigils against U.S. beef importation. In examining candlelight vigils at different time points and stages of technological development, it considers both what changed and what has remained largely the same, while highlighting key agents and affordances and their interactions at each time period analyzed.