Social Classes and Digital Activism

Bianca Mitu

doi:10.3390/isis-summit-vienna-2015-s3011

Abstract

Social Classes and Digital Activism

Highlights

Based on Marx’s pyramid of capitalist system, this article outlines some of the contemporary approaches of the digital activism and elaborates a critique of these approaches
The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it
If we apply this to the ongoing debates about the development of the internet and internet use, we are facing the situation of the ruling classes that decide over the working classes

Summary

Introduction

Based on Marx’s pyramid of capitalist system, this article outlines some of the contemporary approaches of the digital activism and elaborates a critique of these approaches. Marx and Engels (1970) state that “the ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. According to the statistics (http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm, 2014) the people from richer countries are the ones that are able to participate in digital activism, as Mary Joyce states: ”people in richer 2 countries are usually more able to participate in digital activism because of the cost and quality of Internet connections available to them” (2010: 3).

Results

Conclusion