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Opportunities and Challenges of Analysing Twitter Content: A Comparison of the Occupation Movements in Spain, Greece and the United States

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Analyzing Social Media Data and Web Networks

Abstract

The year 2011 could well be remembered as a year marking the rebirth of protest politics on a global scale. Hundreds of thousands participated in protests against authoritarian regimes in what became known as the ‘Arab Spring’ while, in the Western world, large-scale protest campaigns shook European capitals like Madrid and Athens for months, inspiring thereafter thousands to occupy central squares in more than 200 American cities. The extensive use of digital media for organisation and mobilisation was a distinctive feature of the protest events and elicited much commentary and speculation about the political effectiveness and democratising potential of the Internet.

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Authors
  1. Gema García-Albacete
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  2. Yannis Theocharis
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Manchester, UK

    Marta Cantijoch

  2. University of Manchester, UK

    Rachel Gibson

  3. University of Salford, UK

    Stephen Ward

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© 2014 Gema García-Albacete and Yannis Theocharis

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García-Albacete, G., Theocharis, Y. (2014). Opportunities and Challenges of Analysing Twitter Content: A Comparison of the Occupation Movements in Spain, Greece and the United States. In: Cantijoch, M., Gibson, R., Ward, S. (eds) Analyzing Social Media Data and Web Networks. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137276773_6

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