Digital Networks and the Transformation of Civil Society

This book investigates the long-term impact of digital communication networks on civil society organizations, with a particular focus on Taksim Solidarity (TS), the broad-based coalition that emerged during the 2013 Gezi Park protests in Turkey.

Moving beyond the commonly studied short-term mobilization effects of social media, this study centres on what happens after the protests fade—a critical yet under-researched phase in the lifecycle of social movements. Drawing on a decade of empirical material, the author examines how digital platforms have influenced the cohesion, communication practices, and endurance of TS as a civic collective under growing authoritarian constraints. Key themes include digital fragmentation, online-offline disjuncture, the erosion of deliberative culture, and the challenges of maintaining activist infrastructures in the absence of continued mass mobilization. Through a mixed-methods approach – including social network analysis, discourse analysis, an original civil society survey, and in-depth interviews – the study provides a comprehensive account of TS’s transformation over the past ten years and leads to an understanding of whether and how digital networks help sustain collective action over time, particularly in hostile political environments.

Digital Networks and the Transformation of Civil Society is aimed at academics, researchers, and graduate-level students in the fields of political communication, digital activism, social movement studies, and Middle Eastern politics.