社交媒体在“阿拉伯之春”中的作用辨析

Social Media's role in Arab Spring:A Retrospective Analysis

社交媒体具有开放、自由的特点,客观上具有销蚀传统民族国家权威的效果,易被各种政治势力藉由言论自由的名义利用。在"阿拉伯之春"的某些关键进程中,社交媒体不自觉地扮演了促进和加速社会革命的作用,但这种作用不具有主导性,也不尽是西方"颜色革命"主动塑造的结果,其效果发挥的程度和性质取决于当时具体的政治和社会条件。"阿拉伯之春"的爆发是当地治理结构矛盾长期积累的结果,反映了中东地区秩序调整和社会转型的总体要求。政治先于媒体,地区社会转型为社交媒体广泛应用创造了条件,此前发生的民主化改造和美国战略转移等历史事件更预设了社交媒体在"阿拉伯之春"中的政治角色。

Featuring transnational networking and post-national grievances, social media are widely believed to have the potentials to undermine the authority of a traditional nation state, and thus are susceptible to political manipulation and conspiracy fantasies. Social media played a role of catalyst at some critical junctures during the course of Arab Spring, but the nature and extent of the effects it played was rather decided by its social and political context than orchestrated by the West to stage a color revolution. Politics always goes before media. Precedent events like regional democratic transformation and American strategic pivoting etc., not only made the boosting of social media possible but also defined its role way before Arab Spring set in