The Global Digital Activism Data Set (GDADS) will be a coded list
of digital activism cases from around the world, created as an open resource to scholars.
On this page you can download a free copy of the codebook and case study list and read our FAQ. Also check out infographics of the 1,200+ digital activism cases from over 140 countries that we have collected in this slideshow:
Downloads
File:Case Study List
Format: Excel (.xls)
Date: June 2, 2011
Cases: 1,240
File: Codebook
Format: PDF
Date: October 3, 2011
Pages: 41
Current Needs
Volunteers: We are currently looking for coders to help us analyze the 1,000+ cases in our database. To volunteer to assist with this task, please contact Mary AT Meta-Activism DOT org. (June, 2011)
FAQ
Who is making the data set and who can use it? This is an open initiative, where the data set will be created mainly by volunteers. To volunteer to be part of this project, email contact AT meta-activism DOT org. The final data set will be available under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license to allow maximum dissemination of the results.
What types of case studies are included? In order to make the data set useful to the widest array of scholars and activists, we are defining the parameter very broadly to be:
1) Any instance in which digital technology is used in a campaign for social or political change that is initiated by citizens, either as individuals or through a nonprofit organization.
2) Any instance in which citizens use digital technology to create or alter a public discussion of social and political change issues.
The reason for the second criterion is that what is political action differs from country to country, depending on the level of political freedom. Writing a blog post about the importance of elections does not challenge the status quo in the UK, but it is radical political speech in China. The goal is to include as much information in the data set as possible and then for scholars to extract from the data set the cases and variables that are useful to their own work.
What types of sources are being used? Because case studies of digital activism come from the popular press and citizen journalism as well as traditional peer-reviewed academic journals, we are adopting the relatively open Wikipedia standard for verifiability of sources : the information in the case study should be sourced from “reliable, third-party (independent), published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy.” (more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability). While some cases are submitted individually to the data set, we are finding many caches that contain large numbers of cases that have already been created by other organizations in the fields of digital activism capacity-building and citizen media. Our principal sources so far have been Global Voices, Tactical Technology Collective, DigiActive, MobileActive, and FrontlineSMS. See the info-graphic below for more detail on our sources:
What is your methodology? The data set will be created in 3 steps:
1) Collection of Case Studies: We began by collecting digital activism case studies using a broad inclusion criterion (see above) and referencing pre-existing caches of case studies, many of which were created by online sources (see info-graphic above).
2) Codebook Creation: Our next task was to create a codebook of variable definitions which we could use to analyze and create comparable data across cases. This task took several months of writing, testing, and refining with our super-coders. The current codebook includes 72 variables for each case with include data on time, geography, actor, digital tools used, and strategy. We hope to make the codebook itself available shortly.
3) Coding of Case Studies: Once we have a usable number of case studies, we will begin a call for coders. Anyone can volunteer to code a case study. Each coder will be given basic information about the case (title, year, country, sources) and 30 days to read those sources and submit the data through a second form. If you are interested in being a coder, please submit your name and email address to contact AT meta-activism DOT org so you can be contacted when this phase begins.
Project Team
Mary Joyce is Project Manager of GDADS and Founder of the Meta-Activism Project. You can email her at Mary AT meta-activism DOT org.
António Rosas is the GDADS Research Coordinator. He has a Ph.D. in Political Science and is the co-editor of Cidadania Digital (in Portuguese). You can email him at Antonio AT meta-activism DOT org.
Chris Evans is GDADS Project Advisor and has been closely involved in the creation and testing of the codebook. She is an Associate Research Specialist at the Civic Engagement Research Group at Mills College.
Abdulmajeed is a Coder and is on the Case Study Collection team that assembled the GDADS case study list. He is a digital activist and journalist.
Brannon Cullum is on the Case Study Collection team that assembled the GDADS case study list. She is a graduate of the Communication, Culture & Technology program at Georgetown University.
Fabienne Der Hagopian is on the Case Study Collection team that assembled the GDADS case study list. He is a contributor to the French version of the citizen media site Global Voices Online.
Marietta Le is a Coder and is on the Case Study Collection team that assembled the GDADS case study list. Based in Budapest, she is a contributor to the citizen media site Global Voices Online.
Amanda Lloyd is a paid Super-Coder whose time is made possible through the generosity of the MacArthur Foundation and Ethan Zuckerman. She is a recent graduate from Mills College.
Joey Mornin is a paid Super-Coder whose time is made possible through the generosity of the MacArthur Foundation and Ethan Zuckerman. Based in Boston, he is also a researcher at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society and Online Director at Fix Congress First.
Anas Qtiesh is a paid Super-Coder whose time is made possible through the generosity of the MacArthur Foundation and Ethan Zuckerman. He is a Syrian blogger based in San Francisco.
Nabiha Syed is a Coder. She was a student fellow of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School, and is currently at Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar.
Susannah Vila is on the Case Study Collection team that assembled the GDADS case study list. She is Director of Content and Outreach at Movements.org.
We would also like to thank the following people for their help: Erica Chenoweth, Jack Duvall, Jennifer Earl, Chris Evans, David Faris, William Gamson, Doug McAdam, Patrick Meier, Hardy Merriman, John McCarthy, Dieter Rucht, Susan Olzak, José Manuel Robles, Clay Shirky, Sarah Soule, Christina Spiesel, Aaron Shaw, Lokman Tsui, and Ethan Zuckerman
Contact
How can I learn more or get involved? Email Project Manager Mary Joyce at Mary AT meta-activism DOT org.
