It is tempting to see the political protests sweeping the Middle East as "Facebook Revolutions"; to see the Internet as a force that galvanizes hundreds of thousands of young people into a new political force that breathes life into stolid authoritarian regimes. But the Internet is only part of the story. Good old-fashioned television is probably more important in turning political protests into mass movements.
Movements, however, are not revolutions, and whether the political upheavals in the Middle East come to constitute revolutions will be played out in the next six months. For the coming part of the drama, television has little role to play, and the Internet only a limited one. Despite all of the changes afoot, it will be hard to subvert conventional politics.
Facebook and Twitter have certainly played a role. In Egypt, groups such as the April 6 Movement and "We Are all Khaled Said" allowed young people to share ideas and for some to emerge as leaders. In societies in which authorities monitored independent thinkers and distrusted intellectual entrepreneurship, Internet technologies allowed the young and techno-savvy to develop ideas and build online constituencies. Young people used the Internet to network and to plan protests. With hundreds of thousands of followers, they were able to draw several hundred into the street.
Several hundred does not a revolution make, however. In Egypt, the Kifaya movement was able to draw hundreds to protests for years but ultimately fizzled out. Onlookers stared at what they perceived to be rich kids in t-shirts and jeans, and they felt no stake in their battles. In Bahrain, sectarian protesters had taken to the streets for years, although they failed to become a mass movement. The protesters were an aberration, not the mainstream.
Two things changed. The first is that the leaders of the protests emphasized economic discontent, striking a chord that resonated with the broader public. While many of the protests' organizers were deeply politicized, the public was not. It cared about pocketbook issues more than elections; it cared about improving outcomes more than the method of doing so. Yet, the protesters and the masses agreed on one big thing-the current political leadership was failing and needed to be replaced. That agreement was enough to swell the ranks of protesters from the hundreds to the thousands.
But thousands are not millions. To bring millions into the street required a second change: television.
Television?
It had been around for more than four decades, and it had not provoked political change. While satellite television began to erode states' information monopoly in the late 1990s, almost a decade and a half of al-Jazeera and its imitators did little to bring protesters into the streets.
Some even argued that political debates on television depressed political activity because they gave a safe outlet for political speech without actually involving any action by the viewer. Television is, by its nature, passive, and the passivity of television's huge audiences seemed to reinforce the notion of television as inert.
Yet, from the early days of the protests in Tunisia, then Egypt, then Bahrain and then Libya, television was transformative. Television brought the actions of thousands to audiences of millions. Censorship of years past would have allowed isolated protests to stay isolated.
The rise of regional television stations undermined censorship and now every local protest was potential national-and international-news.
Day in and day out, broadcasts of the protests helped articulate widespread grievances and give a sense of urgency to an entire nation of viewers. Within weeks, in both Tunisia and Egypt, the army stepped in and removed aging political leaders who seemed hopelessly out of touch.
Even more important, television helped frame the region's events, describing them early on as revolutions and giving them a historical weight that they had not yet earned. Constantly broadcasting the judgment that revolutions were underway became self-fulfilling, as participants and audiences alike felt a part of a single community that was changing history. Al-Jazeera's English broadcasts helped bring along Western policy communities as well, simultaneously engaging these communities in the struggles and reassuring them that change was compatible with Western interests. For weeks on end, al-Jazeera provided a steady diet of emotional analysis, relying on tight crowd shots and generously judging the size of protests. Western channels raced to catch up. The protests made good television; the good television made good history.
This sense of history unfolding spread the protests well beyond where they fed on the interaction between the Internet and television. In countries such as Libya and Yemen, with relatively low Internet access and even less social networking, people took to the streets as well. In these places, the impact of television was even more profound, playing the role of providing the spark and coaxing it into a flame.
And still, the Arab world has not yet seen a popular revolution. For these revolts to prove themselves as such, they need not only to displace the status quo, but also to replace it with something fundamentally different. Doing so requires coordinating priorities and integrating agendas. It requires committees and compromises. For all of the difficulty of dislodging authoritarians who ruled for decades, ensuring the survival of the democratic order that the activists seek is far harder.
It is a struggle that is pointedly bad for television.
Television is a medium that prefers clear narratives and graphic pictures. It is the perfect medium for taking to the streets, for broadcasting graffiti and placards, for showing the bankruptcy of a system that dispatches thugs on camels to beat back peaceful protesters. Television favors drama.
The drama unfolding in the Arab world now, however, is excruciating to watch on television. It is textual, the story lines are muddled, and there are no dramatic pictures. In a world with 700 free-to-air Arab satellite channels, it cannot compete.
The irony is that what we are coming upon now is the moment that the media helped enable, and the moment that truly matters. Yet, it will also be the most difficult to track.
The Internet can play some role creating a broader debate, but access remains sketchy for large segments of the population. We have not yet entered the era of postmodern politics. Getting support for change requires field operations, committees and compromises. It requires good old-fashioned politics.
The revolt was televised, but the revolution cannot be. Mass media can help create the conditions for a revolution, but it cannot accomplish one. Only political leaders can do that.
