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From Streets to Screens: Understanding the EndSARS Movement and the new patterns of Protest in the Digital Age  <div> <br> </div>

Domain:

peace and security

Record type:

paper
Creator:
Ola
Publisher:
Elsevier BV
Host:
Digital technologies have been reshaping the structure, organization and strategies of modern day-today protest movements around the world. This study investigates the evolution of protest in context of Nigeria's EndSARS movement. The study was anchored on the Connective Action Theory with mixed research methods which included questionnaires, indepth interviews and key informant interviews with the study participants and stakeholders in Lagos State, Nigeria. Findings show that EndSars was a movement of the youth and a grassroots movement, with decentralised leadership, digital coordination, shared grievances and broad resource mobilization. Social media was found to be essential to the dissemination of information, identity construction, mobilisation for protest and international visibility, developing a hybrid protest structure that blended online activism and offline protest. The results, however, also show that digital platforms promoted the mobilisation and participation of citizens, but also posed questions of movement sustainability, leadership coordination, and the enacting of institutional change based on online activism. The study findings are that EndSARS is a new way of protesting beyond the traditional model into networked forms of collective action, using technology as a mobilisation tool and a forum to negotiate social change.

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