Dijital Diasporalar ve Ulusötesi Aktivizm: Sınırları Aşan Siyasal Eyleyiciliği Yeniden Düşünmek
Karadeniz Teknik Üniversitesi 9.Siyaset Bilimi ve Uluslararası ilişkiler Kongresi, Trabzon, Türkiye, 21 - 23 Ekim 2026, ss.49, (Özet Bildiri)
- Yayın Türü: Bildiri / Özet Bildiri
- Basıldığı Şehir: Trabzon
- Basıldığı Ülke: Türkiye
- Sayfa Sayıları: ss.49
- Ankara Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
Digital technologies have changed the ways in which diasporic communities maintain connections to their countries of origin and engage in transnational political life. Social media, encrypted messaging applications, and other digital platforms facilitate diaspora communities’ ability to sustain social and cultural ties, as well as to exchange political information, coordinate collective action, mobilize resources, and engage in debates at the local and international levels (Brinkerhoff, 2009; Diminescu & Loveluck, 2014; Smets, 2019). In this sense, digital spaces have increasingly become important in understanding how diasporas exercise political agency beyond the territorial boundaries of states.
This study explores how digital diasporas engage in transnational activism and how digital platforms shape the possibilities and constraints of such engagement. It explores how diasporic actors use social media and other networked technologies to build solidarity, maintain collective identities, respond to political occurrences in their countries of origin, and bring homeland-related issues to wider audiences around the globe. Bennett and Segerberg (2013) argue that these practices can take various forms, such as online protest, hashtag activism, fundraising, humanitarian aid, digital lobbying, and public diplomacy. Instead of viewing diasporas simply as supporters of the political movements in their countries of origin, the presentation considers them as transnational political actors who can connect local struggles with wider political and international debates.
At the same time, digital connectivity does not automatically lead to greater political freedom. The same platforms that enable diasporic communities to organize and have their voices heard can also expose them to surveillance, harassment, disinformation, and other forms of transnational repression. According to Moss (2016) authoritarian states are expanding their political control outside of their territorial borders through digital technologies by monitoring and targeting dissidents and diaspora communities. This results in a central tension: digital platforms enable and reveal diasporic political participation, and they expose and render political actors vulnerable. The study draws on insights from migration studies, media sociology, and international relations to argue that digital diasporic political agency is shaped by what diasporic actors choose to do but also by the digital infrastructures and political environments within which they act. Digital technologies can help diasporas build networks, mobilize support, and connect local political struggles to global audiences. At the same time, they can reproduce new forms of surveillance, inequality, and political vulnerability. Understanding this tension is key to understanding the changing relationship between diaspora, technology, and transnational political activism.